The intensity of the reaction to Donald Trump suggests that for many Americans, the injury is primarily symbolic rather than material. When people describe his presidency as a personal catastrophe, they are often describing a collapse of the cultural hero system that gives their lives a sense of order and transcendent value. Ernest Becker argues that we manage our fear of mortality by attaching ourselves to “immortality projects”—frameworks like the progress of democracy, the sanctity of institutions, or the moral evolution of society. When a leader appears to mock or dismantle these structures, he is not just changing a law; he is threatening the psychological “character armor” that protects people from existential dread.
If an individual’s self-worth is tied to the idea that they live in a stable, rational, and “good” country, a leader who thrives on disruption and violates traditional norms can feel like an assault on their very identity. This explains why the animosity remains so high even among those whose daily economic or physical lives remain unchanged. The erosion of a shared hero system leaves the individual feeling significant only in a biological sense, which Becker would describe as being “naked before one’s own insignificance.” For millions, the “worst thing” is the sudden awareness that the cultural stories they relied on for meaning might be fragile or false.
However, the distinction between symbolic and tangible changes is often a matter of vantage point. For specific groups, the challenge to the hero system and concrete harm are inseparable. An immigrant facing a change in legal status or a family whose healthcare costs rise due to policy shifts experiences a tangible blow that is simultaneously a symbolic rejection by the state. In these cases, the “hero system” of being an American citizen or a protected member of society is physically dismantled through executive action. The symbol and the reality collide in a way that makes the threat feel total.
Ultimately, the belief that his elections are a personal disaster stems from the fact that he forces a confrontation with the “creatureliness” that Becker says we try so hard to ignore. By breaking the aesthetic and moral spells of traditional governance, he removes the illusions that many use to feel heroic and secure. Whether the change is a new tax rate or a perceived decline in national dignity, the result is the same: a profound sense of loss that feels as real as any physical wound.
Ernest Becker argues in The Denial of Death that humans are driven by a fundamental terror of our own mortality. To manage this anxiety, we build “hero systems” or “immortality projects.” These are the cultural frameworks, belief systems, and social roles that allow us to feel like we are part of something permanent and significant. When a person believes in the progress of democracy, the sanctity of institutions, or a specific moral arc of history, they are participating in a hero system that gives their life meaning beyond their physical existence.
For a large segment of the American population, the national identity functions as their primary immortality project. They view the United States not just as a collection of laws, but as a noble experiment in Enlightenment values and civil behavior. Trump often acts as a wrecking ball to the aesthetic and behavioral norms of that system. When he mocks traditional rituals or challenges the dignity of high office, he is not just changing a policy; he is delegitimizing the very framework that helps these individuals feel “good” and “right” in the world.
This explains why the reaction to him is often so visceral and out of proportion to specific legislative changes. If your sense of self-worth is tied to the idea that you live in a rational, polite, and progressing society, a leader who thrives on chaos and perceived “low-status” behavior creates a state of acute existential dread. Becker would suggest that this looks like an “annihilation of the self.” If the hero system is proven to be a farce, the individual is left naked before their own insignificance.
However, the physical and the symbolic are often intertwined. For many, the hero system includes the promise of protection for their family or the stability of their profession. When the symbolic order breaks down, people fear the physical consequences follow closely behind. A person might feel that if the “rule of law” immortality project fails, then their physical safety is no longer guaranteed. The symbolic wound is the lead indicator of a physical threat.
Even a citizen who ignores the news and avoids political debate still interacts with the machinery of the federal government every day. When that machinery changes, the ripples eventually reach the individual level.
Federal policy dictates the cost of basic needs. For example, changes to the Affordable Care Act or the expiration of premium tax credits can result in a sudden, sharp increase in monthly health insurance premiums. A law-abiding citizen who never watches the news still sees that higher bill in their mailbox. Similarly, tariff policies can drive up the price of groceries and consumer goods. A person might not know which executive order caused the price of a gallon of milk to rise, but they feel the resulting strain on their bank account.
The quality of public services also shifts with an administration. Mass workforce reductions in federal agencies can lead to longer wait times at the Social Security office or delays in processing tax refunds. If the Department of Government Efficiency makes deep cuts to agencies like FEMA, a citizen in a disaster zone might find that federal assistance arrives more slowly than it did in the past. These are not ideological grievances; they are practical disruptions to the way people live.
For many, the difference is also one of social atmosphere. Even if you do not follow the news, you live in a community. When national rhetoric becomes more polarized, it can change how neighbors interact. It can lead to the loss of friendships or create tension at family gatherings. The atmosphere of the country—the general “mood”—often changes with the person in the Oval Office, and that shift can make a community feel either more cohesive or more fractured.
Many Americans view the elections of Donald Trump as uniquely personal catastrophes because they perceive his presidency as a direct threat to their identity, safety, and fundamental rights. Unlike traditional political shifts where disagreements center on tax rates or zoning laws, the rhetoric and policies of the Trump era often touch on the immutable characteristics of citizens. For many immigrants, people of color, and LGBTQ+ individuals, his administration represents an existential risk rather than a mere change in governance.
The intensity of this feeling stems from a sense of total vulnerability. Many families live with the immediate fear of deportation or the loss of healthcare protections that they rely on for survival. When a leader uses language that targets specific groups, members of those groups often internalize it as a personal rejection by their own country. This creates a deep psychological burden that transcends simple partisan disappointment.
Institutional erosion also plays a role in this personal sense of loss. People who view the stability of the legal system and democratic norms as the bedrock of their personal security feel the ground shifting beneath them. The perceived weaponization of the Department of Justice or the rollback of civil rights protections suggests to many that the government is no longer a neutral arbiter but an active adversary. This breakdown in trust makes every policy change feel like a targeted strike against one’s way of life.
The social fabric has also frayed in ways that people experience at their dinner tables and in their group chats. The polarization surrounding his elections has led to the permanent estrangement of friends and family members. For many, the “worst thing” is not just a policy in Washington, but the fact that their personal relationships have been hollowed out by a political environment that demands total allegiance. The election becomes a marker for the moment their private world became inseparable from a volatile public conflict.
Psychological studies suggest that for a significant portion of the population, the stress surrounding Donald Trump’s presidency is not just a disagreement over policy, but a form of “sociopolitical stress” that mimics clinical anxiety. Data from the American Psychological Association (APA) shows that since 2016, and accelerating through the 2024 election and into 2025, a majority of Americans identify the political climate as a primary source of stress. For those on the left, this often manifests as a perceived loss of agency and a sense of impending disaster, leading to what some commentators have colloquially called “Trump Anxiety Disorder.”
Whether this is “adaptive” depends on how a person defines the boundaries of their personal life. From a strictly stoic perspective, freaking out over things outside of your direct control is indeed maladaptive. It consumes mental energy without altering the outcome. However, psychologists often note that for many people, politics is no longer a separate “news item” but a direct variable in their personal safety and economic stability. If a person believes that a change in federal policy will result in the loss of their healthcare or the deportation of a family member, their anxiety is a rational response to a tangible threat, even if the policy itself is not within their individual control.
The “mental health crisis” on the left is also fueled by the breakdown of social anchors. Becker’s “hero systems” are often reinforced by our immediate social circles and family structures. When political polarization leads to the severing of these ties—which about 30% of Americans reported doing during the last election cycle—the individual loses the very support system they need to process stress. This creates a feedback loop: the political event damages the social support system, which in turn makes the individual less resilient and more prone to viewing the political event as a personal catastrophe.
Resilience in this environment often requires a process of “cognitive reappraisal.” This involves acknowledging the reality of the political shift while intentionally refocusing on the local and personal spheres where an individual still possesses agency. While millions feel that the “worst thing” has happened to them, those who maintain the best mental health are typically those who can decouple their personal worth and safety from the national narrative. They find ways to act on their values locally rather than remaining in a state of paralysis over national headlines.
Religious, traditional, and tribal people focus on their families, jobs and communities, and that seems a healthier way to live.
Charles Taylor’s distinction between the buffered and porous self provides a sharp lens for understanding the current American psyche. The porous self, characteristic of the pre-modern world, lived in an “enchanted” environment where the boundaries between the individual and the outside world were thin. Meanings, spirits, and cosmic forces could “get to” the person from the outside. In contrast, the modern buffered self is an autonomous individual who sees their mind as a protected space. Meaning is something the buffered self creates internally, and they view themselves as invulnerable to “external” spiritual or moral forces.
The election of Donald Trump has acted as a massive shock to this modern sense of buffering. For many Americans, particularly those in the professional and elite classes who most strongly inhabit the buffered identity, his political rise felt like a “breach” of their internal sanctuary. They believed that the “meanings of things”—the stability of the law, the progress of history, the dignity of the office—were secure and objective truths that protected their personal peace. When those structures were challenged, it forced a realization that the self is far more porous than they had assumed. They discovered that they could not, in fact, “disengage” from the outside world; the external chaos had successfully invaded their internal mental state.
This recognition is painful because the buffered self relies on a sense of mastery and control. If you can no longer buffer yourself against the “vibes” or the rhetoric of a leader you find abhorrent, your autonomy feels compromised. You are no longer the master of your own meanings. For millions, the “worst thing” about the Trump era is this loss of psychological insulation. They feel “exposed” to a world that they previously thought was managed by rational, predictable institutions. They are experiencing the “quavering network of terrors” that Taylor says pre-modern people felt in a world of demons and spirits, only now the “spirits” are political forces and social media cycles.
However, the experience of this porousness is asymmetrical. While many on the left feel “invaded” by his presence, many of his supporters have moved toward a different kind of porosity known as “identity fusion.” In this state, the boundary between the personal self and the leader becomes blurred. The leader’s conquests feel like personal conquests, and his perceived injuries feel like personal attacks. Both sides are moving away from the detached, autonomous “buffered self” and toward a highly reactive, porous state where the national drama is experienced as a direct, intimate struggle for survival.
The highly educated have historically been the primary keepers of the buffered identity. For decades, a university education functioned as an initiation into a worldview where reason, institutional stability, and professional distance protected the individual from the “enchanted” or chaotic forces of the world. However, the political upheavals of the last decade have punctured this insulation, forcing many into a painful and involuntary state of porosity.
The buffered identity relies on the belief that the “meaning of things” is stable and managed by competent experts. When those experts and institutions lose their authority or are openly mocked by the highest levels of government, the highly educated lose their psychological shield. They find that they can no longer “disengage” from national rhetoric; the news is no longer an external data point but an internal emotional intrusion. This explains why the stress levels among the educated often exceed those of the “traditional” or “tribal” groups you mentioned. While a traditional person might rely on a local community that remains intact regardless of the president, the highly educated person’s hero system is often tied to the national and global order. When that order appears to dissolve, their internal world becomes porous to existential dread.
This shift is visible in the changing nature of academic and professional discourse. There is a moving away from the “dispassionate observer” model toward a more “activated” and emotional stance. This is a move toward porosity. When professionals feel that their “buffered” space is being invaded by hostile forces—whether through social media cycles or executive actions—they often react by fusing their personal identity with their political causes. The boundary between “what I do” and “who I am” thins out.
The hit to the buffered identity among the educated has created a new kind of vulnerability. They are now experiencing what Charles Taylor described as the pre-modern condition: a world where external forces have the power to fundamentally alter your internal state of being. For a class of people whose entire hero system was built on the fiction of autonomy and control, this new porosity feels like a permanent state of trauma. The result is not just a disagreement with policy, but a systemic collapse of the psychological architecture they used to navigate the world.
While Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age provides the foundational theory, several contemporary thinkers have written about the specific sensation of the “buffer” failing in the face of modern political and technological life. These essays explore the realization that we are far more porous—susceptible to external “vibes,” digital spirits, and national moods—than our modern education led us to believe.
Key Essays on the Failure of the Buffered Self
1. Technological Enchantments and the End of Modernity
Author: L.M. Sacasas (The Frailest Thing)
Sacasas argues that our digital environment has effectively “re-enchanted” the world, but with algorithms instead of spirits. He suggests that the modern buffered self—the person who believes they are a self-contained, rational actor—is an artifact of a bygone era. In our current “technological milieu,” we are constantly impinged upon by forces we cannot control or see, making our experience of the self more porous and vulnerable, much like the pre-modern world.
Author: Alan Jacobs (Letter & Liturgy)
Jacobs reflects on Taylor’s work to argue that the “buffered self” often feels lonely and flat. He explores how modern people, while claiming to be buffered and rational, frequently fall back into “porous” behaviors—such as seeking mystical meaning in political movements or “following the heart” as if it were an external oracle. He captures the moment when the modern person realizes their “expressive individualism” is actually a form of possession by external cultural spirits.
Author: Charles Taylor (The Immanent Frame)
This is Taylor’s own summary of his thesis, but it reads as a powerful essay on the “subtraction story” of modernity. He describes the buffered self as a “master of the meanings of things,” but notes that many people now look back at the porous self with nostalgia. The essay highlights the “fragility” of the modern buffered state and how easily it can be punctured by things that “get to us.”
4. Obeah and its Others: Buffered Selves in the Era of Tropical Medicine
Author: Kelly Wisecup
While more academic, this essay explores the historical limits of the buffered self. It argues that even during the height of the Enlightenment, people lived with a “conflicted relation” between a disenchanted mind and a body that felt open to invisible, untraceable forces. It provides a historical parallel to the modern feeling of being intellectually “buffered” but physically and emotionally “porous” to the political climate.
5. Why Identity is Failing—and Can’t be Abandoned
Author: The Ideas Letter (Various Contributors)
This recent collection of reflections discusses how “identity politics” has become a new form of enchantment. It suggests that highly educated people who thought they were objective and buffered have instead become “fused” with political identities. This fusion represents a collapse of the buffer, where a national election is no longer an external event but an internal, porous experience of the self.
The recurring theme in these works is that the “buffer” was always a fragile construction of the professional-managerial class. The current political era has not necessarily created new porosity; it has simply stripped away the institutional illusions that allowed us to pretend we were invulnerable.
The rise of artificial intelligence and the subsequent erosion of status closure represent a direct strike on the hyper-educated hero system. For decades, the university degree and the professional credential served as a form of “character armor” that offered both economic security and moral prestige. This system allowed the educated to believe their value was tied to a unique, inimitable cognitive mastery. As AI begins to replicate core professional tasks like legal research, medical diagnostics, and complex writing, that mastery is revealed to be less of a mystical talent and more of a reproducible process. This realization is triggering a profound identity crisis among those who have built their entire self-conception on their intellectual credentials.
Status closure—the process by which social groups restrict access to resources and opportunities to their own members—is failing because the “gate” of the credential is being bypassed. When an algorithm can perform the work of a junior associate or a mid-level analyst, the “badge” of the elite degree loses its exclusivity. This creates a state of “elite over-production,” where there are more individuals with high-status aspirations than there are roles that can sustain them. For the hyper-educated, this is not just an economic threat; it is a symbolic death. It forces an introspection that is often painful because it reveals that their “buffered identity” was actually a “porous” one, entirely dependent on the recognition and stability of the very institutions that AI is now disrupting.
This environment is producing a “mental health crisis of the elite” that mirrors the sociopolitical stress mentioned earlier. When the hero system of the “expert” is dismantled, the individual is left without a clear narrative to explain their place in the world. They may find themselves in a state of “existential nakedness,” realizing that the skills they spent decades honing can be automated in seconds. This leads to a frantic search for new immortality projects, often manifesting as extreme political activism or an obsession with the “ethical” or “human” elements of work that AI allegedly cannot touch. These are attempts to rebuild the buffer and prove that the human expert still possesses a “divine spark” that the machine lacks.
For those who can navigate this shift, the path forward often involves a “de-escalation” of the self. By moving away from the national and institutional hero systems and toward the “tribal” or “local” focus you noted, individuals can find a more resilient sense of purpose. This means finding value in immediate human interactions, craftsmanship, and local service—areas where the “status” is earned through personal presence rather than a credential validated by a failing system. The decline of status closure may be the catalyst that forces the hyper-educated to finally trade their abstract immortality projects for a more grounded, and perhaps healthier, way of being.
The collapse of status closure is perhaps the most significant psychological event for the hyper-educated since the end of the Cold War. For decades, the professional class operated under the “credentialist hero system,” where a high-prestige degree functioned as a shield against the volatility of the market. This system promised that if you mastered a complex, codified body of knowledge—law, medicine, or finance—you were essentially “buffered” from the world’s chaos. AI disrupts this by revealing that much of what was once considered “elite cognitive labor” is actually a series of reproducible patterns.
This disruption triggers an intense period of introspection because it attacks the “self-esteem” and “distinction” pillars of the modern expert. When an algorithm can generate a legal brief or a diagnostic path in seconds, the years of “invested competence” that a professional used to build their identity feel devalued. This is not just an economic threat but a professional identity crisis. The hyper-educated are moving from a buffered state of “I am an expert because of what I know” to a porous, uncertain state of “What makes me uniquely human if a machine can do my work?”
The loss of status closure also accelerates the phenomenon of “elite overproduction.” As AI lowers the barrier to entry for complex tasks, the exclusivity of the credential evaporates. This creates a surplus of individuals with elite aspirations but no “protected” status to claim. The result is often a move toward hyper-politicization or “moral entrepreneurship.” If an expert can no longer distinguish themselves through technical mastery, they may attempt to regain status by positioning themselves as a moral arbiter or an “AI whisperer.” This is a desperate attempt to rebuild the buffer by moving the goalposts of what constitutes elite status.
Ultimately, this transition may force a healthier, more grounded way of life for those willing to accept it. As the abstract hero system of “the global professional” fails, there is a renewed interest in localism, craftsmanship, and roles that require physical presence and irreducible human judgment. For the hyper-educated, the path to resilience lies in admitting that the buffered identity was always a fragile fiction. The move toward a more porous, community-focused existence—concentrating on family, local jobs, and immediate neighbors—is a way to find a permanent significance that a machine cannot simulate and a credential can no longer guarantee.
In law and medicine, the response to AI is a strategic retreat from “technical mastery” toward “human judgment” as the new site of status closure. For over a century, these fields defined their elite status by the ability to memorize and process vast amounts of data—legal precedents or diagnostic indicators. Now that machines can perform these tasks with superior speed and accuracy, professionals are rewriting their “hero system” to focus on the elements of the work that require a physical person.
The Legal Field: From Researcher to Strategist
In the legal sector, the transition is marked by a shift from “information retrieval” to “strategic advocacy.” AI can draft a motion or summarize a thousand pages of discovery, but it cannot stand before a judge and sense the temperament of the court. Status closure is being rebuilt around the concept of “unauthorized practice of law,” which now increasingly focuses on the irreducible human responsibility of the attorney.
Responsibility as Closure: Courts are issuing rulings that hold human lawyers strictly accountable for AI-generated “hallucinations” or fabricated citations. This creates a new buffer: the lawyer is the only one who can legally and morally “vouch” for the truth.
The Nuance of Negotiation: Status is now found in the ability to read a client’s risk tolerance or an opponent’s bluff. These are “porous” skills—they require a person to be open to the emotional and social environment in a way that a closed-loop AI system currently is not.
The Medical Field: From Diagnostic to Pastoral
Medicine is undergoing a similar reckoning, moving away from the “doctor-as-encyclopedia” model. AI systems like GPT-4 are already outperforming human doctors in diagnostic accuracy and even in the “empathy” of written responses. In response, the medical establishment is re-emphasizing the “pastoral” role of the physician.
The Physicality of Care: Status closure is shifting toward the “hands-on” aspects of medicine—the physical exam, the surgical procedure, and the bedside manner. These are tasks that require a human presence and cannot be outsourced to a digital interface.
Moral Weight: New laws, such as those in California and Texas, now mandate that AI-generated clinical communications be disclosed and reviewed by a licensed human. The “hero” is no longer the one who knows the most facts, but the one who carries the final accountability for a life-or-death decision.
The Rebranding of “Human Value”
Both fields are attempting to convince the public—and themselves—that the “human in the loop” is not a bottleneck, but a safeguard. This is an attempt to reconstruct the buffered identity by claiming that humans possess a “divine spark” of judgment that exists outside the realm of algorithmic calculation. They are betting that even if an AI can diagnose a disease or draft a contract better than a person, a human client or patient will still pay a premium for a person to be “with” them in their vulnerability.
This shift suggests that the hyper-educated are trying to solve their existential crisis by becoming more “tribal.” They are abandoning the abstract, global mastery of information and returning to the role of the trusted local authority whose value is based on their personal character and physical presence.