Untold millions are appalled at Trump’s actions as President of the United States. Many question his psychological state and stability. As a psychotherapist, I can speak to another terrible aspect of Trump’s ascent to power, and the reason I could never “give him a chance.” That is, the psychological harm that he is causing.

Having practiced as a therapist for twenty years, if I was asked to sum up in one word the main cause of emotional distress, I would say shame.

Shame is the feeling that goes along with the belief that we don’t measure up as human beings. Shame is a core human emotion that everyone experiences. However, shame can become toxic. It can take root in our psyche and have pervasive, ongoing effects. Rather than a transient emotional experience, it becomes a fundamental driver of our being. It putrefies into certitude about our inadequacy. The core self-criticism may be different for each individual - I’m stupid, ugly, unlovable, undeserving – but the feeling is the same.

When our shame is that deep and our distorted self-belief lives in us as a conviction, it can determine our lives. Sure that we are doomed to fail, we dare not try, fulfilling that prophecy. Frozen with fear and unable to act, we end up obese, alone, addicted, underachieving.

Where does shame come from? Emotional trauma is the central answer. People who are sexually or physically abused as children are almost certain to be profoundly self-loathing.

But trauma can come in many shapes and sizes. Chronic shaming behaviors in a family can lead to the same kinds of effects that grosser abuse causes. Shaming behaviors include insults, put downs, mean jokes, denial of realities, disqualification of feelings, blame, silencing, lying.

Many of us grew up in families where these kinds of behaviors were the status quo. If you worked in a milieu like I did, the music industry of the 1970s, where narcissistic superstars often treated underlings inhumanely, though we covered our pain with sex, drugs, and rock n roll, the wounds cut deep. Many people who work with abusive bosses, whether you are behind the counter at a fast-food joint or an associate at a top law firm, are psychologically assaulted and undermined on a regular basis.

Though this shame is the underlying cause of so much of our misery, we are often unaware that we live in this state, and feel other emotions, like anxiety or anger, instead. Once planted in our unconscious, shame makes us susceptible to a multitude of triggers which can spark these destructive feelings. One example is when we compare ourselves to someone who seems to have it better than us. The rage of many Trump supporters toward Obama reflects this. Oppressed by the conditions of their own life, when they see an intelligent, beautiful, powerful, happily married, decent black guy in the White House they feel inferior by comparison. But instead of feeling badly about themselves, they feel an inchoate animus toward Obama.

Then along comes a guy like Trump who expresses this rage for them, and validates their distorted projection, seeing the mote in everyone’s eye without seeing the log in their own. When he lies and calls Obama “the worst President ever,” this relieves them of their cringing, and makes them feel better about themselves. And they love him for this.

But this relief for his supporters comes at a great price. Trump can say any awful thing about anyone because he is the opposite of being shame-based. He is shameless. He can do anything, no matter how it hurts others, without any moral compunction whatsoever.

Trump lives in a world where you are either dominating or submissive, and shaming is his primary means of establishing power. The argument, therefore, that Trump was not making fun of a reporter’s disability because he used the same gesture when making fun of Ted Cruz completely misses the point. In both instances, he is shaming the individual involved. This is how Trump has destroyed all his competitors. Trump not only shames his opponents, but anyone who does not submit to his dominance displays. Today his target is the media, tomorrow it will be whoever attempts to stand up to him.

His ability to shame others without remorse may be effective in winning, but it is a fundamentally destructive force. It debilitates all those who become subject to it. It also retraumatizes those who have been wounded in their lives that witness Trump’s transgressions. And perhaps worst of all, it gives permission to those that are enthralled by Trump to behave just as egregiously. Shaming is in.

Recently, my children saw the Instragram post of an affluent sixth grader who attends one of our nation’s best schools, in which he boasted to all the libtards, snowflakes, and asswipes that his guy did more in one week than that “black donkey” did in eight years. My Trump apologist friends dismiss this as what sixth grade boys do, just like they dismissed the pussy-grabbing talk of their leader. But there is a reason beyond political correctness why we should find both abhorrent. It is because this kind of behavior can lead to the root cause of most psychological problems.

Trump did not invent this method of interaction. Shaming, abusive behaviors have already wreaked havoc on our world. Spend a day in my office if you doubt that. And the right wing media have made a sport of this for decades. But the last thing we need is a leader who tells us that shaming others is just fine.

Instead, what the world needs now is for all of us to simply stop shaming behaviors in all its guises. We need to oppose Trump’s way of behaving with all the vigor and courage our healthy self-love can muster.

If through the model of our shamer-in-chief this kind of cruel behavior becomes the way of the land, woe betide the soul of America.

Glenn Berger, PhD is the author of NEVER SAY NO TO A ROCK STAR: IN THE STUDIO WITH DYLAN, SINATRA, JAGGER AND MORE (Schaffner Books, 2016). He has an expertise, and presents, on narcissism and celebrity. He has a private psychotherapy practice in New York City, Mt. Kisco, NY, and around the world by Doxy.