The Psychology of Revenge: Trump’s Narcissism and the Effect of Pathological Vengeance on Society

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“I think there has to be retribution. I think there has to be payback. I think the people that did this to me, I think they have to suffer.”

Read the Full Transcripts of Donald Trump’s Interviews With TIME on Time on 30 April 2024

It should come as no surprise to regular readers that Fraud and Rapist wants revenge on those who have indicted him and now convicted him. All you’ve ever needed to know about Trump is that he is a narcissist. Revenge is what narcissists do. And, since he is a textbook malignant narcissistic personality disorder, revenge for harms both real and imagined is what he wants.

So, scratch my ass and call my fingers stinky, why are we writing about Trump’s narcissism, AGAIN!?! Is there anything new to say about it at all? Well, yes, yes there is. First, we should all be sure to listen to Trump’s own words when he describes his desire for revenge and retribution. I mean, when someone tells you who they are and all that. Why isn’t it WSTYWTABTFT? Okay, never mind.

Then, there is the social role that revenge plays, like gossip and reputation. We should understand that because that’s what Trump is trying to do to “liberals.”

And last, there is the resonance that Trump’s personal sense of revenge and retribution has with MAGA’s racial need for violent threats of revenge and retribution.

The Implications of the Trump’s Narcissism

Given the amount that Trump talks about revenge, it is fair to say he is obsessed. It is all that he thinks about, really. I know this because he is such a textbook narcissist. If you want to check the textbook definition of narcissism, see this blog post, otherwise, we’ll settle for this dictionary-type definition:

A personality type that is characterized by extreme selfishness, grandiosity, and a craving for admiration. And, boy howdy, does that describe the felonious rapist in spades, amirite? Do we need to go through the ten symptoms and check off the ones that he meets (Spoiler: he meets them all)?

Because a narcissist has to maintain a delusion of perfection, it takes all of their psychic energy. It is the only thing they are capable of doing is believing that they are perfect. They are terrified that someone, anyone will see through the delusion to the blackhole where a shred of self-esteem should be. Since everyone knows he’s not perfect, he’s mainly maintaining the delusion for his own benefit.

Trump’s Revenge: The Narcissist’s Quest for Payback

Anytime something challenges this caricature of perfection, it is a narcissistic wound. Anything that exposes the lie that is at the core of Trump’s life is experienced as a deep painful injury. He loses his narcissistic swagger. He’s knocked off balance. He flops around like one of the semi-inflated wiggly monstrosities that swindly-type business put out front to attract attention to themselves.

To soothe his wound, he has to destroy, utterly and completely destroy, whatever or whoever inflicted the wound. But, Trump is a coward. He can’t risk actually doing something himself in case he fails. It is much easier to lie and say he did or didn’t do something than actually do it, like when he called Milwaukee horrible and made plans to stay in Chicago to commute to the RNC, and then said he didn’t say it and he never made those plans.

Now, the narcissistic wounds have been staking up fast and furious: his TWO impeachments! His LOST election! His FAILED insurrection! His LOSS of his business license! His $83 million damages he owes to E Jean Carrol! His FOUR FELONY CRIMINAL INDICTMENTS! His CONVICTION on 34 state felony charges!

A delusion of perfection can only take so much, so Trump now vows retribution and like every playground bully he points and pouts as he whines about the other kid starting it and muttering that he’ll get them when the teacher’s not around.

“If I run and if I win, which I believe I will, I will instruct my Attorney General to immediately investigate Biden. He started it, he and his cronies, and they have to pay for what they’ve done to me and to the country. There has to be accountability, there has to be justice.”

Read the Full Transcripts of Donald Trump’s Interviews With TIME on Time on 30 April 2024

After his legal battering, both civil and criminal, Trump needs to avenge his narcissistic wounds. He is desperate fo a win, right now, and the only thing he has are his own jactations of perfection.

The Psychology of Revenge

The psychology of revenge is closely tied to this need to restore one’s sense of status and control after a narcissistic injury. As explained by researcher Ian McKee, “Revenge fulfills several important psychological functions, including restoring a sense of power, regaining status, and deterring future harm.”

The Pro-Social Benefits of Revenge

As in all mental health disorders, the person takes a perfectly normal psychological event, like the desire for revenge, and makes it pathological, lets it get out of control and prevent them from living a productive, healthy, happy life. As it turns out, revenge is just another example because it has its benefits.

First, it is motivated by a sense of a just world where good people shouldn’t be wronged. Who doesn’t want a just world? Who doesn’t want to prevent people from being wronged, amirite? It helps us in two ways: it helps us recover from injury, and it helps us maintain society.

Revenge, even just fantasies of revenge without the follow through, can take us a long way towards feeling restored from what ever injury we’ve experienced. We’ve all been there, right, but few of us actually act on our revenge fantasies. This restoration of status, honor, and control helps us take our lives back from whatever has disrupted them. Generally, that is a good thing.

And second, revenge or the threat of revenge can help maintain a social order. Vengeful behaviors have been observed across primates and human societies. It is one of the universals, strongly suggesting that revenge evolved as a useful tool that benefited our gene pool. How does that work?

Advocates of the death penalty have long touted its mythical preventive effects. Turns out, those are illusory. But, that doesn’t mean the act of revenge that our justice system embodies doesn’t help restore a sense of social justice and benefit society as a whole. Bringing a criminal to justice helps us have confidence in maintaining the social order, and, actually deters people from committing crimes. Speed traps actually do help control speeding, for example. Confronting murders with their victims survivors not only helps the survivors grieve their loss, it helps us all feel like the system is working and feel safer because of it.

Revenge and honor-based cultures have been intertwined throughout human history. In many traditional societies, a wrong committed against one’s family or tribal group was not just an individual slight, but an attack on the entire community’s status and worth. Engaging in revenge was seen as a moral obligation to restore that wounded honor, even if it came at great personal cost. This dynamic can still be observed today in certain regions, such as parts of the Middle East, Latin America, and the American South, where cultures place an exceptionally high value on vengeance. However, the norms surrounding acceptable forms of retaliation vary widely – from formalized blood feuds to more covert acts of retribution. Understanding these cultural nuances is crucial for appreciating how deeply rooted the psychological drivers of revenge can be.

Unfortunately, the current political landscape in the United States exemplifies how the human propensity for revenge can have profoundly destabilizing effects. Trump has demonstrated how revenge when taken to pathological extremes can be destructive. Trump’s vindictive actions and rhetoric have contributed to a dangerous polarization that threatens the very foundations of American democracy. Right now, Trump’s lust for revenge is threatening to take us all down, and by us all, I mean the whole ding-dang-darn world because Trump will sell us all to the fossil fuel industry so some CEO can hold 500 billion in dying company stocks instead of just 100 billion should he win in November.

The Anti-Social Risks of Revenge

For revenge to be constructive rather than destructive, it has to be constrained. It has to fit the crime and the person on the receiving end has to know why they’re receiving the punishment, or we’re all Balkanized by the experience, amirite? We’re all living on the Gaza Strip trapped between Hamas, the IDF, and Jar-Jar Binksher’s Saudi fueled fantasy of luxury resorts.

That’s the downside of revenge. It’s great as a TV trope that gets you into the plot of the page-turning summer novel, but it ain’t no way to live your life, just ask OJ Simpson. Oh wait, you can’t. He’s dead, having died a disgraced shadow of his former self because he let revenge get out of hand.

While revenge may offer short-term psychological benefits, research has shown that unchecked vengeance-seeking can have profoundly negative long-term consequences. Studies have linked excessive focus on getting even to increased rates of depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues. The perpetual stress of being embroiled in cycles of retaliation takes a heavy toll, both personally and interpersonally. Relationships often suffer as individuals become consumed by their need for payback, distorting their empathy and ability to let go. Additionally, communities can become irreparably fractured as vendettas spiral, eroding the social fabric that holds society together. Clearly, while revenge may feel justified in the moment, it is a dish best served in moderation – lest it poison the very well-being it seeks to restore.

In the end, the psychology of revenge is a double-ended dildo capable of fucking us in multiple ways. When Trump is leading his howling flying monkey chorus, the discordant cacophonous song of revenge is one that will shatter crystal, not because of the high notes, but because they’re just throwing it against the walls! While it may fulfill certain psychological needs and play a role in maintaining social order, unchecked vengeance-seeking can quickly spiral out of control and inflict lasting damage on individuals, communities, and society as a whole, especially when it is based on delusions, delusions that only serve to prop up impossible views of the self as the narcissist Trump has to have or to maintain the fantasy of racial superiority that the white supremacists who are MAGA entertain. When taken to these pathological extremes, it can only be destructive and must be resisted by the sane.

Image Attribution

This image was generated using Poe’s StableDiffusionXL bot using the prompt, A political cartoon of Trump leading a howling flying monkey squad throwing crystalware against the walls