One of things that fuels the emotional Trump rallies is our political paradigm. In America, politics is a struggle for power. In my view, we have several different ways of fighting for power.

Note: I’ve learned a little about this, but am no expert. I’m just looking and thinking and sharing with you.

Childish struggle for power

Where do we learn to struggle for social power? It’s usually as young kids with siblings or neighborhood friends. Kids push their way to the front- like that reporter did when he stood up at a Trump rally and commanded attention. Or they interrupt and talk over each other, like Trump did to reassert the upper hand.

Little kids take whatever they want and assert things are “mine” even when they’re not. It reminds me of the story where Trump did everything he could to run some woman out of her beachfront property. His wants trump his compassion.

Some kids bully others, steal from them and feel no remorse. Like when Trump took goods from people but declared a project bankrupt and didn’t pay them.

Where are the parents?

Little kids break the rules their parents give them, testing boundaries. Like when Trump calls women names. He knows not to do that. But he can’t help himself. He has a sense its wrong, but has to be reminded. And then, like a little kid, lies that it was all in fun and he didn’t mean it. Or he makes a joke about it to try to take attention away from an adult conversation about manners. He wants to dominate. He refuses to be dominated even by a parental figure.

Trump seems to have a very young judgement about right and wrong. Many have sued him. For him, court is the parent figure. If the court doesn’t say it’s wrong, then he gets away with it. And since he’s a bully, frequently his mom, the court, has to step in to force him to do the right thing.

Public dominance – shame and expulsion

Kids also learn to call each other names, ridicule them. Trump just can’t resist calling his opponent “crooked Hillary.” This means little or nothing to adults. But Trump supporters, who seem to operate at this immature level as well, all mimic the name-calling, trying to use the force of public shaming.

Or they use the final option of little kids- to reject someone and expel them from the group, like Trump does so often from his rallies. Or they “take their ball and go home”, as Trump did by sitting out one debate. They also dominate by physically fighting or threatening to fight, like Trump dominates by reminding his followers of how great it used to be to beat people up at rallies.

It’s not just Trump

Many of Trump’s followers seem to love these behaviors. Probably many have a hard time with the complex rules of adolescents, much less to behave as adults. They want that thrill of dominating.

Americans often try to keep our politics more adult than that. But those childish lessons are inside. Many of us let them out at sporting events.

Being attacked by such childishness easily provokes childish responses. Rubio got sucked down to that level when he criticized Trump’s “small hands.” The other candidates resisted pretty well, but not always completely. It’s very, very tempting to fight fire with fire.

Next: The adolescent effort to win.

In the previous article, I looked at how Trump childishly tries to dominate. In this, I’ll look at the more mature behavior of adolescents- desiring to win and be right.

As I said in the previous article, I’m no expert in this. I’m just looking and thinking. Also, there’s nothing wrong with acting childish or adolescent or adult in politics. Although it’s our society. We can make rules and say what’s right.

Adolescent struggle to win, and make the opposition lose

The childish struggle for power soon changes into an adolescent struggle to win. There are rules for the struggle, the rules of games and sports. The contestants fight within the rules. And they fight to win for their fans, as well as for themselves. Meanwhile the fans empathize with the wins and losses of “their” team and the challenge of battling the opposition.

We saw a lot of this in the Republican debate. The candidates besides Trump followed the rules of decorum. They tried to score many of the same points, but couldn’t be as immature and boisterous. They certainly were adult as well, but it’s very challenging to be adult with Trump.

In politics, an adolescent win often means being right and making the opposition be wrong. We see this frequently. It often takes the form of repeated noting of something questionable the opponent did, like Hillary’s acceptance of huge payments for speaking to financial firms. It’s one thing to note it, it’s another to keep harping on it.

Referees replace parents

Adolescents are no longer disciplined in sports by their parents. Instead, they have referees who make sure they follow the rules.

If we choose to keep our politics at the adolescent level or higher, we really should do what we’ve done in professional sports and have professional, disciplined referees. They should be stepping in as often as referees do, policing even little mistakes to maintain the rules and ensure politicians don’t get carried away.

We could even make rules like no lying or name-calling. So you could say someone was lying in a certain situation where you quote them. But you can’t call them a liar.

This might make politics very challenging for some, like Trump. But it would still be fair.

Of course, we shouldn’t bar him from running for office for this. But at a debate, his microphone could be turned off as a penalty for an infraction. And for insulting the moderator he could be kicked out. But we’d have to be disciplined about it.

In the next article, we’ll look a bit at adults, and a new possibility.