General Discussion

Around 2015, some body language "expert" coached them that spreading their legs to ridiculous extents was a "power stance". And some of them avidly took it to extremes.


George Osborn


David Cameron


Theresa May


Sajid Javid


Boris Johnson

Some have traced the advice to a 2013 TED Talk by body language expert Amy Cuddy:

She based her findings on research that found that adopting a spread-legged stance could boost testosterone levels. Unfortunately, whichever guru taught the Tories forgot the part of her advice that recommended doing it in private before an important speech or whatever, not in public, where it just looks vaguely demented.

If the Tories had been better fans of Blackadder, they might have picked up on that nuance, which the show amply described:



I've no idea whether this has anything to do with why Trump was standing like that, but it does remind me of my younger childhood, when one of my playmates might occasionally have had an unfortunate accident and been forced to plod spread-legged home for a severe scolding, a clean-up and a change of clothes.