Philosophy Now Forum

Donald Trump and Mao Zedong are two very different people of very different backgrounds and eras, but after listening to Trump’s speech I think there are lots of commonalities between them: Here is a list of that those commonalities are and I can provide enough evidence to support my findings:

1. Strong Nationalism:
Donald Trump believes America used to be a great country, but it is now in deep trouble, and he is determined to end those “harmful treaties and deals” to “make America great again “once he enter s the office.
Mao Zedong believes China used to be a great country and in his writing the phrase “make China great again” is all over the pages. He immediately ended almost all “unequal treaties” after he came to power.

2. Xenophobia：
Donald Trump believes that America is under attacks from some foreign powers, and he is determined to build some walls to “protect America”. He considers Islam a threat to America and he wants to expel all Muslims and forbid them from entering America.
Mao Zedong believed that China was under attacks from many foreign powers; and once he came to power he forbid all Christians from entering China.

3. Class-war masters:
Donald Trump came to power by telling the ordinary folks that a “corrupt Washington power elite” causes all the troubles in America, and the “working people” should follow him to fight this “power elite”.
Mao Zedong came to power by telling the ordinary folks that a “corrupt ruling-class” causes all the troubles in China, and the “working class” should follow him to fight this “ruling-class”.

4. Military first:
Donald Trump is determined to spend multi-billion dollars to bolster the US military with the plan of reducing cost-of-living adjustments and trimming benefits despite the fact that America is in debts by trillions.
Mao Zedong spent a big chunk of China’s wealth to build a strong army despite of having millions of Soviet debts and food shortage.

5. Ideologues
Donald Trump attacks the political correctness of his enemy while at the same time he keeps his own political correctness intact. In this process, he is creating a brand-new ideology—Trumpism.
Mao Zedong attacked the political correctness of his enemy before and after he came to power, meanwhile he wrote several books to safeguard his own political correctness, and in this process, he created a brand-new ideology—Maoism。

6. “Womanizers”
A record of Donald Trump was leaked showing that he has had intimate relationships with several women.
In a book by Mao Zedong’s personal physician, Mao also had intimate relationships with several women.

Do those commonalities really exist?

They seem rather weak. Mao and Trump as unscrupulous womanisers isn't much of a link, and by the standards of politicians, neither leads the field in that disgrace. Neither comes close to JFK on that score.

I also don't think Mao said "Make China great again", at least not as some slogan. He's more associated with "Great leap forward" and "Century of humiliation" which cover similar ground. And surely if the Donald had pinched his campaign slogan from Mao, that would have been a pretty big deal when he was using it?

If you have evidence Trump wants to go so far as expelling Muslims, you should share that. But I don't think Mao expelled Chinese Christians, I think he just suppressed their religion. Suppressing an unfavoured religion isn't unique to Mao, nor is it something he excelled above all others at. I think it's a tenuous link unless there is something in the methods or reasons of suppression that exclusively links them.

Class warfare hardly starts with Mao, and I don't see any particular link between Trump and Mao among all the other class war zealots. I see far more variance between them. The Donald is unlikely to strip the wealthy of their property for instance.

Mao was a guerilla warrior who fought the Japanese in WWII and then a civil war which he came close to losing. He had a hostile government in exile across the Taiwan Straight backed by a nuclear armed superpower. He had some reason to put resources into his military. Among all the leaders who have poured money into the military, I see no particular link between Mao's choice to do so and Trump's (should he choose to do so).

Mao was not a terribly flexible ideologue as I recall. Aside from the Taiwan question which he was powerless to resolve, he wasn't famous for reversing course in the face of criticism. Trump will have no such option, he will compromise and just claim to have gotten amazing deals on everything. Mao would have had us both shot.

Ooh! I'll play!

Mao wrote a little red book.

Trump has read books very little.

I think I read a book titled something like "On Tyranny," not long ago, but a reputable historian that pointed out some similarities between Trump and fascists of the past. So, it's not as if this post can be completely written off as pure speculative nonsense, when we do see some alarming signs from Trump.

It's the social justice warriors encircling their victims for abuse and shaming sessions that remind me of Mao's cultural revolution.

Perhaps you write that in complete ignorance of what actually happened in cultural revolution?
Or maybe you get so overwhelmed by all dramas that when somebody eats the last biscuit on the plate you are reminded of Genseric's hordes descending upon Rome.

Mao slaughtered more people than Hitler and Stalin combined, and you want to equate Mao's cultural revolution with social justice warriors on social media?