Quickly rising to reach more than a million views on X alone, a viral video purporting to feature actual MAGA voters going through extensive mental contortions to justify their Trump support is being widely shared and inviting a comment pile-on from those who never really disagreed with Hillary Clinton about who the “deplorables” are.
Unknowingly answering to facts about Donald Trump in a series of trick questions, the three Trump loyalists featured appear to perfectly demonstrate the less-talked-about MAGA strain of Trump Derangement Syndrome — that is, one in which any fact can be twisted enough or contextualized enough to favor the former President.
Literally the dumbest people in the country. pic.twitter.com/bAYsU181u4
— Scott Smith, MSW #BLM (@Canaansdad1987) September 8, 2024
Wikipedia notes that Trump derangement syndrome (TDS) “is a pejorative term, usually for criticism or negative reactions to former United States president Donald Trump that are perceived to be irrational and to have little regard towards Trump’s actual policy positions, or actions undertaken by his administration.”
On the other side, the video seeks to display behavior that supports with the notion that a certain segment of MAGA voters behave, when it comes to Trump like cult members.
Notably in the way that — in a Psychiatric Times review of Steven Hassan’s The Cult of Trump: A Leading Cult Expert Explains How the President Uses Mind Control, reviewer H. Steven Moffic, MD, explains — “all cults have something in common. They strip away freedom of thought and realign ideas with those of the leader.”