When does an act of calling people names get old? There are certain entertainers whose act is all about insulting and name-calling others and the public allows it, accepts it, even celebrates the behavior. They do so thinking it’s just an act meant without malicious, no harm intended. So-called “insult comics” like Don Rickles, Joan Rivers, and Bob Hope were legendary comedians whose name-calling and insults were seen as funny, harmless, and acceptable. Even an insult comic like Robert Smigel can use personification through a puppet, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, and be considered acceptable. So where is the line of good taste and acceptable behavior? What’s the difference between name-calling and a nickname? Is the behavior only acceptable in the world of entertainment? What happens when entertainment crosses over to politics. Time and space are as important as intent. When determining intent, we have to separate the people from the problem. If the problem is the context in which the name-calling occurred then we have to try and understand what the person’s underlying intent was at the time the name-calling or insult occurred. Sometimes by doing so we project our own biases.
As insult comics, Kathy Griffin and Roseanne Barr found out that context and intent are very important and sometimes the line of acceptable behavior changes…and the consequences of crossing that line can be severe economic loss. Much of the public took Griffin’s insult of holding a severed Donald Trump effigy as literal intent to do harm. The comedian even received a visit from the Secret Service. Barr’s insult of Valerie Jarrett was an inferred racist name-calling that cost her a job at ABC.
So how can President Donald Trump get away with insults and name-calling or, as some have called it, giving people nicknames? The difference between name-calling and a nickname is the difference between throwing a stone or a pebble. If you intend to belittle someone, make fun of someone, have no social familiarity with the person, and use the name as a pejorative characterization…it’s a stone, not a pebble. Of course, most of us learn it’s unacceptable to throw these verbal stones during recess on the third-grade playground when our teacher tells us name-calling is unacceptable, even as we are told that sticks and stones can break our bones but names can never hurt us.
So how about an entertainer who turns into an insult politician? How important is context and intent when a politician uses insults and name-calling to belittle a political opponent? The answer seems to be very little if you support the politician and a lot if you don’t. The main difference between the insult comic and insult politician is the comic’s monologue doesn’t result in counter-insults or a loss of civil decorum. Comic genius Don Rickles could call someone in the audience a “hockey puck” without resulting in a back and forth of pejorative name-calling and a breakdown of civil discourse. While it’s true many of us don’t care what you call us—as long as it’s not late for dinner—the use of name-calling can have a negative impact on one’s reputation and result in a negative spiral of retaliatory behavior.
Research shows that different groups, from sports teams to street gangs, give informal descriptive nicknames to in-group members. These informal names are often endearing or humorous with a hint of truth and given with positive intent. It is one thing to give such a name to a friend or family member as one might lovingly call a brother “Knucklehead” but another matter altogether when the target of your name-calling is barely an acquaintance.
It’s common practice for cognitively-closed biased individuals to assign pejorative names to oppositional group members. As a rabid Braves fan, I’ve been guilty of calling my beautiful wife, a life-long Yankee fan, a “Stankee Fan.” Of course, the more extreme the mindset the more contemptuous and degrading the name becomes. Research from David Matsumoto, Hyisang, and Mark Frank demonstrated the connection between a trajectory of emotions to include anger, contempt, and disgust rhetoric that can lead to a more chronic emotion of hate and even violence. When one feels anger, they want the person to hurt; when they feel hate, they no longer want the person to exist.
It really comes down to the intent of the individual and that is very difficult to measure. What is the intent behind President Trump’s use of name-calling or nicknames? Is he throwing stones or pebbles? Is it nothing more than innocuous good-humored teasing or the sinister name-calling of a bully? Apparently “The Donald” doesn’t think to call someone a name is all that big a deal. After all, he named his Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson “Psychopath” and his Attorney General Jeff Sessions “Nuts.” Neither seem to be positive nicknames but their relationship continues. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, which Trump has referred to as the “Fake News Journal,” he said, “I” or “I’d” have a very good relationship with “Rocket Man” Kim Jong-Un. He suggested opening diplomatic meetings with the very man he called names and played a game of nuclear one-upsmanship with only several weeks earlier. Trump and Jong-Un met on June 12, 2018 in Singapore where Trump told George Stephanopoulos that he “trusts” Kim with whom he had “…developed a very special bond…” during their discussions.
Of course, the biased left-wing media pejoratively referred to as “Libtards” began blaming “Benedict Donald” for an ineffective meeting, grandstanding, and giving status to Kim Jung-Un without any real progress. In their reaction to his name-calling they go to their own bag of stones. King Solomon aka “Old Sol” was right when he said, “There is nothing new under the sun.” Political name-calling has a long history in D.C.’s swampland.
Conventional wisdom states that the “Trumpster” thinks calling people names makes him appear stronger and gives him positional advantage for negotiating terms in any transactional relationship. The “Cheeto-In-Chief” only knows an autocratic transactional leadership style where positional advantage can be demonstrated by a domineering handshake, creepy over-the-shoulder body positioning, and name-calling to demonstrate the principle of least interest in the relationship. “Pudgy McTrumpcakes” told us in his book “Art of the Deal” (AOTD) that positional advantage is the key to negotiations. Make the other party feel less confident and make them want to earn your approval. Trump doesn’t believe trust is a necessary component to completing a deal. Trump told Stephanopoulos in June: “Over my lifetime I’ve done a lot of deals with a lot of people and sometimes the people you most distrust turn out to be the most honorable ones and the people that you do trust turn out to be not the honorable ones.”
If relationships are held together by trust and control, “Trumplethinskin” is always seeking control. It is his way of establishing initial boundaries or a baseline in relationships. It might appear counterproductive, but not if you are always seeking to dominate others in a relationship. Regardless of how uninspired, witless, or lame the name-calling might appear, it is a stone thrown with the threat of being followed by a stick. An example would be his insult of John McCain, stating he wasn’t a war hero because he was captured. Trump said, “I like people who weren’t captured.” Of course, he later conceded, “If someone’s a prisoner I consider them a war hero.” This control tactic is straight out of AOTD, but only works when the other party needs a relationship with you, is less confident, is interested in your approval, or won’t fight back. Those who came to McCain’s defense called Trump “Draft Dodger Don.”
Once, during an interview with Anderson Cooper, Trump was asked about re-tweeting an unflattering and sexist picture of his opponent Ted Cruz’s wife. Trump first lied saying he re-tweeted the image because he thought it was a nice picture, but after Cooper challenged that statement, Trump complained that Cruz had “started it.” When Cooper admonished him for sounding like a 5-year-old, Trump simply repeated that Cruz “started it.” Even his supporters, including his White House staff, have referred to Trump as “childlike,” prompting Republican Senator Bob Corker to tweet that the White House was effectively an “adult day care center.”
To “Ole Trumpy” calling someone names can start from a place of anger but lead to a “good relationship” or begin with a compliment only to lead to a future insult. Once, shortly after being elected, Trump praised Sen. Chuck Schumer, saying they had a “good relationship” and tweeted “…[Schumer] was far smarter than Harry Reid and has the ability to get things done.” He was quoted as saying, “…and I have a good relationship with him.” Of course, later he called the senator “Cryin’ Chuck.”
“Prima Donald” may or may not be a racist, but when it comes to name-calling he is an equal opportunity insulter. Still, the worst part of President Donald Trump’s name-calling isn’t that it’s un-presidential, it’s that he encourages the other side of the political aisle to refrain from going high and instead encourages them to join him in the insult swamp. So, for every “Lyin’ Ted,” “Low Energy Jeb,” “Cryin’ Chuck Schumer,” “Little Marco,” “Clinton News Network” (CNN), “Al Frankenstein,” “Jeff Flake(y),” or “Sloppy Steve,” etc…the opposition gives us Graydon Carter’s “Short-Fingered Vulgarian” or Sarah Palin’s “Golden Wrecking Ball.”
So, when POTUS says Maxine Waters is a “low I.Q. individual” or calls others “Dumb as a Rock Mika,” “Wacky Congresswoman Wilson,” “Crazy Megyn,” “Pocahontas” (Sen. Warren), “Little Katy” (Times reporter Katy Tur), and “Crooked Hillary,” we shouldn’t assume his intent is to demean women, it might be his form of foreplay. Of course, it results in a backlash from thin-skinned left-wingers who call our president names like “Putin’s Puppet,” “Hair Fuhrer,” “Adolph Twitler,” and “Agent Orange” who should be ashamed of his stone-throwing behavior.
Are these opponents disrespecting the man who disrespects the office of the presidency? Perhaps these people are simply using the President Trump interpersonal relationship method of insult politics and lockerroom humor. Maybe people like Jon Stewart who called President Trump “Man-Baby” and “Fuckface von Clownstick,” or Bill Maher who called him “The White Kanye,” are simply taking a lesson from AOTD, priming him for a good relationship where he is less confident, needs a relationship with the press, and is interested in his approval ratings. What was Rosie O’Donnell’s intent in calling him “Orange Anus”? Was it an insult or simply the new normal of political stone-throwing?
Things are unlikely to change for the next 3-7 years or as long as “Macho McGrump” is in office. It would be great to have politicians focus on the business of governance without the distractions of a WWE interview. Some argue it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it, but in reality, if President Donald J. Trump can decrease taxes, maintain border security, reform a broken immigration system, improve international trade, increase jobs, improve the health care system, balance the budget, defeat terrorist groups who target US interests, and achieve nuclear non-proliferation…he can slap a T on the Washington Monument and rename it Trump’s Tower for all I care. If on the other hand, it turns out that he runs the government like he ran Trump Airlines, Trump Ice, Trump Casinos, Trump Steaks, and Trump University it will be a long 7 years, indeed. Of course, with obstruction of justice and less-likely money-laundering charges in the potential near future, name-calling might be the least of the worries for the “Combover Con Artist.”
Nicknames and name-calling have a long history in American politics from George Washington’s complimentary nickname “Fabius” for his strategic battle style, to Andrew Jackson being called “Old Hickory” by his men for his willingness to suffer alongside them in battle. Then there were the not-so-flattering name-calling including President Van Buren being called “Belshazzar” by the opposition for his insincerity in political matters, President John Tyler having been known as “His Accidency” upon inheriting the role after President William Henry Harrison’s sudden death, and President Grover Cleveland who was called “Uncle Jumbo” for obvious reasons. And who can forget the stone- throwing “Tricky Dick” moniker given President Richard Nixon?
During the last State of the Union, “The Lyin’ King” gave a speech to the biggest audience ever in the history of television—just ask him! His address was watched for truths and lies, and history will determine if he is forever known as the “Pinocchio President.” So, will America ever get tired of Donald Trump’s act as the Insult President? To be fair, he has called himself names like the “Stable Genius” which, with historical context and intent, could either be used as an ironic insult or a memorable nickname.
When does an act calling people names get old? For the sake of our country we need to re-set our baseline for acceptable behavior. Encourage civil discourse without the name-calling. Maybe insult politics is an old act that is no longer funny. Maybe it’s the obstacle that keeps America from being great again. Maybe we should simply re-visit lessons from the playground and leave the sticks and stones on the ground.
