Yeah, I don’t see why one should wait until after the abuse occurs (“by clinical standards”, above commenter says) to begin defending oneself. As you say, politics isn’t divorced from the rest of their psyche.

It’s predictable that a person who e.g. yells slurs and threatens violence against (whoever they perceive as) gay people on TV is going to progress to actual violence against the gay people in their life, more often than not.