Battered Democrat Syndrome

I can't help but notice the abuse vested on my friends across the aisle and how it seems enabled by psychology.

A few weeks ago, I read about a woman, a mother of three, found murdered after being missing for a week. Her boyfriend was convicted of her death. What fascinated me was their backstory. She was 38, he was 42 (and and illegal alien from Nicaragua). She had a history of abusive relationships since high school, enduring thirty years of violence from five men, two of whom served jail time, one for causing the death of her unborn child. She had multiple restraining orders and chances to escape but often returned to her abusers or found new ones when others were jailed.

Her partners were serial abusers, accused or convicted of physical, mental, and emotional abuse. They made empty promises to change, but abuse defined their lives. When her boyfriend was arrested for her murder, he cried, showing a depraved indifference to his actions. This is a story of a woman who seemingly chose abusers and abusers who targeted victims, all under the guise of “love.”

I know this seems crass, but I couldn’t help but tie this to the nomination of Zohran Mamdani - and the current trend of Democrats to select candidates that are way out of the mainstream. They just can’t seem to stop themselves. There seems to be a sort of sexual attraction for candidates from the other side of the tracks, and the more radical and different they are, the better. It almost seems as though Democrats, both men and women, are searching for dangerous liaisons with people and ideas that would normally be considered taboo, and the eroticism increases with the degree of radicalism.

This pattern of abuse reminds me of a combination of battered wife and Stockholm Syndrome on a national scale within the Democrat Party. Stockholm Syndrome occurs when a hostage identifies with and grows sympathetic to their captor. Examples include the 1973 Stockholm bank robbery, where captives bonded with their captor, Patty Hearst joining the Symbionese Liberation Army after her 1974 kidnapping, and Elizabeth Smart forming emotional bonds with her captors during her nine-month ordeal.

Counseling Resource outlines Stockholm Syndrome features:

• Positive feelings by the victim toward the abuser

• Negative feelings toward family, friends, or authorities trying to help

• Support for the abuser’s reasons and behaviors

• Positive feelings by the abuser toward the victim

• Supportive behaviors by the victim, sometimes aiding the abuser

• Inability to engage in behaviors that may lead to release or detachment

Four conditions foster Stockholm Syndrome in hostage, severe abuse, or abusive relationships:

• A perceived threat to physical or psychological survival, with belief the abuser will act on it

• A perceived small kindness from the abuser

• Isolation from perspectives other than the abuser’s

• A perceived inability to escape

Two key features are the inability to act for one’s own release and the perceived inability to escape. Democrats face a similar dynamic, bombarded with messages that they can’t function without government. You need government-backed loans for school, permits to build a house, licenses for a business, or environmental studies to develop land. Government can seize private land via eminent domain. Even benign interactions—driver’s licenses, car tags, park fees—reinforce its omnipresence, creating helplessness and dependency.

This environment fosters national rigor mortis, where people lose confidence that their actions matter, fueled by rhetoric and imagery designed to entrench this perspective. Politicians, especially Democrats, perpetuate this by crafting false premises to show constituents “why you need me” during elections. The message has shifted from individual politicians to “you need the government to protect and provide for you.” Democrats seem to say, “Your government loves you, so love it back—don’t worry about freedom, we’ll take care of you.”

This mirrors the logic of battered wife syndrome and Stockholm Syndrome. The mind’s survival mechanism in these traumatic situations can erode normal livelihood. The cure is a dose of reality, helping victims realize they can stand independently and define their own existence, free from their captor or abuser.

Sadly, some never break free, and their families watch their self-destructive spiral end in tragedy, as with the woman in the story.