I know, I know---I'm old and I am certainly not a psychiatrist. I am totally unqualified to

[Atticus]

diagnose just what specific mental illnesses afflict Republicans like Cawthorn, Taylor-Greene, Gaetz and Boebert, so I am left to use an old-fashioned non-medical term to describe these folks.

They are "nuts"--- people not to be believed, trusted or dealt with in unsecured situations. I fully support their being treated humanely by mental health professionals, but I do not support the pretense that they are "normal" and can be treated as such.

They're nuts.

[Stuart G]

1. I will add one idea..."Not Just any Nuts, But "Poisoned Nuts"

[vlyons]

2. I would ask how were they brought up?

Were they raised in a barn? Didn't their parents love them enough to teach them any social skills? Or any self control over their speech and behavior? Was there no discipline in the home?

Maybe one or both parents were drunks and habitually acted out anger. Maybe there was daily name calling and put-downs and belittlements? Perhaps constant neglect that caused them to be outrageous to get attention.

[Walleye]

7. I think you're onto something. Drunken abusive parents.

I assume some of these nuts were brought up in loving household but I’ve always blamed a lot of it on lack of early training. I know I learned my empathy when my mom took me aside and said “how would you feel if somebody did that to you” that’s where it comes from. When they say endowed by your creator, I say fine my creator was my mom. Of course any other responsible adult or parent can fill the role

[viva la]

30. I bet no matter what the socioeconomic situation at these people's home:

instead of " “how would you feel if somebody did that to you” (empathy), someone was telling them "do it to them before they can do it to you!"

All of them have that belligerent attitude that makes others into enemies and targets.

[Walleye]

31. Wow, that's a pretty clear-eyed explanation. Sad but true

[vlyons]

37. Yeah maybe they grew up under the influence of bullies

nt

[viva la]

8. Boebert came from a bad situation

She had a teen mom, father (supposedly a pro wrestler!) refusing responsibility, welfare... was on Jerry springer or Phil Donahue show with mom about how she too wanted to be a teen mom, dropped out of high school...

Married the guy who shoved his dck to her and her friends at the bowling alley. She has the sort of life story that you'd read in those old True Confessions magazines. .

And she's all hobknobby with spoiled rich assets Gaetz. United by sexual dysfunction?

[IcyPeas]

45. this is lauren boebert's mother on the left

Link to tweet

[llmart]

16. I do believe your explanation is probably the most accurate.

The only thing I would add is that often times it wasn't that there was no discipline in the home, but there was discipline of the abusive type. But if your meaning of discipline was more along the lines of disciplining with kindness and caring, then I agree. I grew up in a home where discipline was abusive. I raised my two children with discipline of caring and kindness. I would never allow name calling in my home when raising my children. I never had to hit them, raise my voice. In my experience, the "discipline" that was most effective for me was telling them that I was disappointed in them for whatever they might have done that wasn't acceptable behavior. Most children just really want their parent's approval.

[XacerbatedDem]

27. You sound like my mom. Her acceptance and understanding, caring and kindness

was something I will always cherish 'til the day I die.

[llmart]

32. Aww...thank you for that.

I hope she knows/knew how you felt about her. My son has often told me how grateful he always was for how I raised him. Not so sure my daughter is as complimentary. If she feels that way, she has never been able to bring herself to actually say it to me. I think it's sad that some people just don't realize how important it is to say the things you should before you no longer can. My mother died when I was 17 and I never got to say all the things I wanted to say to her or ask her more about her own life as a younger person. Teenagers are usually pretty self-involved and think their parents will always be there. I have always wished I could have one day with her as an adult now that I know how difficult it is to go through the rest of your life without parents.

[XacerbatedDem]

35. Yes, I told her how much I loved her and thanked her for taking such good care of me before I left..

... to move out west. I was out west for four years and when I came back, I found out she had passed away 2 years earlier. I was so mad at my relatives for not letting me know sooner, but let it go, as to find out she was gone was so devastating. She developed Alzheimer's and from what I learned hardly remembered anyone toward the end.

She was an amazing woman. She had a dozen kids with my father. I was number 11. We lost our father when I was five years old due to an out break of hepatitis that swept through our city. But she was so strong, she raised us with even more love as the days moved on. She was a nurse by trade, I'm proud to say, and in our family, she inspired my oldest brother to be a doctor, and 3 of my brothers and sisters to follower her example. I remember she use to knit almost all the time once she retired, and later on started painting after watching that painter on PBS, I forget his name. I still have 5 of her paintings on my wall.

I miss her so much. When I finally got to visit her grave, I just laid down on top of it and cried, much like I'm doing now. She will always live on inside me, a part of me I will always cherish forever.

[vlyons]

38. I was thinking more of teaching self-discipline

Not spankings and beatings, but sit on the naughty chair for an age appropriate time, calm yourself down, and think about what you could have done differently so that Kevin wouldn't wreck your favorite toy.

[Backseat Driver]

34. I'd would also add that religious fundamentalism covers a wide variety of

of "sins" regarding parental abuse and/or neglect right alongside the traumatically changed and/or the sick dysfunctional home, in which autonomous boundaries of the individual/child may be upended as the perfectly "righteous" play the parental god or mentor, leaning increasingly on cruel physical and/or emotional wrath in speech or deed that creates crazymaking fear--the best controls by which to damage, subdue, and subjugate.

[Phoenix61]

3. It's not a mental health condition.

They are over-indulged, self-entitled, whiney assholes who shouldn’t be in charge of changing out the empty rolls of toilet paper in a bus station bathroom.

[viva la]

4. And somehow gop and their voters...

Choose the nuts everytime.

They wouldn't hire these nuts to pet-sit, but they trust them with their country?

[Rebl2]

12. Apparently

they can relate to them I guess. Several, I think, live the same type lifestyle as MGT and Boebert, etc

[Mr.Bill]

46. They vote for them

because they know it pisses us off. They aren't capable of making any judgement about whether they should be a member of Congress or not. Five or ten years ago they probably didn't even know their congressman's name.

These are the people who when they were kids, would break windows just to hear the sound.

[Cyrano]

5. And they are also a danger to our government

[WhiskeyGrinder]

6. Just because they're cruel and irrational doesn't mean they have a mental health issue.

Pathologizing their behavior is ableist and hurts people who actually have mental health issues.

[Atticus]

44. Bless your heart! nt

[riversedge]

9. and nutty folks certainly DO NOT BELONG IN CONGRESS

[Ocelot II]

10. Mad or bad?

I'm going with bad. Personality disorders, which seem to be abundant with these folks, might be categorized as a sort of mental illness - at least they're included in DSM-V and its predecessors - but people with personality disorders like narcissism have agency in the sense that they can choose how to behave, unlike a person with schizophrenia. Narcissists can be harmless but irritating pains in the ass like my SIL, or they can be dangerous ghouls like the above-mentioned dingbats (and, of course, TFG). Normal >>>>> mentally ill is clearly a continuum. Personality disorders are somewhere in the middle. These characters are not mentally ill in the sense that therapy would do them any good (a lot of mental health professionals think NPD isn't treatable), but they aren't normal. They're what those of us in other professions might call "assholes."

[ashredux]

11. Nuts? Ok...but I prefer Evil

[dalton99a]

13. They are evil assholes.

[jaxexpat]

14. It's no great stretch to qualify their "illness" as lethal.

They're so fond of capital punishment, maybe they need a first hand experience. The Oklahoma city bomber went that way and it could be argued his death count is much less than the cretins' body count.

[KS Toronado]

15. Is power hungry a mental illness?

Needing to be the center of attention might be.

[ancianita]

17. They are cases of arrested development, are oppositional defiant; they think that's politics.

Of course they're nuts. They're high school. And because 70% of Americans walk around with no more than a high school diploma, they gravitate to a politics they're familiar with. They're "normal" in a high school teen-drama context, not in the context of democratic governance.

I'm sick and tired of the adulting the House has to do in spite of them -- they should be seen as a virus to be quarantined -- all of that while conducting the People's business.

[usonian]

18. I read a bunch about cults, and to make it short:

Mostly a repeat of some of my posts.

Cult/QAnon behavior is a small percent. They are hard-core psychopaths and sociopaths beyond logic, basically projecting all their problems on everyone else.

My opinion is that through declining relevance, repub politicians have aligned with tycoons and devangelicals with the unifying force of racism, in a mass denial, similar to the hardcore cult but not as deranged. Small consolation. To the extent that apocalyptic thinking leads people to think that "blowing everything up" is compensation for losing an argument, they are dangerous.

One can "judge" by the signs: (so this is by analogy. I am not a psychologist)

Maga is a cult, and cults trap you in ways similar to ways that addiction does.

When you compare the manifestations and mechanisms, they are remarkably similar.

They have no problem with lies and contradictions as long as the group/addiction are served.

They both shut out anything that does not reinforce the group/addiction, and project members' failings onto others.

They both work on the "old brain"/limbic system.

And one escapes often by "hitting rock bottom", when the lies and contradictions are overwhelming, or through outside acts of kindness (which can be rejected repeatedly until they aren't)

The hope is that enough people come to their senses to tip close races.

Elections seem to be won "at the edge"
https://democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=16589262

Professionals are invited to critique, but what we can do is message the self-destructive nature of the cult and the wacky projection in the sense of "Every accusation is a confession."
More at the link above.

The completely unhinged behavior is a deliberate distraction, as were many of the participants on Jan 6. Don't let it sap your mental and GOTV energy.

[Hotler]

21. What manifest the hate?

Does the hate drive create the mental illness or, does the illness create the hate?

[usonian]

33. My guess

is that most of the behavior we are seeing is projection. (standard disclaimer applies)

People who are self-confident and who feel empowered to solve problems don't hate.

I read "When Society Becomes an Addict" by Anne Wilson Schaef before all this, and bells started ringing, boxes were being checked.

Here are a few topics that should sound all too familiar:
Self-Centeredness
Crisis-orientation
Depression
Stress
Dishonesty
Confusion
Denial
Negativity
Defensiveness
Responsibility and Blame
Ethical Deterioration
Fear

OUCH!

In a practical sense, watch out for the cold-blooded!!
Hate is the tool they use to manipulate people into doing their bidding in a blind, self-destructive way.
And that's why the they use racism.

I didn't realize how relevant this image is to the current discussion: "how to stop a raging elephant"!
Not by competing with its powerful rage, but by showing how self-destructive the rage is.

[Septua]

19. Your right, they are nuts.

Internet psychologists and psychiatrists diagnosed Trump early on with all his conditions, including but not limited to:

narcissism: excessive interest in or admiration of oneself and one's physical appearance

opportunism: the taking of opportunities as and when they arise, regardless of planning or principle.

egomania: obsessive preoccupation with one's self and applies to someone who follows their own ungoverned impulses and is possessed by delusions of personal greatness and feels a lack of appreciation.

egocentrism: inability to understand that another person's view or opinion may be different than their own.

If one reflects on the nutty Cawthorn, MTG types' antics, the same mentality disorders are apparent.

One can only conclude the people who vote for them are afflicted with similar disorders.

[Irish_Dem]

20. Ruthless sociopaths, narcissistic personality disorders.

Some of them are into drama, histrionic personality disorders.

[Hugin]

22. After copious amounts of thinkering...

I’ve finally concluded what we are experiencing with these dysfunctional tools is actually a symptom of a far larger and dangerous malfunction of society.

A lazy press.

If you look deeply, what all of these oddities have in common is a very loud mouth reliably saying outrageous shit paired with a lack of any sort of moral filter. I shall coin the term of “social Tourettes” to describe them. (Soon to appear in the DSM)

At the same time they personally never DO anything. Especially anything which would threaten the status quo other than confirm the zeitgeist that all politicians are worthless.

The role the press plays in this cycle of dystopian dysfunction with their laziness is it is so much cheaper and easier to look up the latest tweet from one of these morons or hold a microphone in front of them to generate click revenue than to actually research and report on almost any real news.

People doing things in the public interest such as governing has been deemed boring by someone somewhere.

[Septua]

36. I assume you refer to the Fox style variety press...

..but disagree it's 'lazy'. It's IS popular with the nut cases supporting the Trump cult but Fox supplies it for the ratings...

[Hugin]

40. Of course...

Sadly the business model has become pervasive because legitimate and responsible news sources simply can’t compete with the foxesque carnival steam organ.

[Texin]

24. Well, how 'bout Malignant Narcissists?

Works for me.

[Texin]

25. Well, how 'bout Malignant Narcissists?

Works for me.

[LaMouffette]

26. I don't know their childhood environment, but seems to me all four must have been overindulged,

spoiled, and raised to believe they are superior to most other people. The result: a debilitating lack of empathy toward others, displayed through behavior reflecting a staggeringly narrow-minded meanness.

Just like their god: Traitor Trump.

[Enoki33]

28. Stupid nuts seems appropriate.

[2Gingersnaps]

29. Mental Health care has never had parity with Physical Health care, and in our "You're on your own"

"pull yourself up by your bootstraps" "suck it up and walk it off, Nancy" society-we are going backwards, not forwards.

The libertarian wet dream is upon us, a civil society with no personal responsibility to contribute to the common good remains just how civil? People who are not paid enough for their labor to pay rent or buy groceries "just don't want to work." Power does not come from the mind with an education, it comes with a gun anyone can get. The needs of the few outweigh the needs of the many and they can't stay unimaginably wealthy and fly to Venus and build an outpost on Mars if equal justice under the law applies to just anybody. You can't raise a rose in bad soil, wrong temperatures, inadequate moisture-but anyone with functional biological parts can give life and raise a functional adult no matter the environment in which they are raised. What could go wrong?

[Evergreen Emerald]

39. They are smart and know what they are doing

They are attempting to undermine the institutions of government to destroy our democracy and maintain power. They cater to the uneducated, racist, small minded haters who support them. They raise taxes on their supporters who wear the t-shirts praising Putin, while cutting taxes for the oligarchs.

Previously their actions were behind closed doors, in the dark of night. But now they just spew the ugly loudly from the rooftops. They could shoot someone on 5th avenue and have no consequences. They could organize and carry out an attempted insurrection, and have no consequences.

Their actions appear stupid. But the vast right wing conspiracy is moving forward.

[Faux pas]

41. I

call them sub humans. That is all.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

42. Two books, Atticus.

Escape From Freedom, by Erich Fromm

Assholes- A Theory, by Aaron James

It is not considered ethical to diagnose an individual based merely upon their public presentation and without a formal evaluation and there are good reasons for that ethical principle.

That being said, all the people you listed above, and many others who have poisoned our political discourse over recent decades exhibit strong narcissistic traits and could quite likely, in the proper setting be diagnosed formally with that personality disorder. The hallmarks of narcissism are a glaring lack of empathy for others, as well as a (sometimes grossly) inflated sense of self. Observing these people in daily life, we tend to categorize them as “assholes”. The person who parks in two slots in a crowded parking lot, the one who runs a waiter ragged, then stiffs them because there was too much ice in the iced tea…

Personality Disorders ARE mental disorders; they are described in the DSM. They are differentiated though by the fact that they are notoriously resistant to treatment, whether through medication or therapy. This is partly due to their “ego syntonic” nature, whereby the person afflicted with the disorder is not conscious of its presence. Other disorders such as anxiety and depression, bipolar disorder and even schizophrenia are largely “ego dystonic”, whereby the person suffering is aware that something is not right and help is needed.

Personality disorders are crippling. They don’t engender a lot of sympathy in others, as their distorted view of self and others frequently leads to isolation and a trail of pathological, ruined relationships and sometimes, more frequently in the case of antisocial personality disorder, to incarceration. Their lack of consideration and empathy is repulsive. They don’t perceive that something is wrong inside. They project their malfunctioning onto others. Their actions engender resentment and “hitting back” by the people they affect, but they have little capacity to thoughtfully self-evaluate and adjust their behavior when this happens. In the case of narcissists, they are assholes, unaware of their assholery and believing the people around them to be the true assholes.

The narcissist is a perfect subject for authoritarianism and fascism, as their lack of empathy is easily strengthened into cruelty. Their endless thirst for praise and admiration is fed by the fascist narrative of the deserving “hero” overcoming the undeserving “other”. Fromm’s book covers this pretty well. It was written during WWll and dealt with the question of Nazism, but it’s still relevant today, IMO.

[LiberalFighter]

43. There are two considerations.

1) We see more nuts on social media than we would if it wasn't around.

2) There are 80 million more people than there were in 1990. A 25% increase.

[jimlup]

47. They are suffering from Republican derangement syndrome

It should be classified as a mental illness but in our current reality it is not. That is our problem because the majority of the electorate are not paying attention and can't tell the difference between crazy and "we are trying everything we know to help you."

The press says we need to work on messaging. I say we need to work on educating.