Portray as wicked and threatening:he was demonized by the right-wing press...
If we persist in demonising young people - portraying them as trouble-makers who need to be kept off our streets - we shouldn't be surprised if some of them, at least, turn out to be demons.
Otherwise, we are doing just what we accuse the ‘other’ side of doing: demonizing the ‘enemy.’
And of course you expect the other side to try to demonize him.
Derivatives
demonization
/ˌdiːmənʌɪˈzeɪʃ(ə)n /noun...
I know I'll be backed into some argument where fierce partisans insist that if I don't share their wildly unreasonable demonization of the other side I must be… one of them!
We reject the demonization of perceived enemies, which only paves the way to abuse.
But it's easy to slide from that kind of inquisitive, imaginative investigation of the past to an idealization of the past and a demonization of the present.