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Maybe it was binge-watching Netflix’s “3%” yesterday, maybe it is watching the ongoing and ceaseless fallout related to Trump, maybe it is my experience with the abuse community, but it is clear that we let the loudest asshole in the room power over others over and over again.

“Good” is not the same as “nice”.

And we teach our children to be ‘nice’, which has nothing really to do with “goodness”. Niceness is often a performance of civility. Defined: pleasing or agreeable in nature, exhibiting courtesy and politeness.

“It’s not nice to say that.”
“If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all.”

So instead of shutting boundary violators down from the first, we try to ‘nice’ them into being nice to us.

Explaining our perspective and asking them to respect our boundaries and trying to engender understanding.

NO.

Is that maybe a step in the process? Sure. AFTER you set a boundary.

It is literally the same as dealing with kids. If you see your 3 year-old hitting someone, you don’t explain to them that this is not nice to do to our friends, et cetera, without physically stopping them from hitting the other kid first.

We need to stop tolerating boundary violations.

Both in our personal life and the political stage. We need to stop treating all viewpoints as ‘valid’, especially when the person with the other viewpoint isn’t treating ours as valid.

Do not give away your power under the misapprehension that using that power is inherently wrong.

…that it is ‘not nice’. You know what is not nice? Allowing bullies to continue bullying. Allowing people to get torn to shreds. Wringing our hands as the (predictable) next victim is victimized.

Preventing people from experiencing the consequences of their behavior is what enables abuse and abuse of power.

“When they go low, we go high” doesn’t mean disempowering ourselves. It means we act with integrity and moral strength and conviction. Not only can you set boundaries with integrity, having integrity means you should.

Truth is not power.
Truth is not justice.

Truth is simply the framework for understanding, and then making choices and acting on that understanding. Knowledge has never been enough to effect change.

Knowing someone is abusing you isn’t enough.
Knowing your behaviors are abusive isn’t enough.
Knowing something is wrong isn’t enough to stop it.

SOMEONE has to stop it.

And expecting entitled boundary violators to stop themselves is foolishness. And that’s what we do every time we try to communicate to the boundary violator, to the bully, to the abuser that what they are doing is wrong.

We are doing SO MUCH EMOTIONAL LABOR for these assholes.

…and yet never let them experience the consequences of their actions. But we persist in treating them like reasonable people when every action of theirs is unreasonable. Instead of looking at their actions, we attribute to them our own beliefs and motivations, and give them the unearned benefit of the doubt.

We need to learn to hold people accountable for their actions without vilifying them.

Because that is stopping us from holding them accountable in the first place: we don’t believe they are villains, or that you shouldn’t determine someone is a villain until ‘all the facts are in’.

And if you stop someone at the early boundary violations, they never get a chance to escalate to villainy.

WE ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS. But we are responsible for ours, and for our unreasonable expectations around unreasonable people.

One common thread I’ve seen is how ‘nice’ people are so hamstrung by their fears that other people won’t think they are ‘nice’.

And so they stay and ‘nice’ at the aggressor, over and over, trying to change them. You know what’s good? Not trying to change people. Respecting that they are the way they are, and making empowered decisions from that knowledge. Letting an aggressor experience the consequences of their actions.

Total submission to overwhelming brutality in the (likely futile) hopes that they will finally recognize your humanity and stop is the absolute last resort for a victim who is trapped.

But the fact that we have defined ‘niceness’ as submission is horribly problematic. It also puts the responsibility on the victim to ‘keep the peace’, even though the peace was already broken by the aggressor.

We’re paranoid about being like ‘them’.

So we act like a mirror, which only complements the abuse and bullying dynamic. But the opposite of mis-using your power over someone isn’t to abandon power, it is to use your power wisely. The opposite of being assaulted isn’t to take it, it is to prevent the assault, to protect yourself.

Reflecting the inverse of abuse isn’t the opposite of abuse, it completes abuse.

(And also between those who have mental health disorders, are neuro-divergent as compared to those who are neuro-typical, or do not present with any mental health disorders.)

Abuse is a specific kind of violence that occurs within an existing relationship,

…and specifically ones with a certain level of emotional intimacy and interdependence or dependence (such as between a parent/child, partners, or friends).

When violence occurs within your wider social circle but not between people who have a close/intimate relationship, it’s called “bullying” when it doesn’t rise to the level of a crime.

When violence occurs with strangers, it’s called “battery” or “harassment”.

So in order for violence to be abuse – and it could be the exact same action such as hitting or name calling – it has to occur within the context of a close and emotionally intimate relationship.

It’s an ‘abuse of power’ or an abuse of the relationship.

In order to have relationships work, we use tools such as trust

…giving each other the benefit of the doubt, each person assumes the other is operating in good faith, that both are reasonably honest with each other, and that love exists within the relationship.

A victim of abuse is typically operating within the relationship under the ‘healthy’ framework listed above:

…they trust the abuser, they give the abuser the benefit of the doubt, they assume the abuser is operating in good faith, that the abuser is being honest with them, and that the abuser loves them.

Meanwhile, the unsafe behavior is escalating and the victim is a ‘frog in a boiling pot’.

They don’t understand what is happening because they assume they are in a healthy, loving relationship and that assumption is wrong.

So they do what they have learned is what helps repair things in a healthy, loving relationship which is to “communicate”.

But the abuser uses that communication against the victim. It gives the abuser more leverage over the victim. The abuser then says they can’t trust the victim, that the victim isn’t honest, that the victim doesn’t love them, etc. The victim is completely confused and tries to prove that – no! – they do love the abuser and that they are honest and have been trustworthy.

The victim is made to feel like a bad partner, a bad child, a bad friend – all because the abuser is mis-using and hijacking the elements of healthy relationships.

They even hijack the language and concepts of therapy, e.g. the elements of what it takes to recover from unhealthy relationships. They weaponize everything because of how they think and how (unreasonably) entitled they feel.

So victims come away from these relationships thinking that they can never love or trust again.

But it isn’t that love is wrong, or that trusting people is wrong. It isn’t that those things aren’t possible. We need love and trust to have intimate relationships, it is just that abuse co-opts and takes advantage of them.

The clarion call of “because we’re family” doesn’t just trap victims of abusive families.

It also traps employees, by positioning the company/business/corporation as something you should be loyal to, sacrifice for, and have no boundaries against.

“We’re like family!” they proudly inform you in the job interview.

And it sounds amazing. We hear “family” and think of people who support each other, people you can trust, people who have your back.

But, just as in abusive families, “family” only goes one way.

In what they expect from you.
In what business norms they expect you to ignore.
In re-defining “fair treatment”.

They expect your loyalty to the company and managers…but probably don’t demonstrate their ‘loyalty’ to you. Places like this usually expect you to be available with no notice, or to stay late to ‘help’, or to ‘pitch in’ on things having nothing to do with your actual job.

How can you tell it is toxic?

Because you don’t get to make your own decisions. You don’t get to ask for loyalty, for help. They believe that merely working at the company is as good, if not better than money. Because they enforce a fiction where everyone is there because they love the company, and not because they need a paycheck to actually function in society and live. They may take a paternalistic attitude toward you, as the arbiter of what is best for you.

You aren’t in a relationship of near-equals where a qualified and skilled individual is exchanging their time and work-product for money.

When companies sell a prospective employee on their benefits package, they don’t include “the privilege of being a member of the family” or “Friday bagel mornings”. They include health insurance, paid time off, sick days – things that translate to either money or direct monetary value.

They’ve created an alternate reality.

Instead of filial piety, it’s corporate piety; a way to make the employees of a business or company feel obligated to their employer above and beyond what is normal and reasonable. It’s a way of fostering compliance and obedience.

And it’s typically a way to justify spending less money: less raises, less actual benefits.

It weirdly shifts the power dynamic, and the employee has less agency than they might otherwise have.

• Who is the arbiter of the relationship?
• Who is allowed to perform anger?
• Who enacts double-standards?
• Who is able to take perspective for the other person?
• Who has empathy?
• Whose hurt/pain takes priority?
• Who is entitled?
• Who respects boundaries?
• Whose needs or wants take priority?
• Who listens?
• Who interrupts?

I was listening to a video this morning, when I heard this:

“If I have a sense of entitlement, it’s primarily shown in my complaining and in my lack of gratitude. And the less entitled I am, the more I’m grateful and the less I complain.” – Mike Winger

And I realized that THIS is the link between entitlement and complaining, and therefore possibly indicative of a controlling abuse template.

I’ve typically referred to this type of toxicity as critical/negative/judgmental, and when you combine that orientation with unreasonable entitlement, you often get abusive and/or controlling behaviors.

If they can brainwash you, gaslight you, or convince you, they’ll have weaponized you against yourself and it can be more effective than the original abuse. Not just because it’s 24/7…but because it’s in your own voice.

One of the biggest predictors of whether someone is unsafe is whether or not they respect boundaries and whether or not they will stop.

A lot of unsafe people won’t stop because they feel justified/entitled to do what they are doing, or because their feelings are more important, always.

They often have to have the last word.

It might feel satisfying to think that there is something you can say or do to make them understand, or to ‘win’, or to have the last word.

But it is often literally impossible with this kind of person because they will almost always out-escalate you.

And you can’t get them to understand your perspective much less agree on reality.

Unsafe people are unsafe.

…and believe you should treat someone according to the societal “role” they have in your life regardless of whether the relationship actually exists.

This puts a victim in the position of having to honor societal ‘obligations’ to a harmful person who mis-used their role to harm the victim

…claim advantages and benefit from them, and basically demand their target ‘honor the letter, not the spirit of the law’. They want the rules to apply to the person they are coercing, while demanding grace – or having given themselves permission – for not having followed those rules in the first place.

One of the most interesting things to me is how abuse dynamics and political dynamics often mirror each other.

So in an abusive relationship, the abuser is often very “rules for thee but not for me” – engaging in double standards – basically, using the agreed upon construct against the victim but never adhering to it themselves.

And in politics there’s actually a really good quote explaining something similar.

It’s from Francis M. Wilhoit, and he said, “There are in-groups whom the laws protect but do not bind, and there are out-groups whom the laws bind but do not protect.” And essentially that’s the dynamic in an abusive relationship.

You are the group, as the victim, that the laws bind but don’t protect, and the abuser is the group that the laws protect but don’t bind.

And why is that? It’s because of who has power. When you have a person in a position of power who misuses that power against other people at their expense and for their own benefit, they’re engaging in abusive behaviors.

Not everybody in a position of power does this, but people in a position of power very commonly do this.

And in a relationship – it could be a friendship, it could be a romantic relationship – you’ll have somebody who’s trying to put themselves in a position of power above you. They’ve made themselves judge, jury, and executioner.

The thing is, as the arbiter of the relationship, they are having to get you to agree that they are the arbiter of the relationship, that their version of reality is correct and that you are wrong.

And that’s why these dynamics are so mental. That’s why there’s so much argument, and you have these circular arguments that are going over and over again. But each time you think, “Oh, we resolved the issue. We had this great discussion and now it’s resolved,” and no, it circles back.

You’re having the same argument or a different version of the same argument, or just arguments in general over and over and over again.

The circular arguments are such a good example of the fact that you are in an abuse dynamic. It’s not just “oh, we have our ups and downs.”

You are competing over whose version of reality is the version of reality everyone’s going to act as if it is correct.

And abusers, they know on some level that their version of reality is not correct, because if they didn’t know that, they would think, “Oh no, I don’t want to deal with this person. I’m going to go be in a relationship with someone who understands reality.” But no, they stay and try to make you believe something different. They try to control your perspective on the relationship. They try to control your perspective on yourself. They try to control your perspective on them. They engage in a lot of image management, narrative control.

All of this, really, is about defining reality, not just to the victim but to people outside the relationship.

And so it’s very confusing when you’re the victim and you are taking everything at face value. When someone you care about presents an argument wrapped in moral principles, it naturally makes sense to you, so you accept it. But then when you try to apply that same moral standard consistently – expecting it to work both ways – the abuser shifts the rules. And then the abuser flips it around on you: “Oh no, it doesn’t apply to me for this reason,” or “Oh, you’re weaponizing this against me.” and you don’t get to protect yourself.

And from the victim, they’re trying to establish an integrated understanding of reality.

The abuser’s understanding of reality is “I’m right. Things that make me feel good, the things that I want, those are my needs, and whatever I need to do to obtain those things is valid and justified.” They’ve given themselves permission to mistreat you.

They do not have a comprehensive view of reality from an objective external sense.

It all revolves around themselves, their inner self, their ego, their selfishness.

So when you have these arguments coming back up over and over again, it’s because you’re trying to establish an objective foundation that works equally for both people, and that’s fundamentally opposed to an abuser’s internal goals.

That’s why they are pushing so hard to make you start to defer to them in terms of what is reality, what is right and wrong, and who is making healthy or good choices in the relationship dynamic. Whether it’s a friendship, a romantic relationship, a coworker, it looks the same. They are the ones who are in a position over, they are the ones in charge, they are the ones with status, they are the ones with power, and they don’t want to use that power responsibly, they want to use it to obtain what they want.

And that’s why they’re very “rules for thee but not for me.”

That’s why they engage in double-standards.

You are in the relational outgroup, whom the rules bind but do not protect.

And the abuser is the person whom the rules protect but do not bind.

Double-standards show who has power in a relationship.