What Trump Has Stripped in 2025 (And Why Some Don’t Even Notice)
The Ground Shift You Felt
Feeling off lately? Dizzy, disoriented, like the floor beneath the country just rearranged while you blinked?
It’s not your imagination. That’s your body registering systemic collapse. Civil structures—legal protections, social contracts, institutions—aren’t quietly evolving. They’re being ripped out.
And because our bodies are wired for survival, we respond. Some of us scream. Some go silent. That silence? It’s not peace. It’s shutdown.
Here’s what’s already been taken—and why it feels so different depending on who you are.
DEI: Deleted, Dismantled, Dissed
On Day One, Trump signed Executive Order 14151, eliminating federal support for diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility programs. Gone.
Also gone: Executive Order 11246, which required federal contractors to uphold affirmative action and diversity standards.
Websites? Offline. Grants? Dead. Offices and staff? Vanished.
This wasn’t a rollback. It was a purge.
For marginalized people, DEI wasn’t fluff. It was institutional acknowledgment. Its destruction tells their nervous systems: “Your safety is not a priority.” That triggers trauma responses—dissociation, hypervigilance, collapse.
For those who never needed those protections? It feels like nothing changed.
The Gestapo State Has a PR Department
Trump federalized D.C.’s police. Masked agents now roam U.S. cities. Rooftop snipers. ICE raids. Journalists detained. No accountability.
Local democratic control over law enforcement? Gutted. Instead, overlapping military and police operations blur legal boundaries, creating a national paramilitary force loyal to one man.
When the same face controls police, military, and local governance, trust dies. The only option left is submission—or resistance.
For some, this feels like order restored. For others, it’s a locked room with the lights off.
Workers’ Rights: Cut at the Knees
Trump gutted federal workers’ union rights. No bargaining. No protection.
Project 2025 goes further:
- Lets states override national labor law
- Allows companies to dissolve unions mid-contract
- Removes penalties for employer retaliation
Wage protections, overtime rules, and unemployment benefits are all on the chopping block.
For those already living in economic chaos, this is familiar territory. But for others—especially white-collar workers who believed the system had their back—this is the first real taste of betrayal.
Gender Identity: Legislated Out of Existence
Executive Order 14168 redefines sex as binary and immutable under federal law. Gender identity? No longer recognized. Gender-affirming care? Targeted. Pronouns? Erased from official use.
This is an assault not just on rights but on being.
DEI erasure deletes identity from systems. EO 14168 deletes it from the body.
When the state denies your internal reality, the brain perceives injury. This isn’t just policy—it’s psychic violence.
And for those who’ve never been acknowledged by the state to begin with, this is just confirmation.
Health, Education, Visibility—Gone
LGBTQ+ healthcare protections were rescinded. Data collection on sexual orientation and gender identity? Stopped.
Schools now face federal threats: comply with anti-trans mandates or lose funding.
Say “diversity” in a grant proposal? Lose your budget.
Representation is being legally erased.
When institutions stop collecting your data, they stop seeing you. When they stop seeing you, you stop existing—at least in the official record. And invisibility, over time, is a form of sanctioned harm.
Why Some Are Still Clapping
The Authoritarian Comfort Zone (And Why It Feels Like Love)
Here’s the part no one wants to say out loud:
A lot of people don’t hate authoritarianism. They were raised by it.
They don’t see power grabs and civil rights rollbacks and go, “Oh no, fascism.”
They see home.
I know this because I was raised that way.
When I was little, my mother grounded me because she loved me.
Not in the cartoon way—“you broke curfew, give me your phone.”
No, I mean grounded like a lockdown. Confiscated my belongings. Monitored who I spoke to. Decided what I could read. All of it under the banner of “protection.”
She said she was keeping me safe from the world.
But really, she was keeping the world safe from knowing me.
In her mind, love meant control. Not understanding, not respect—just override.
I grew up believing that being loved meant being watched. That safety required submission. That if I just followed the rules hard enough, maybe I’d finally be allowed to exist without punishment.
So when I see MAGA voters cheering as Trump centralizes power, erases identities, and militarizes peace, I don’t see confusion.
I see familiarity.
Many MAGA-aligned folks were taught the same emotional equation:
- Obedience = safety
- Defiance = chaos
- Authority = love
They weren’t raised to expect freedom; they were raised to fear it.
They learned early that being “good” means shrinking. That compliance earns care. That control means protection.
So when a political father figure promises to “restore order,” even if it means silencing millions, it feels like love.
They made peace with their chains long ago.
Now they’re applauding as more are handed out.
To them, this isn’t cruelty—it’s structure.
Not violence—reassurance.
They never had to depend on DEI, or gender recognition, or labor protection to feel safe.
So when those things vanish, it doesn’t feel like a loss. It feels like coming home.
Like Dad returning to fix everything—with a belt.
Authoritarianism feels like love when you’ve only ever experienced love as control.
And when someone powerful promises to protect you by restricting someone else, it feels safe—until it’s your turn.
By then, the locks are already changed.
What’s Gone—A Recap
- DEI and identity protections
- Local democratic control of policing
- Workers’ collective bargaining rights
- Recognition of gender identity and bodily autonomy
- LGBTQ+ healthcare access
- Educational independence
- Data visibility and representation
What replaced it?
- Paramilitary enforcement
- Top-down censorship
- Surveillance infrastructure
- Fear as policy
- Executive supremacy
- Pardons for insurrectionists
- A rulebook written for one man—and fewer of the rest of us
Final Thought
If your body is screaming, it’s not broken. It’s translating the crisis.
If your mind is asking, “What now?”—good. That’s clarity, not despair.
We’re not broken because we feel this.
We’re alive because we refuse not to.
