abuse – Page 5 – Real Social Skills

Tips on how to figure out who is trustworthy and who is not

October 13, 2013June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

A reader asked:

Do you have any tips on how to figure out who is trustworthy and who is not? As in whether or not someone intends to cause harm to you, etc. I find that I never realize I’m being mistreated until it’s too late, and it makes it really hard for me to find good friend, especially IRL. Advice/tips?

realsocialskills said:

Here are some things I consider to be red flags:

Having a strong self-image as not being the kind of person who does bad things:

We all do bad things, even awful things, from time to time
People who think that they’re “not that kind of person” actively avoid noticing when they’ve done bad things
People who deal with one another regularly hurt one another from time to time, and it’s important to be able to acknowledge this and fix things
If you’re dealing with someone who can’t bear the thought of having done something wrong, you’re not going to be able to tell them when they’ve hurt you
Because they will blow up at you and hurt you worse when you try, or else they’ll cry and convince you that you’re a terrible person for making mean baseless accusations.
Either way, it will make it impossible to deal with problems, and you’ll end up tolerating things that hurt you badly
I wrote about that some here

Expecting immediate trust

Trust is developed over time
If someone wants you to talk about deeply personal things right away, and gets upset when you don’t, they’re not respecting your boundaries and that’s dangerous

Asserting that a deeply intimate relationship exists without considering your opinion on the matter relevant

Close friendship only exists if you *both* think it does
You are only dating if *both* of you think that you are dating
Someone can’t just decide that they’re close to you and that you have a deep close committed relationship; you both have to want it
If someone considers your opinion of the matter irrelevant, run.
I wrote a post about that here

Wanting you to depend on them

If someone tells you that you couldn’t function without them, do not trust them
If they want you to fix your life, do not trust them
If they think your sanity depends on their loving understanding care, *seriously* do not trust them
If they get angry, or hurt, or cry when you don’t do what they want you to do in your personal life, don’t trust them

Being under the impression that they’re doing you a favor:

If they think that they’re doing you a favor by being friends with someone like you, they’re not likely to treat you well
Friendship is not a charitable act. It is a mutual relationship between people who regard one another as equals.
Similarly, when someone thinks they’re doing you a favor by employing you, it will probably end badly

If people you trust dislike them:

If you have people you know to be trustworthy, and they don’t like a new person in your life, it’s important to find out why
Sometimes they will be wrong, but often they will be right
It’s important to figure out what’s going on, and why they think that – then if you disagree that’s fine, but it’s not a good idea to dismiss it without thinking about it

I’ve also written a lot of posts relevant to this issue. It might help you to read through some of the related tags.

Arguments about the definition of abuse can be counterproductive

October 2, 2013June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

redsuspendershoothoot asked:

What defines abuse? Like say someone is unsure of weather the way they are treated by another is actual abuse and is worried that if they try to get help it will be denied and only get worse?

realsocialskills said:

Here’s the thing. When people are inclined to violate your boundaries, they will often do just about anything they can to derail things when you tell them to knock it off.

One common way they do this is to start an argument about whether something is technically bad enough to be abuse or not.

That’s usually beside the point. What’s relevant is that you are being pressured into putting up with something that hurts you. And sometimes you need help getting them to stop hurting you.

That’s what’s important. Not whether something technically qualifies as abuse according to some formalized definition.

It’s ok to be happy

September 30, 2013June 14, 2021 Real Social Skills

Sometimes people in abusive or damaging situations feel like they’re not allowed to be happy, or to enjoy anything.

Because, like, if you’re happy and growing, that feels like evidence that maybe the things people are doing to you must be ok. Because if the things were actually bad, you’d be miserable all the time. But, it does not actually work that way.

It’s ok to be happy and like things. It doesn’t mean you’re wrong to object to what they are doing to you or what they did in the past. It doesn’t mean things are ok. It just means that you’re finding some good things, too.

What it means when kids aren’t allowed to know about bad things

September 20, 2013June 14, 2021 Real Social Skills

There are a lot of things kids are often considered too young to know about. For instance:

Rape
Violence
Racism
Sexism

The problem is, almost every bad thing kids are considered too young to know about happens to some kids.

The rule that kids should be shielded from these things has some really negative effects on the kids who are most vulnerable.

It hurts kids who have been abused, because they’re considered dangerous to other kids if they ever talk about it. Their peers aren’t supposed to know about it, so they’re supposed to just never talk about it ever. That creates a lot of shame, and living with that kind of shame hurts people.

It also hurts kids who are currently being abused. They get the overwhelming message from everyone that kids are not allowed to talk about these things. That makes it hard to tell adults what’s going on, especially if they don’t quite know the right words. If they try to tell indirectly, they might even be hushed and told that they’re too young to be thinking about that kind of thing.

It hurts kids of color, because they’re often required to put up with racist things rather than have the white kids find out about racism. Because they’re old enough to have to deal with racism, but their white peers aren’t considered old enough to be told about it.

There’s also parents who don’t want their kids to play with disabled kids, because they think their kids are too young to know about disability or serious illness or injury. Or even, to the point that a kids’ show hosted by an amputee actor got a lot of complaints that her missing arm was upsetting to children. This kind of attitude is all over the place.

Preventing kids from thinking about bad things hurts all kinds of kids, all kinds of particularly vulnerable kids. And I don’t see how it does much to protect the safer kids, either.

I’m not sure what the solution is. But I think it is a problem.

Getting past “I’m not being abusive!!!” and getting perspective on how you’re treating people

August 20, 2013June 21, 2021 Real Social Skills

A reader asked:

re: ‘I’m not being abusive!’ – I’m concerned I’ve done this in the past because I grew up around someone very verbally/emotionally abusive and am trying to work through those behaviors. I feel like I flag myself sometimes that way to check in with others, but get the feeling this is a really bad way of dealing with things. Any advice on what I can do in these situations when I’m very worried I *am* being abusive and want help to stop?

I think there’s a couple of things:

First of all, recognize the difference between asking for feedback and asking for reassurance:

Trying to find out whether something is wrong is one thing.
Trying to get someone to reassure you that nothing is wrong is a different thing.
It’s important to be open to the possibility that something is actually wrong.
If you’re not open to that possibility, then don’t ask.
Because pressuring someone to tell you that everything is ok makes things worse
Work on learning how to be open to the possibility that things are wrong
And ask in a way that makes it clear you actually want to know.
Eg, don’t say things like this: “You’d tell me if something was wrong, right?” “Nothing’s wrong, is it?”
Things like this are better: “I feel like something might be bothering you. Is something wrong?”, “Did I mess something up? I feel like I might have.”

Don’t rely too much on people you might be hurting to teach you how to act right:

It’s important to listen
But it’s also important not to make them responsible for your actions
You are responsible for learning how to treat people well. People you might be hurting are not responsible for teaching you how to stop.

Get outside perspective of some sort:

Outside perspective is important because it is a way to get feedback without putting pressure on people you might be hurting to tell you things are ok
It’s also an important way to protect yourself against gaslighting. People who worry that they might be abusers are particularly susceptible to gaslighting. Some gaslighters prey on this worry really aggressively.
It’s important to care about treating people well. It’s also important to care about protecting yourself and being treated well.
It’s also a way to learn things that no one involved knows
Outside perspective is important for other reasons I’m having trouble articulating
For some people, therapy is a helpful way to get outside perspective. Therapy is not for everyone, and it can be actively harmful for some people, but it works really well for people it works for
For some people, it helps to talk things over with friends outside the situation
Reading fiction and watching TV can also be helpful
So can reading blogs and books that are explicitly about interpersonal dynamics, although unfortunately there are not many good ones.

Any of y’all have other suggestions?

“I would never abuse anyone!”

July 23, 2013June 20, 2021 Real Social Skills

This kind of conversation is a major red flag:

Bob: I’m going to go to the mall.
Stan: Don’t go to the mall. I want you to stay home.
Bob: Um, why not? I need new trousers.
Stan: Why are you taking that tone?! Are you saying I’m abusive? You wouldn’t be upset if I wasn’t abusive, so you must think I’m abusing you. I’d never abuse anyone! How dare you?!

Another version:

Bob: Could you not make jokes about my weight? It makes me feel bad.
Stan: I would never do anything to hurt you! How dare you call this bullying!

It’s especially bad when:

It happens every time Stan and Bob want different things.
Because it gets to the point where it’s impossible for Bob to say no without accusing Stan of being abusive
Or where Bob can’t express a preference that conflicts with Stan’s.
This means that Bob has to always do what Stan wants, or else call Stan a bad person
This is an awful way to live

In a mutually respectful relationship:

People want different things from time to time
People hurt each other in minor ways
People make mistakes, and need to be told about them
Everyone understands this, and can accept that their friend/partner/whatever wants something different, or is upset about something they did
They understand that wanting different things, or being upset about something, is not an accusation of abuse.

If someone close to you claims that you’re accusing them of being abusive every time you have a conflict with them, they probably are, in fact, being abusive.

Another thing about Facebook

July 14, 2013June 20, 2021 Real Social Skills

Facebook is an environment with confusing boundaries. It’s easy to inadvertently cross lines on Facebook. Almost everyone ends up inadvertently violating boundaries on Facebook that they would never violate in person.

But not all boundary violation on Facebook are like that. Facebook can also be used for stalking. Serious stalking. Not semi-cute awkwardness like commenting on too many things.

Facebook can be used to harass people. It can be used to try to force contact. It can be used to track someone’s movements. It can be used to find out who the victim associates with, and then to try to use those people to get to them.

If you are Facebook friends with both an abuser and their victim, this can hurt the victim. It can, and often does, result in you accidentally giving information to the abuser that it is dangerous to the victim to have. This is the case even if the victim has blocked the abuser.

(For instance, photos of the victim that you post or comment on can show up in the abuser’s news feed.)

If you’re close to someone who is extracting themself from an abusive relationship, and they ask you to unfriend their abuser, it’s important to take that request seriously.

When you have mixed feelings about an abusive relationship

July 2, 2013June 20, 2021 Real Social Skills

Content warning: this post probably uses language that gets used against abuse victims. I’m trying to avoid that, but I don’t think I’ve entirely succeeded, and some of these words might be triggering. Proceed with caution.

So, here’s the thing.

People are complicated, and relationships are even more complicated. Abuse victims are often pressured to pretend that things are simple. They’re pressured to believe that if there was any positive aspect whatsoever to an abusive relationship, then it wasn’t really as abusive as they think it was.

But it doesn’t work that way. People aren’t averaged. People can do some really good things, and some abusive things. They don’t cancel each other out. They coexist. Whatever else happened, the abuse was real, and you’re right not to tolerate it.

Sometimes… sometimes your abuser is also the person who taught you your favorite recipe.

Or something fundamental about how you understand the world.

Or a major skill you now use professionally.

Or maybe they gave you a lot of valuable criticism that made your art better.

Or maybe they supported you materially when you were in real trouble.

Or any number of other things.

And…

…none of that makes the abuse ok. None of that is mitigating in any way. It doesn’t cancel anything out. Sometimes people talk like the abusive interactions and the good ones get put in a blender or something, and like some sort of theoretical blended average is what really counts. That’s not how it works. It’s the actual interactions that count, not some theoretical average. The abuse is real, and significant, no matter what else happened.

It doesn’t have to be one or the other. If some things about an abusive relationship were positive, it’s ok to acknowledge and value them.

And you can still refuse to ever have anything to do with your abuser ever again. You can still be angry. You can still hate them. You can still decide never to forgive them. You can still warn people against them. None of these things are mutually exclusive.

And, most importantly, valuing some aspects of the relationship or having some positive memories does not in *any way* mean the abuse was your fault.

All communities have predators

June 29, 2013June 20, 2021 Real Social Skills

No place is inherently safe; every space ends up having predatory people in it.

Well-run communities/organizations/schools/whatever have things in place for dealing with this. And, from time to time, abusers hurt people, and the communities actually use the things they have in place for dealing with abuse.

And they will be able to tell you what those things are.

And if the community has been around for a years, they will be able to tell you about instances in which that has happened. (In general terms; they don’t have to (and usually shouldn’t) reveal identifying details).

If a school or business or something gives a training on harassment, and they can’t tell you what’s happened in the past when abuse has happened, and they only say “we take that very seriously”, it’s a major red flag.

If a community/school/whatever tells you that abuse can’t happen there because of how great people are, or how much training there is, or anything like that – that’s an even bigger red flag.

The safest communities are those that recognize that no space is safe all the time, and that it’s always necessary to be on the lookout for abuse.