What to Do With a Madman?

How does one man manage to traumatize the entire world, holding everyone hostage with his mind games while controlling unlimited outcomes?

I’ve always wondered how this is possible.

On a smaller scale, I witnessed a similar phenomenon growing up in a religious cult, an authoritarian dictatorship within a closed society. Anyone who has survived life in a cult knows what I’m talking about. There’s one person, often a man, who makes all the decisions, and all of the decisions benefit him. Everyone else is there to support what he wants and to sacrifice their entire lives so that he can get what he needs. No one else matters.

He’s the divine leader, the one chosen by God no less. This is his calling.

When you’re raised on a steady diet of authoritarianism, you’ve been conditioned to fear repercussions if you make a decision that runs counter to what the chosen one has ordained. You will go to hell for eternity if you do. You could get ostracized from the community. You may be called in to face the stern reprimands of the brethren, those brothers who are nearest to God’s chosen man and believe they are privileged to protect his calling from anyone who defies him. You could be beaten. Your own parents might disown you, even cast you out of the closed society, the only culture you’ve known.

It’s a grim outlook.

So, I understand the psychological tactics used by a delusional leader who rules with an iron fist. I’m familiar with the tried and true methodologies of these madmen who are determined to believe that they are gods. Through fear and restricting what their followers get to read, where they get to go, who they can befriend, and what they choose to believe, the glorious leader successfully keeps their followers in line, marching step by step to his relentless commands.

I left the cult.

Yeah, I got the hell out of Dodge City when I was eighteen years old. I was disowned, of course. I was uncertain how I would fit into the civilian world, but I left.

That was my only choice.

It’s still hard for me to accept, however, that one crazy, delusional, ruthless, man can terrorize the entire world. It pisses me off. It drives me to call for action on the part of his unfortunate followers. I want to scream, “ It’s been too long. How much longer are you going to allow this one crazy individual with delusions of grandeur to ruin your lives and the lives of your children, let alone the rest of the world? Get rid of him, leave him, do something.”

The followers are often not even there by choice.

They may have simply inherited the leader. I did. If you’re born into a madman’s world, that’s about as grim as it gets. It’s not the same as voting for a madman, is it? The people who choose, even enable a madman to flourish are as guilty as the madman. But let’s face it, young people often inherit a pile of shit from their parents.

I did.

My heart goes out to the young people who strap on a gun and risk their lives for a madman. That’s the ultimate sacrifice for the chosen one. Right? He may sit in a castle or a church enjoying his position of power, but his loyal followers are never granted the same luxury. Instead, they must prove their love of the leader by risking their lives for him.

It’s a strange old world and yet kind of predictable after all.

There are only so many ways that people react to an authoritarian madman who terrorizes the entire world. It’s been playing out roughly the same way as far back as the Roman Empire when the insane and cruel Emperor Caligula traumatized the entire kingdom. The people finally got fed up. They couldn’t endure him any longer. On January 24, 41 A.D. the madman Emperor Caligula was attacked by a group of guardsman, stabbed thirty times, and buried in a shallow grave.

Afterwards, the people tore down every existing statue in an effort to wipe him from their memories.

Teresa Roberts is a retired educator, author, world traveler, and professional myth buster. You can find her books on Amazon.