Given everything that has been said so far, it is obvious that discrediting attacks, whatever their motive, generally take place under heavy disguise. First, the attacker must portray his attack as an attempt to support the order of values of society by exposing a violator who deserves to be exposed, in essence enhancing his own image as he assaults another's. If this were all there were to these disguise, we might have an easier time discerning the role of discredit, domination, assertiveness and sadism in public life. But the disguise of motives is often supplemented by a far more insidious deception, one that masks the fact that an attack is taking place at all or that the journalist or attacker is the one making the attack. communicators often portray themselves as merely asking questions, reporting what others say or describing events, when everyone knows a verbal mugging is actually taking place that may leave the designated victim stripped of the self-defense provided by an effective image.
Fortunately, these disguises tend to be very transparent once one begins to identify the various games and strategies that are being used. Once that has been achieved, we can begin to expose these disguised attempts to expose others; we can discredit these disguised attempts to discredit; and hold these attempts to embarrass others up to embarrassing scrutiny.