Obama Wants To Fight ISIS by Telling Them They Are Weak

Obama has a killer counter-terror strategy:

President Obama has a new way to defeat the Islamic State: by telling the terror organization they are weak…

“It is very important for us to not respond with fear. As I said, that’s hard to do because we see the impact in such an intimate way with the attacks that they make, Obama said at a press conference. But we defeat them in part by saying you are not strong, you are weak.

Note that rabbits project. To Obama, if he did his best to make somebody miserable, and that person unemotionally ridiculed him as weak and impotent, that would crush him and destroy his motivation.

You see this with narcissists who are trying to wear down a target. They will perform some amygdala stimulation, like asserting that something highly objectionable is true, and then look eagerly. If the target gets emotional as they object, the narcissist will show the slightest relief/happiness, and then regroup and irritate them again by doubling down on their assertion.

The best way to freak them out is to not be affected. If they look on eagerly, and you impassionately ignore them and carry on as you were, they will transition to a look of anguish and disappointment. It is why the stillface expression is so powerful.

It is interesting to see Obama perceive the rabbity nature of Islamic radicals, and offer advice that is what he feels would best demotivate himself.

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Mantis Toboggan
Mantis Toboggan
8 years ago

I don’t exactly get it. Are you partly agreeing with Obama?

Malignant narcissists don’t back down when they feel their strategy is working. Telling ISIS that they are weak doesn’t mean anything while there’s footage on TV of westerners cowering in fear and hiding under benches. That footage tells ISIS that they are winning, so they will naturally assume the weakness thing is a projection or a bluff. It may cause some narcissistic injury, but it won’t deter them. Perhaps it would work if our actions were aligned with our words and we actually presented a face of strength after terrorist attacks and tried to look unphased, but we look very phased. We are actually downright exhibitionist about how “horrified” and “shocked” and “saddened” we are by these attacks. Like that cartoon you posted the other day. ISIS would see that cartoon and have no choice but to think they are winning. The west is horrified, and the terrorists and their sympathizers gleefully share stories on social about how afraid westerners are to come out of their houses. So, Obama coming along and saying “you’re weak” isn’t going to do anything.

I wonder what Obama would say if someone said “okay, that’s one part. What’s the other part?”

Mantis Toboggan
Mantis Toboggan
Reply to  Mantis Toboggan
8 years ago

Just wanted to add that this seems to be a case of “projective identification” and not merely “projection”. Obama wants ISIS to feel the weakness that he projects onto them.

Here’s a quick explanation of the difference between projection and projective identification:
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-projection-and-projective-identification

Narcissists do this all the time. They not only project things on to someone, they manipulate that person into feeling the things they project onto them.

Anyway, just because Obama is a narcissist and ISIS are also narcissists means that this trading of projections back and forth is very interesting, and you are absolutely correct to analyze it the way you did because there is definitely some insight to be gained by analyzing what Obama is able to perceive about the nature of Islamic radicals due to his own narcissism, but ultimately, this is just a case of two narcissists disagreeing with each other about which one of them is the narcissist. Nothing special.