This Is What Brokenness Looks Like

Are all human beings broken in some way? What do we mean by ‘broken’? 
And if the answer is yes, can we be made whole again? If so, how? – Higher Thought game question

There is a crack, a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.” – Leonard Cohen

In his brilliant novel TROPIC OF NIGHT (which I finished reading just the other night) author Michael Gruber describes the existence of grelet, little psychic parasites that feed on fear and hatred and other negative emotions, like malignant metaphysical bacteria. 

The grelet exploit people’s inner weaknesses and wounds, stirring up rage, contempt, and violent, terrified thoughts and feelings, sometimes entirely conquering a person’s mind and personality, in a kind of gradual, organic demonic possession. 

In real life, we may sometimes see this process unfold with drug-addicted people.

Years ago, I saw it in someone I’d known a very long time, who’d transformed into a different person, someone I felt I needed to block from my life. This person wrote me a parting email calling me all sorts of vile names, which was not surprising, telling me I was “sick” (also not surprising), and also saying that I was “broken,” which jumped out at me. “Broken” was a word I’d never heard this person wield before. I guess it was their final poisoned arrow into the self-doubting regions of my psyche. I perceived the deliberate malevolent intent, but it impacted me nonetheless.

I wrestled with the word a while. Broken. It had struck a nerve. It had landed. I had to deal with it. I had to accept it. Maybe I really was broken in some way(s). In fact, I probably was, if the word bothered me that much.

Disseminating Mind Parasites on Television

A few days ago I saw JD Vance in a YouTube news clip, defending his claim that Haitian immigrants had been kidnapping and eating people’s dogs and cats in Springfield, OH. His interviewer countered that the mayor of Springfield and other city officials had all stated, on the record, that there had been no credible evidence of such incidents. Vance retorted that while local politicians might say one thing, he and the Trump campaign were hearing harrowing stories from his “constituents on the ground” in Springfield, who were calling the campaign to testify. 

Now, of course, being a good liberal, I disbelieved Vance. But, I thought to myself, What if I were coming to this moment – the moment of viewing the interview – with absolutely no biases or preconceptions about whom to trust? Why would I believe “the media” and “the politicians” over Vance and his alleged “constituents”? What do I truly know?

Yet, applying my faculty of reason, I might assume that – apart from anything else – the small community of Springfield was being impacted, and perhaps their resources were being strained, by a sizable influx of immigrants. 

But this is simply a human problem that calls for solutions – hopefully solutions that take into account everyone’s humanity, rather than consigning one group of people (in this case, legal Haitian immigrants) into a category of thieving, pet-eating, subhuman savages. 

The inscription on the Statue of Liberty says: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore…” etc. That may be a tricky credo to apply in our current reality but it nonetheless expresses one of our country’s key animating ideals. We aspire to welcome those who are rejected elsewhere, ideally with open arms. 

And if we cannot easily do so, then what? Do we respond with ingenuity and goodwill and cooperation, or do we collapse into atomized shells of fear, screaming, “Me and my family first, and to hell with those ‘others’!”

We know what Trump and JD Vance want us to do. 

I have no idea if Vance sold his soul to the devil and was lying through his teeth or if he’s convinced himself of something insane. But without question, he (along with Trump) is recruiting hysteria and horror, and fear of “the invading alien,” thereby occluding his listeners’ sense of humanity.   

And this proliferation of mind parasites has resulted in severe disruptions to civic life in Springfield: violence, bomb threats (and the attendant evacuation of schools and government buildings), locked down hospitals, and terrorized innocent Haitians who have reportedly been reduced to “cowering” in their homes.

This is what brokenness looks like in a society. 

Trump and Vance feed on human brokenness, just like the grelet in TROPIC OF NIGHT.

Trump’s Brokenness on Full Display

A week and a half ago, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump debated on national television, with an audience of more than 67 million people. The consensus afterward, which was borne out by both pundits and pollsters, was essentially that Harris had filleted Trump like a fish. 

But Trump did an unusual thing. Minutes after the debate, he walked into the “spin room” where all the reporters were. Normally, the candidates themselves go elsewhere after a debate, letting their campaign team and surrogates speak for them in the spin room. 

But not Trump. He wanted to dictate the narrative himself. And here’s what he said (and I quote verbatim):

So we thought it was our best debate ever. It was my best debate ever I think. And we had, uh, it was very interesting, it showed how weak they are, how pathetic they are, and what they’re doing to destroy our country and the border with foreign trade, with everything, and I think it was the best debate I’ve ever, personally, that I’ve had. We’re getting polls that show 92 to 6, 88 to 11, and we’re having a lot of great polls that just came out, they’re phone calls and lots of other polls, but you see the polls. A very important debate. Now she wants to do another one cuz she got beaten tonight but I don’t know if we’re gonna do another one. I wouldn’t mind. The polls are indicating that we got 90 percent, 60 percent, 72 percent, 71 percent, and 89 percent. So the polls are very good but beyond the polls I felt very good. I had a good time doing it…. She wants a second debate because she lost tonight very badly so they want, they immediately called for a second debate because they lost. So we’ll, you know, think about that but she immediately called for a sec– Look, we’re looking at polls, we’re looking at polls, the worst, the worst poll that we’ve had was 71 that I see. 71 percent to like, 24 or 25 percent. … I thought it was my best debate. I had a great debate. I thought this was my best debate.”

My initial reaction to this was: How can he get away with such conspicuous, blatant lies?? Why didn’t the assembled press demand that he name the polls he was citing?!

As absurd as his statements are, if they go unchallenged, many viewers will simply believe him.

But of course, that’s always the case with Trump. He spews lies like a fire hose. He free associates from one lie to the next, saying whatever goes through his head. He’s a stream-of-consciousness liar. 

This is so obvious to me, and to tens of millions of my fellow citizens.

And maybe it’s obvious to his fans too.

I was thinking recently about something a friend once said to me about Trump, quite some time ago. She said, with conviction, “Trump wears his heart on his sleeve.” 

I disagreed, but I knew what she meant. Trump is unrehearsed. He doesn’t filter his words; he just “goes for it.” 

And perhaps that’s refreshing to a populace accustomed to slick politicians who double- and triple-think their every utterance (and you can see it in their faces too; and you can almost hear the background whirring noise of a computer brain).

Still, what Trump wears on his sleeve is not his heart. It’s his brokenness.

That’s what people see, what they relate to and can sympathize with. 

His depravity, his abject brokenness is authentic, and he lets it be seen. He can’t even help it.

In a perverse way, maybe that’s why many people trust him. To love Trump is to accept their own brokenness. So they vote for that.

The Cure?

Okay. I understand that what I wrote above is a lot of presumptuous, perhaps even arrogant, armchair psychology about people I don’t know from Adam. I’m making wild inferences, largely based on dynamics I perceive within my own psyche.

But in closing, I will say this. 

I think we are all broken. I think it’s the human condition. Every human being I have ever known carries ancient, deep-set, unhealed wounds. 

(And, paradoxically, as a friend pointed out to me the other day when I shared this thought aloud, we are also all whole, unbroken, and inviolate. I do believe and perceive that this is simultaneously true though it seems contradictory. But that’s another discussion.)

But our brokenness is not a curse. Brokenness enables us to be humble and compassionate. If we can love ourselves in all our brokenness – in fact, if we can truly love our brokenness – then we can also love others in all their brokenness. 

And then we can begin to do the work we are here for, which is to heal together. I believe forgiveness and healing are the great tasks of human life.

But back to Trump for a minute. (Sorry.) Like millions of my fellow Americans, I not only want him to lose bigly in the coming election. I also want to see him sentenced and sent to prison for his innumerable crimes. I want to see him justly punished. I want him to really suffer (because he’s not suffering now – is he?).

And I wonder if that desire in me – that Trump should suffer mightily — is symptomatic of my own brokenness and wounding.

And if I (and by extension – forgive me! – we) really learn to love and accept my (our) own brokenness, might that mean risking having to love Trump a little bit too? 

Would I (we) be willing to risk that?

 —Marc