Trump Is an ‘Anti-Hero’

Jemima Kelly: “Many worry that all his legal woes are turning Trump into a ‘martyr,’ but I’m not sure that quite captures it. It would imply, apart from anything else, that Trump is being persecuted for some kind of strongly held beliefs or principles. But he is in possession of neither — apart from the belief in himself. No, Trump is no feeble martyr. He is something altogether more ‘based’ — to borrow the internet slang-word for someone who is respected for paying no regard to political correctness or even basic morality.”

“Trump is the ultimate American anti-hero. An anti-hero, a word normally associated with fictional characters, is someone who plays the central role in a story despite possessing none of the virtues associated with a traditional heroic lead character. In a 2022 paper, a pair of researchers described the anti-hero as ‘a bewitching, unrepentant, amoral outsider who breaks old rules and creates new ones while leaving chaos in his wake.'”