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🧩 BND Motif Index · M1810

Kiss up, kick down

A man who bullies those beneath him is said to cringe before those above him: hard on the weak, the submissive one in the presence of stronger men.

🎭 ArchetypesπŸ—‚οΈ Politician ArchetypesπŸ—‚οΈ Leader-Follower Dynamics

⚠️ A story people tell, not a claim that it's true.

A motif is the shape of a story as its tellers tell it, named the way a folklorist names a tale type, so the same story told about other people, by the other side or in another year lands in the same place. Some of the claims below are true, many are false. Arguing against a story is often a story of its own, its answer (Voter fraud is answered by Voter suppression, Lawfare by No one is above the law), and we file it there; where no answer has a motif yet, the arguments against a story sit with its tellings.

πŸͺœ Its family

what it rests on, what rests on it, and the motifs that answer it

πŸͺœ rests on 🧩 Lapdog

πŸŽ™οΈ Who it came up with

the shows we follow where its claims came up (4 left-leaning, 0 center, 0 right-leaning so far), colored by the show's lean; the bar is how many of its claims each one heard

  1. 🫏 David Pakman Show (podcast) 1 claim
  2. 🫏 The Adam Mockler Show 1 claim
  3. 🫏 The MeidasTouch Podcast 1 claim
  4. 🫏 To the Contrary with Charlie Sykes 1 claim

"Came up on" means one of its claims was heard on the show: told, reported or argued against. We don't yet mark which. Show leans are our own grouping of the shows we transcribe.

🧢 Its claims

what's been told in this shape, in our words, by who told it: newest first in each; a claim's dots are the shows it came up on, in their lean's color (point at them for their names)

Told on the left 2

claims heard on left-leaning shows, and no right-leaning one

  • 2026-10-20 β€œDonald Trump is a Putin bootlicker who has made the United States subservient to a gangster hierarchy.” 2
  • 2026-10-19 β€œTrump is afraid of powerful men like Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong-un.” 2

Told on the right 0

claims heard on right-leaning shows, and no left-leaning one

πŸ¦— No claim heard only on the right so far.

M1810 Β· first seen 2026-11-09 Β· what this is Β· how the index works