It's the most tenuous element of my """"analysis"""" for sure, but the fact someone feels their personal identity is under attack is often one of the best and most versatile explanations as to why they appear willing to become hostile without a shred of reason.

It's a tactic which is used in advertising too, encouraging consumers to adopt a brand as part of their identity. Which leads to a sort of fanboyism where brand loyalty can make people buy something just for a label or encourage them to defend their chosen brand even though in reality they aren't truly invested in it.

I suppose I'm talking about a socially imposed version of subconscious personal identity.

For example, one of the best theories I've heard as to why people are transphobic is because the existence of trans people is perceived as an attack on the transphobic persons' identity. The ability for someone to shift from one gender to another undermines what they believe to be a core and immutable aspect of their own identity. Thus, transgender people serve as physical proof that a rigid view of gender is incorrect. It stands to reason that anyone who strongly identifies as being a manly man or a girly girl seems likely to take issue with the mere existence of trans people, since it's interpreted as an attack on their being. So either they've been wrong their whole life, or the existence of trans people is what's wrong.

In the case of anti-communist views, I can only guess it's because people strongly internally identify as being capitalist whether they realize it or not. I've noticed a huge number of people who still earnestly believe in capitalist ideals such as the American dream (which has long since been thoroughly undermined) and pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Perhaps to even entertain the idea of a different system is interpreted as an attack on capitalism, or the implication that it's an imperfect system. That maybe individuals don't necessarily get where they are by working hard or being talented and that social inequality is not justifiable after all. It would be a bitter pill to swallow, so why do that when you can simply refer back to your own mental conditioning and let propaganda do the thinking for you?