Maligning one's intended target as part of preparation to assault

Maligning one's intended target as part of preparation to assault, is another mode of what some people do do. Sometimes that is called "character assassination."

There is lots of it mildly going on currently in the political posturing, getting much attention in the news lately.

This is something that I have not been so aware of in most of my life, although looking back, more seems to have been occurring than I was aware of at the time.

And, this fits right in with the apparently standard military technique of "monsterizing" the enemy, as part of psychological conditioning of the troops so that they are fantasizing they are destroying monsters instead of destroying fellow human beings, when going into battle.

Generalized, the principle may be a subset of the "I am better than you/he is" or "we are better than they are" operational mode, with particular derivatives "you/he are worse than I am" or "they are worse than we are."

On the destruction-construction scale, it is deeply into the destructive side of the scale; therefore, it seems likely that its root cause is from some fear in the perpetrators, even the fear of not being the sole owners of everything in sight, or being the sole reproductive option for third party observers.

As a practical application, this principle suggests that, if total strangers or minimal acquaintances start off with treating you as if you are a very bad person, it might be a flag to be on the alert for it being some kind of excuse for some kind of assault on oneself, that may be being prepared by some predatory entity that wants to look like the hero instead of as a predator.

Malevolent descriptions of one's intended rival or victim, appears to be a standard technique sometimes practiced in human endeavors, ranging from war preparations, to sheer reproductive rivalry of enormous variety.