US culture is an incubator of ‘extrinsic values’. Nobody embodies them like the Republican frontrunner
Many explanations are proposed for the continued rise of Donald Trump, and the steadfastness of his support, even as the outrages and criminal charges pile up. Some of these explanations are powerful. But there is one I have seen mentioned nowhere, which could, I believe, be the most important: Trump is king of the extrinsics.
Some psychologists believe our values tend to cluster around certain poles, described as “intrinsic” and “extrinsic”. People with a strong set of intrinsic values are inclined towards empathy, intimacy and self-acceptance. They tend to be open to challenge and change, interested in universal rights and equality, and protective of other people and the living world.
People at the extrinsic end of the spectrum are more attracted to prestige, status, image, fame, power and wealth. They are strongly motivated by the prospect of individual reward and praise. They are more likely to objectify and exploit other people, to behave rudely and aggressively and to dismiss social and environmental impacts. They have little interest in cooperation or community. People with a strong set of extrinsic values are more likely to suffer from frustration, dissatisfaction, stress, anxiety, anger and compulsive behaviour.
I’m going to break this down because it seems like you’re coming at this from a place of honest ignorance.
There are lots of things worth visiting that you would find if you bothered to look. For example:
The world’s oldest and largest collection of military aircraft is in Dayton, Ohio
The largest cave network in the world is in Kentucky
Indigenous earthworks all throughout the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys
Plenty of small, charming, non-trumpian towns
These are just a handful of things off the top of my head in and around my home state of Ohio. It ain’t Hawaii, but we do have lives. You should come and visit sometime, maybe stay for a while and help push us back toward the left. Plus, you get rust belt prices on everything ($100 for 2oz of weed in Michigan).
How about starting with the fact that there are tens of millions of your fellow countrymen living here and oh, by the way, THEY GROW YOUR FOOD. If you truly believe that the only value a person or community has comes from their ability to attract tourists, then I suggest you try not eating for a week and see if that changes your mind. Believe it or not, I don’t sit around all day begrudging all those awesome coastal cities out of jealousy. I don’t think about you much at all to be honest. What does irk me is the fact that, when people do talk about us, it’s almost always dismissive and condescending. There’s east coast, west coast, the south, the southwest, and that big flat nothing in between. In shows, memes, and movies, the midwest frequently either doesn’t exist, or serves as some far-off no-mans-land that the character is trying to escape. It’s all tornadoes, children of the corn, and naive or racist simpletons. It doesn’t have a culture, it is the absence of culture.
But who cares anyway? Ok so there’s some nature and generic museums, it’s nothing you couldn’t find in Philly or Fresno, and the racists are still really off-putting. Why should you care? I’ll tell you why; because we need your help. The midwest, and in particular the rust belt, used to be a hotbed of leftist politics. In the span of less than a century, these people have turned from ardent secular socialists to rabid christian fascists. What we’re seeing now isn’t just the same old assholes being assholes. Many of these people are honest-to-god fascists, and it’s spreading like a plague through the center of the American continent. I’m sorry for the wall of text but this is a really personal issue for me. I’ve lost a lot of friends and one of the first symptoms, before the cult worship, before the authoritarianism, before the capital storming and mass violence, is “the left doesn’t want me, the ‘coastal elite’ don’t want me, the corporatist republicans won’t help me, I have been politically abandoned” (obviously not literally).