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Trump deletes post depicting him as Jesus-like figure after backlash
If the image had been satirical, people would have dismissed it as too over the top. But Trump's taste is such that he posted this thing unironically.
Any Trump supporters care to steelman this? To me, the most parsimonious explanation is that Trump is a narcissist with a god complex.
Obviously this is low-effort, boo-outgroup, and a particularly lazy case of "arguing with the forum", so I'll be brief: there's a long tradition of people making hilariously hagiographic pictures of politicians they like. Think Boomer facebook. Trump seems to have no filter on retweeting/retruthing these things - the most recent 'controversy' iirc was a video of him dumping manure on a No Kings protest - so he saw this, liked it, and retruthed it (or someone on his team did, where it gets weird is that someone apparently ran the image through another AI to recreate it, which is what added the odd symmetrical Statue of Liberty silhouette, and I'm sure that Trump isn't mucking around with ChatGPT).
If you are looking for evidence that Donald Trump is a narcissist - I know, it's a shocking and contrarian thesis to suggest, but we can explore even the wildest ideas here - I'd recommend starting with the giant gold tower with his name on the front.
Really, really cringe things that associate elements of the American civic religion with Christianity are pretty dime-a-dozen in red tribe art, such as the most hilarious painting of all time: Jesus holding the Constitution of the United States while a Supreme Court Justice weeps.
It's exceptionally gauche to make such a piece of artwork of a living politician, but I'm sure it happens on the left too from time to time. That people invest this kind of hope in politicians is pretty ridiculous to me, but they do, and silly stuff like this results.
I think most people have generated a "what would I look like as a medieval X/what would Y look like as a Christian saint" image using AI, it's a fairly common pastime. Sharing it on social media is pretty ridiculous though.
Trump is pretty narcissistic, and this may be a symptom of that, but it's far from the most insane thing he's ever done and at this point the truth is that his supporters' support for him is something that's not amenable to anything that actually happens, and the hope that many on the left/center have that some scandal will destroy his popularity among his base just isn't going to happen. Even the Christians who were outraged by this still "back the mission."
That's a great painting. Yes, it's a very Red-coded thing, partially because it's so boomerish - the big exception for the Left being Obama, who was also beloved of his tribe's boomers.
I also doubt that more than a lizardman-constant % of the people reacting are genuinely offended Christians who loved Trump until this outrage. It's just social media being social media.
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