You've probably all heard of "Trump Derangement Syndrome" (TDS). And we've seen it in action. It is, more or less, an irrational hatred and rejection of Donald Trump and everything he does.

There are numerous public examples of this, aside from the mainstream media (MSNBC and CNN in particular). Robert DeNiro's recent public statements make it clear he has a particularly pernicious case of this. I used to be a fan of Wil Wheaton (Wesley Crusher on Star Trek Next Generation). I watched his videos on Youtube and considered him an intelligent fellow with a reasonable outlook. Until Trump. At that point, he went completely off the rails and ranted irrationally about Trump. I stopped being a fan.

I've previously discussed why Trump got elected, so I won't go into that. But it is worth examining what this syndrome is, and what causes it.

One clue as to how TDS works is that ordinary folks can look at something Trump does and simply take it for what it looks like. He visits Estonia and people say, "Ah well, he visited Estonia". Those afflicted with TDS, on the other hand, see his Estonia trip as something sinister, brimming with hidden agendas and evil intent.

That's the key to this. Those with TDS see everything connected with Trump as tawdry and bad. Ordinary people don't. But why? How can one person looking at an event see one thing, and another see something entirely different?

The answer is in how TDS sufferers see Trump at his core. They view him as fundamentally evil, fundamentally unsuited for his office, fundamentally unworthy of human regard. Thus, a seemingly neutral event becomes a thread in a tapestry of deprivation. The guy has a phone call with the Ukrainian president, and immediately there are overtones of hidden machinations. When the transcript is released and it shows nothing of the sort, the TDSers still see a secret cabal meeting.

In other words, no matter what Trump does, it's wrong, bad, evil or unworthy. It doesn't matter what it is, "orange man bad" dictates that if it's Trump, it's bad. Even Trump's family is attacked, because they are automatically guilty by association.

And that's TDS in a nutshell. That's how simple occurrences become examples of bad behavior. A person who is neutral or even favorable to Trump sees each occurrence as just what it is. But a TDSer invents all kinds of negatives just because basically, Trump is a bad man.

Of course, this brings up the question of why Trump is a bad man. I'll answer that in the next installment, about why Trump is hated.