The Arsonists Who Pretend to Be Firefighters

 The Arsonists Who Pretend to Be Firefighters

(By Sylvie Imelda Shene)

Everywhere I look — from the workplace to the world stage — I see the same psychological game repeating itself. It’s the ancient drama of the wounded child who grows up and learns to disguise their chaos as leadership. My boss at my last job used to play this game perfectly: he’d create confusion, tension, and conflict among employees, then swoop in pretending to be the “hero” putting out the very fires he had started. It’s a performance of power — but underneath it lies deep emotional sickness.

This is how sociopaths survive: by projecting their own crimes onto others. They accuse the innocent to hide their guilt. They criminalize truth-tellers to protect their illusions. They stir up fear and division to distract from their corruption. What we see today with ICE raids and Trump’s manipulative politics is the same pathology, only magnified. It’s psychological warfare on a national scale.

Like the Gestapo in Nazi Germany, these modern enforcers operate under the illusion of “law and order.” But what they enforce is not justice — it’s repression. They destroy families and traumatize children under the false banner of “security.” And like all tyrants, Trump thrives on chaos. He provokes violence so he can appear as the savior who restores peace. It’s the classic abuser pattern: wound, then pretend to heal.

Alice Miller taught us that such cruelty always originates in childhood. The person who terrorizes others once felt powerless, humiliated, unseen. Unable to face their pain, they reenact it — forcing others to feel what they cannot bear to feel themselves. That is the secret of every dictator, every workplace tyrant, every abuser hiding behind a uniform or a title.

But I survived this game because I see it. I no longer confuse manipulation with strength. I no longer believe in saviors who demand obedience. My protest is not in the streets but in my writing, in my refusal to be silent. I vote, I speak, I write — not out of hate, but out of love for truth.

America is entering dark times again, but I believe in the light of awareness. The more we name these games, the weaker they become. The world doesn’t need more heroes pretending to fight fires — it needs witnesses who expose who keeps striking the match.