Surviving President Trump’s Use of Projective Identification
The impetus for this paper is a product of hearing many people in distress regarding the COVID virus as well as reactions to President Trump’s actions and messages. His unwillingness to wear a mask and his often racist messages and name-calling rants as when he refers to Vice President Joe Biden as “tired Joe.”
We know that there are many ways to communicate. Of course, the most obvious one is verbal communication. We also know that there is a large category of communication that consists of different types of nonverbal communication. The one I want to explore is referred to as projective identification. It has been understood, by psychoanalysts, in several different ways.
Originally, it was formulated by Melanie Klein, a British psychoanalyst. Thomas Ogden M.D. (1991) describes it as “...a concept that addresses the way in which feeling-states corresponding to the unconscious fantasies of one person (the projector) are projected in and processed by another person ( the recipient), that is, the way in which one person makes use of another person to experience and contain an aspect of himself. The projector has the primarily unconscious fantasy of getting rid of an unwanted or endangered part of himself (including internal objects) and of depositing that in another person in a powerfully controlling way. The projected part of the self is felt to be partially lost and to be inhabiting in the other person. In association with this unconscious projective fantasy, there is an interpersonal interaction by means of which the recipient is pressured to think, feel, and behave in a manner congruent with the ejected feelings and the self-and object- representations embodied in the projective fantasy. In other words, the recipient is pressured to engage in an identification with a specific, disowned aspect of the projector.”
Let’s look at a typical husband coming home from a day at work in which he was openly criticized. These events have left him feeling humiliated, overwhelmed, and filled with rage. He is angry at himself for letting himself be treated this way. As he enters the door, he has the sense that his wife is upset with him and not happy to see him. He expresses how tired he is of having to put up with that attitude. This is him projecting elements of his inner psyche. He stays at the scene, perhaps egging her on. Another part of him is alert to how his wife is reacting. If she gets agitated and defensive, that will confirm his idea that there is nothing to do to get help. If, on the other hand, she recognizes that he is in pain and distress, she can move toward him and, with compassion, and note what is probably a painful situation. She might invite him to talk about what happened. In this situation, his psyche can identify with being in this calmer and more curious state of mind. Something he may be able to access the next time his boss is critical.
What this says is that when we have a thought, a feeling, and/or a relationship that is disturbing and/or threatening to us, we imagine we are getting rid of it by putting it into another person. We then attempt to induce that person to own that thought, feeling, or relationship. What is critical here is how the recipient handles that internalization. If the person has the psychological resources to cope and master the feelings, thoughts, and/or relationships, the projector can broaden and deepen her psychological resources through the function of reinternalization.
As analysts, we often find ourselves having disquieting feelings that we cannot easily identify. When we reflect on the experience, it often has, as it’s origin, our patient’s psyche. Like the baby with its caretaker, the patient unconsciously invites the analyst to share in this feeling and demonstrate how to calmly manage it.
If, for example, our patient is feeling overwhelmed by her separation anxiety and fears of aggression toward those she believes have abandoned her. She might, in an attempt at ridding herself of those feelings, project them into her therapist. She would watch for how the therapist reacts. If the therapist finds herself becoming anxious about losing the patient or someone in her life, she may act in a short-tempered way with the patient or be overly solicitous. The patient would probably feel justified in not trusting others. On the other hand, the therapist may recognize these feelings as ones she is working on herself. She may also allow for the possibility that the patient is also in that place. In a relaxed and compassionate way, she may comment to the patient on how upsetting it can be to feel abandoned and unseen.
I can hear you now as you wonder what any of this has to do with Trump? One thing for sure, it is not about trying to psychoanalyze him. That would require an extremely talented analyst with a whole lot of time on her hands! At the same time, there is a general agreement that he heavily relies on narcissistic defenses, especially projection and splitting. (Splitting occurs when there is a need to keep two dangerous and frightening thoughts and feelings apart from each other. An external object is given one of the qualities while the original subject maintains the other. Sometimes the subject retains the good. Because it is a purified version of good, it has strong narcissist features. Other times they identify with the bad object, often attacking themselves mercilessly.) Being aware of this can help us know how to best not analyze Trump, but to help ourselves manage the distressing feelings and thoughts that are, in part, originating from the way he conducts himself. They are the resulting impact of his search for an object of identification that can bring him relief.
I’m also thinking of Trump in terms of projective identification because of what I am hearing from people (colleagues, friends, and patients) regarding their pervasive feelings of unreality, anxiety, paranoia, and aloneness. Of course, some measure of this is due to the COVID virus, but not all! I think the most dominant feeling might be one of being out of control -- not of oneself, but one’s life. I think that’s the issue because that is what I see Trump struggling within his life. It always seems that he is under attack by enemies while searching for someone to trust and do his bidding. I also understand his show, “The Apprentice,” as another example of his use of projective identification. The contestants were stand-Ins for him scrambling for recognition and acceptance. I believe he is looking for someone to model a healthy adaptation to failure. I think his attempts to accumulate great wealth and notoriety are attempts to justify his claim of being the good object.
These ideas are, of course, speculations, albeit based on observations and theory. What’s important is that understanding Trump from the perspective of projective identification can go a long way in helping the populace achieve a more balanced psychological state of mind in this tumultuous and anxiety-producing time. Yes, real things are occurring that tap into a world of uncertainty. But like the baby with a distressed parent, we are being left to our own devices to self-soothe. When we find ourselves experiencing these unsettling thoughts and feelings, it may be helpful to appreciate that we are carrying Trump’s inner object world, just as we would if he were a patient.
As we look at this, we have to be careful not to make the same mistake Freud made. He could not allow for the impact of the actual abuse his patients actually endured. Instead, he elevated the impact of one’s fantasy life, i.e., the unconscious. Unlike the baby or the patient, Trump does indeed have real power over all of us, just as the abuser had over his victims in Freud’s times. He can make decisions that can directly affect our level of physical and financial safety. And unlike the analyst, the general population does not have the psychological resources that come with having worked through, at least to some degree, the trials and tribulations associated with dealing with issues like anger, competition, loss, and the sense of not being seen — all the more reason to advocate for the greater availability of psychoanalytic psychotherapy.
I wonder if you can think of other ways (short of leaving the country) of self-soothing during these chaotic times.