One of the greatest ironies of the train wreck Trump presidency is how conservatives have eagerly embraced previously despised attributes of liberals. After years of decrying political correctness, micro-aggressions and trigger warnings, we now have a president who thinks he is a special snowflake.
What’s a special snowflake?
[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Trump allows himself to be emasculated by Bannon and Putin because of his desperate need for flattery. [/pullquote]
According to the LA Times, a special snowflake is typically a millennial:
… who has been raised to see herself and her experiences as unique and therefore demanding of heightened levels of sensitivity and respect…
According to the stereotype, snowflakes drive professors crazy by recoiling at emotionally charged reading material and drive their bosses crazy by chafing at the concept of an office hierarchy. They can’t tell the difference between an awkward social interaction and a microaggression.
Sound familiar?
President Snowflake sees himself as special and not bound by the usual rules of social interaction. He finds facts intolerable, interprets every bit of criticism as a micro-aggression and is obsessed with the way the world views him.
President Snowflake’s actions, which are inexplicable to most mature adults, and virtually unprecedented in any government official who wishes to be taken seriously, make perfect sense when viewed from the prism of his heightened sense of both self-regard and grievance.
True, Trump is not a millennial. He came by his special snowflake status the old fashioned way: he had a rich father. Money is what initially gave Trump the conviction that he is deserving of special accommodations and his belief that rules are for other people not for him.
By accounts of many people who have known him throughout his life, he has always been a bully. He is thin-skinned, narcissistic and incredibly vindictive. Those traits have metastasized to full blown snowflake status.
He cannot tolerate facts he doesn’t like so he skips intelligence briefings; he cannot tolerate criticism so he surrounds himself with flunky losers like Sean Spicer and Kelly-Anne Conway; he is easy prey for anyone who flatters him, like Steve Bannon despite the fact that Bannon has made him look stupider, clumsier and even more obnoxious that he already looked. That also explains his avidity for Vladimir Putin who has played him like a fiddle. Trump may have committed outright treason because Putin, one of the greatest threats to humanity, has made him feel good about himself.
Trump consistently retreats to lies that his enablers sugarcoat as “alternative facts.” Partly that’s because lies are essential to any authoritarian state and Trump dreams of being a tin-pot dictator. But I suspect that like most special snowflakes, he prefers to see the world as he imagines it should be rather than the way it is.
His obsession with Saturday Night Live parodies, individual reporters, and individual media outlets stems from his belief that anything that make him feel bad is an aggression that must be punished. Most politicians, when parodied on SNL take it as a sign that they have “arrived.” Trump, in contrast, evinces no understanding that this is part of the job of any president nor any understanding that it is his own words and personal behavior that make every parody so scathing.
Trump is such a special snowflake that he cannot tolerate disagreement of any kind. When Assistant Attorney General Sally Yates refused to implement his unconstitutional Muslim ban, he characterized it as a “betrayal.” When Federal judges blocked him, he attempted to defy them. When another Federal judge upheld a lower court ruling Trump demeaned him as a “so called” judge and sought to blame him for future terrorist attacks.
Trump’s attempts to muzzle the press by accusing them of lying — despite a complete lack of evidence — and his efforts to punish CNN in particular are political correctness of the highest order, just right wing correctness, not left wing correctness. Trump is triggered by the truth, but no warning is adequate; the truth must be abolished altogether.
The ultimate irony is that Trump is everything that he professes to despise. He is an ignorant, incompetent loser, a small man who appears even smaller in the awesome job of president. And he allows himself to be emasculated by Bannon and Putin because of his desperate need for flattery.
He is President Snowflake, endlessly tweeting his hostility to laws, people and even facts that bruise his fragile ego.
Found this today: https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/c3e20c6a0d7309b88e495c460288bb71c78eda3596f8040fcaa59791dfb2c283.jpg
So anyway vickey sorenson was sentenced to six months for manslaughter because of her involvement in a home birth fatality. Theres abortion restrictions and pp defunding. Stuff relevant to obstetrics and homebirth is happening in the world. Idk if you need a new blog to talk about trump all the time or…?
Translation: You want Dr. Amy to stick to women’s topics.
Gotcha
I suspect it was a passive aggressive way to disagree with this post without getting in the line of fire.
In fairness, I don’t always read the posts about Trump, not because I disagree with them (in point of fact, I do agree, and bless her for saying it all), but because I don’t visit this site for political commentary. That being said, if the day’s topic doesn’t interest me for whatever reason, I just move on. It’s her blog, she can write what she wants. Also, Trump and his cabinet have outlined a number of agenda items that directly impact women’s obstetric health, so Trump commentary is by definition relevant to this site’s subject matter.
OT: http://www.wral.com/mom-angry-carrboro-day-care-worker-nursed-infant/16512331/
I’m glad the mom is pushing for some real consequences for the daycare worker; I’d lose my mind if someone did this to my kid.
That is so nasty. I’d be livid.
Ugh. I’ve always thought it kind of gross.
The mom provided the daycare with formula that the baby’s tummy could tolerate, right?
My sympathies to the baby; I’m lactose intolerant, and I can control it through selective diet. Thank God for Lactofree milk and cheese. I know EXACTLY how miserable the consequences are of accidentally getting some lactose into my system. :'( This poor infant had no say in the matter.
The mom worked at the day care just not in the baby room. She mentioned to the workers in the baby room that her son was constipated, when she dropped him off that day. One of the baby room teachers/workers asked if the mom wanted the teacher to breastfeed the baby to see if that would help. The mother said NO. The baby got sick later that day and the mom had to take him to the hospital. Apparently his lactose allergy symptoms kicked up, investigation of video of the daycare baby room revealed the day care worker breastfeeding the baby in question(Not her own baby) How DARE anyone do this especially after specifically being told NO!
That is a disturbing story.
Yup. In the past few months, conservatives have gone into fits of apoplexy over such offenses as insufficiently religious Starbucks cups, people wishing them happy holidays, SNL, and a Broadway show. They whine that there aren’t enough conservative professors at the best colleges and universities.
Well hopefully this means the best colleges and universities are only hiring the best and brightest professors.
Actually, it’s very interesting.
For example, it’s one thing that faculty in areas like poly sci or philosophy tend to be liberal, but even in hard sciences, the faculty are largely left-leaning.
And having been on dozens of faculty search committees, I can tell you, it’s not because of any bias toward that. In fact, that’s not something we discuss in faculty interviews. Shoot, we aren’t even allowed to talk about it, because it is not relevant to the responsibilities of the position.
The fact that we still end up hiring people that are largely left-leaning is always fascinating to me. A lot of it is probably due to the fact that a lot of faculty have been through Berkeley at one point, and so have had that influence on their lives. But in the end, a lot of the best scientists in the world are in Berkeley, so what should we do, not hire Berkeley alum in order to maintain a proper political balance? That sounds very not republican to me.
Then again, I haven’t seen any evidence of their political views in the classroom. Sure, when we talk science, we talk about climate change and make no hedges about whether it is occurring, but that is a scientific view, not political.
The only colleague I know that let anything political/religious in class was the old guy who used to start class with a prayer. For some reason, he never showed up on the lists of the “the most dangerous professors in America.”
The truth has a liberal bias…..
I’ve never seen conservatives with their knickers in a twist about the lack of liberal/leftist/socialist representation in the CEO and CFO class. Most of those executives are big donors to the Republican party. I’ll worry about the dearth of right-wingers in the academy when bleeding hearts like me are proportionally represented in the upper echelons of Wall Street, hedge funds, etc.
With the current definitions of left/right in the US, an even remotely scientific way of thinking puts you in the left camp by definition.
Going by what I’ve seen of academia in Germany and Australia, there are plenty of conservative (in the actual sense of the word) faculty, it’s just that they aren’t fact-averse and bigoted, which seems to be a requirement for “conservatives”.
LOL, yes:
“Hmm, I think there is compelling evidence for global climate change.”
“COMMIE TERRORIST!!!”
For example, it’s one thing that faculty in areas like poly sci or philosophy tend to be liberal, but even in hard sciences, the faculty are largely left-leaning.
Wouldn’t a large part of it be due to the poorer remuneration in academia compared to the private sector?
It might also be due to academics being on the top tier for intelligence.There were some studies published a while back – I don’t know how robust they were – that correlated liberalism with intelligence.
Insufficiently religious Starbucks cups? 😀 Do tell! ROFL
In 2015: http://www.adweek.com/digital/starbucks-brewing-up-drama-over-its-holiday-red-cups/
And last year: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/starbucks-green-cup-holiday-design-unity-twitter-politics_us_5819f0c1e4b01f610e3934d2
Seriously, Starbucks can’t ever design a new cup without it turning into a controversy.
LOL
“They whine that there aren’t enough conservative professors at the best colleges and universities.”
One of the best professors I had the pleasure of working with was an Orthodox Jewish rabbi. (Secular University of Manitoba, and I minored in religion from an academic standpoint).
Although he always wore a yarmulke that was visible, he didn’t shove his own religion down students’ throats, knew how to laugh at himself, and made classes fascinating because he was knowledgeable about many other religions besides his own. Grabbing the markers and going towards the whiteboard in the lecture hall, he’d say often, “Let’s get high on fumes.” (ie from the smelly markers)
May he rest in peace; he suffered from severe MS and was wheelchair-bound for most of his adult life. He died a number of years ago.
I have thought this very thing for the past two years. Every reason the conservative members of my family gave for liking Trump and/or disliking Obama sounds like a steaming pile of cognitive dissonance. (I will say that many close friends are conservatives and they saw through Trump from the beginning and voted against him. My family has been staunch defenders.) He really is everything he claims to hate, just like any bully.
Also…the title of this post kept making me think of President Snow from The Hunger Games. Please, God, no…
President Snow was at least smarter and more dignified.
Being just a smidge older than millenials, I know a fair few of them, only one or two have ever acted like the stereotype around me. We have an older term for that: spoiled brat.
During the primaries, I had a “conversation” with a millennial on a raw story article whose reason for Bernie HAVING to win the primary wasn’t because he could get the most votes…no…it was just because “THAT’S WHAT WE WANT!” (Meaning, millennials).
All that was missing was the foot stomping. I was like “Jesus…maybe that’s what you “want” but that’s not how elections work…get more people next time” he couldn’t understand that concept. He felt entitled to have the guy he wanted, simply because he…wanted it.
Well…I don’t want trump…does my desire win now? Because I really hope so….
Wow, that one’s definitely a brat
Bratzilla!
“We have an older term for that: spoiled brat.”
I was born in 1981, and I fully support this statement. I hope my children don’t turn into spoiled brats, and I’ll do my best to be a decent parent.
I don’t know why millenials get this bad rep, on a side note. They’ve had it super tough economically speaking.
Trump, however, fits the definition very well. Not just him. The Republicans too. They were just a bit circumspect in their flouting of rules.
I think to rationalize the fact we got screwed over by non-millennials. We weren’t responsible for the shitshow that culminated around 2008 but we were the ones that got hurt the most. I had just graduated college then paralegal school and had a kind of good job for a year before it was all ripped out from under me one day. To manage to stay afloat, I moved back to my hometown and lived with my parents while I got a job in the healthcare field that I had no education in to make minimum wage. No one was hiring barely experienced paralegals when they could get senior paralegals for the wage they would have paid a starting out one in the past. I worked a very hard job for very little pay, but I was one of those frowned upon people who lived with their parents. With student loans to pay back and other bills there was no way I could afford rent or even a savings account. I had friends who got further education just to buy some time knowing there was no way in hell they could get a job that could support them. But damn, if I don’t see some older person whining that we millennials are entitled brats who don’t know how to save our money or get a job.
yup. There are only so many jobs you can handle at once. Substitute teachers are paid a pittance. Even in 2004, the only subs I knew who lived alone were either retired teachers (and thus getting retirement pay) or working 3 jobs to make ends meet.
What was even sadder was that I got preference to unskilled minimum wage jobs because I had a degree. That left those without a degree in an even worse position.
The effing “quality movement” again; I am REQUIRED to have a master’s degree and 2 years clinical training to work in my field, but of course don’t have to paid commensurate with that education, because damn, that would COST MONEY, and we can’t spend MONEY, can we?
I think with that education, though, you can be president of the world!
Look, I wasn’t responsible for the shitshow in 2008 either. And I am not a millennial by any stretch. Putting age group against age group allows us not to notice that it was a group of rich entitled mainly white mainly men of varying ages that was responsible for the shitshow in 2008. The things that are happening to you are happening to ANYONE whose work becomes redundant or who chooses to change professions. Not just millennials. Trust me on this. And what is going spectacularly wrong in health care, as it has gone spectacularly wrong in business and education, is the so-called “quality movement” for which I also disclaim responsibility. People of like values cannot allow massive dissonance in values and worldview to be papered over as “normal generational misunderstanding.” There is a growing discrepancy between the very rich and the rest of us, and it benefits a very few people; those people also benefit from generational infighting rather than a unified look at the unsustainability of their approach to business.
Those rich white men were non-millennials by and large, PeggySue. I didn’t say other people outside of my generation didn’t suffer either. I didn’t place the blame on all non-millennials either. It was my opinion on why *some* people denigrate millennials. That’s my theory. This wasn’t about anything more.
Well, when you say “the fact that we got screwed over by non-millennials,” for some reason it is easy to think it was about something more. Silly me.
Sorry that I wasn’t clearer.
Trust me, you are NOT the ones “hurt most.”
There were people who are 20 years older than you who lost their jobs, homes, everything and didn’t have the luxury of time to start up again.
Youth is a wonderful thing (and I say this as someone who isn’t all that old…I’m only 38 myself).
You are right and I didn’t even realize until you pointed it out that I typed “hurt the most.” I am sorry for typing that phrase.
It’s not that Millennials were “hurt the most” so much as that the generation, as a whole, had a higher percentage of affected individuals, and that’s a very important distinction. The whole populations vs individuals thing.
The economy crashed, and people across all demographics lost a lot, but what
happened next was that the displaced workers of previous generations were all quite suddenly back on the market for jobs. There weren’t enough positions to even absorb all of them, nevermind the fresh graduates, and experience is a valuable commodity, making the older displaced workers better candidates for open positions, and so of course they snapped up the lions share of said openings, which isn’t actually all that unfair. Better candidates get the openings. That’s how hiring works.
There is no denying that the eldest among those that lost existing jobs who did not get one of those positions were definitely hurt worse, especially people nearing retirement age who suffer the effects of ageism, but they number fewer than the people graduating college during the recession (of any age range) who could not find employment after school. We still have the highest unemployment rate of any demographic. So… “most people hurt” would be more accurate than “hurt most.”
Meh, pretty much the new ‘kids these days’
Every single generation is pretty much called lazy, spoiled and entitled by the previous ones.
And the internet probably helped a lot in spreading a lot of misinformation and making it more prevalent. What used to be the old man in the rocking chair on the the porch yelling at kids is now pretty much everyone with a computer.