Answers Originally Posted By Victoria On Quora
Answered Oct 24, 2019
It depends on the sex of the violent person.
If a man beats his wife, then he is automatically, 100% sane, and responsible for his actions. He is an evil thug.
If a woman beats her child, then she is automatically an innocent victim, of anything and everything. Such as being labeled mentally ill. Although that is a distant third, after denial and victim-blaming.
This extends to any and all other situations where, either a man or a woman, commits physical violence.
Updated Jul 24, 2019
These are two different questions/issues.
Age 11, when she directly stated that she beat all three of her children “not for discipline”, but rather, because it “made (her) feel better”.
I figured out, after years of violence… “She isn’t beating me because I’m a bad person … But rather, because she is a bad person”.
Years later, when I was twenty, I learned about the massive denial, victim-blaming taboo that is endemic among women.
I naively assumed that, the average adult woman had awareness and understanding of the pervasive reality of maternal child abuse.
It was at that age that I learned that, females who didn’t experience maternal child abuse are all in a state of denial and victim-blaming. Non-survivors live in a fantasy-world. And that was a realisation almost as profound as the realisation of my mother’s abusive nature.
Those people are effectively accomplices to the abuse. And, due to their numbers and pervasiveness, cannot be jettisoned with anything near the ease that the one direct abuser was dismissed from my life when I was eighteen.
Updated Jul 24, 2019
A tall poppy is a person who is perceived as doing better in some way, compared to the person with the perception. It can be one-to-one comparison, or it can be a group of people targeting one person.
Tall poppy syndrome is contextual.
I have spent time in an environment where someone who just graduated with a bachelors degree is the shortest poppy in the room. And have also spent time in environments where, simply being a first-year uni student would constitute being perceived as the tall poppy.
I have spent time in a low-wage, part-time job at a university, as the lowest employee in the department (e.g. washing test tubes in a lab, etc). And have spent time in other environments with chronic non-workers who would perceive me as a tall poppy for that (or any) job. Although they didn’t quite envy the job, but rather, envied the paycheque that they imagined.
Some other mind-blowingly petty tall poppy experiences:
Some people answer questions regarding tall poppy syndrome with a defensive excuse that, it is only directed towards people who act haughty, and flaunt high levels of success or resources. But that is not true at all.
Merely giving simple, polite answers to someone’s personal interrogation about the above-listed matters is enough for them to target you. Merely existing while they project the above-described fantasies is enough for them to target you.
Answered Jul 10, 2019
They don’t necessarily “convince themselves their lies are true”.
The mechanism seems to be…
“I want you to do, give, or tolerate Such-And-Such-Thing, And think that a certain claim will induce to to so, if you believe it. So I will push that at you”.
It is important to note that, sometimes, the thing they want is control. Many, many people feel a lack of control over their lives. Some will desperately look for control opportunities, even those that don’t actually benefit them.
If they lie, and you believe them, then they can feel control. Even if they don’t benefit in any practical or tangible way. Some will lie to manipulate (“Oh, I love you”), including lashing out to induce you feel bad. There are actually people who will claim to hate you, when they really don’t have any opinion of you, at all.
They often have poor ability to predict whether the lie will work. Or whether lying will reduce your future willingness to believe them.
Some will do an approach of multiple different angles. Where, the first lie doesn’t work, and then they move on to the next lie (which might even contradict the first). Hoping to find the lie that you will believe.
Their perception of whether their lies are true, just isn’t on the radar. It is about saying some words, to expect a certain result. The pathology is the failure to realistically expect a connection between the words (lies) and your response/actions.
Users of stimulant drugs (cocaine, amphetamine) are notorious for constant, compulsive lying. I wonder if some non-using liars have some kind of natural brain chemistry similar to that induced by those drugs.
Answered Jan 16, 2019
I’ve known some severe liars. People who were so bad that literally nothing that they said, about any subject, could be trusted.
Some reasons:
What all of this comes down to is desperation for control. And desperate people do dysfunctional and often blatantly unworkable things.
Facing how things really are is like surrendering. Lying that things are some other way, is an attempt to control the situation.
Facing the fact that you won’t/don’t believe them is like surrendering to you. Lying with you believing them, means controlling you, even if there is nothing practical to be gained.
Answered Dec 19
They don’t understand how consequences work.
The personality-disordered person expects that, she will do whatever impulsive action comes to mind, and that, everyone else will respond by giving or doing whatever she wants. The disorder prevents them from anticipating any negative consequences for themselves.
Later, when the negative consequence has just been imposed, they still refuse to draw the connection. And will insist that, the negative consequence is due to someone being mean-spirited towards them. And “wasn’t” really a reasonable reaction to the disordered person’s abusive behaviour.
This prevents them from learning from past negative consequences. They will do the exact same abusive behaviour again and again. Fully expecting that, this time, everyone else will cooperate.
They can feel fear, but they often cannot apply that to decision-making.
I might say, “If you do XYZ behaviour, then I will respond with ABC negative consequence”. And the behaviour is obviously abusive, and my response is simply removing myself from abuse-range.
What they hear is, “Blah, blah, blah, I am going to harm you, and deprive you of what you are entitled to”.
Also, some personality-disordered individuals view everything as a dominance-fight. If you set a rule by stating action→consequence, they will view that as you attempting to dominate them. So they will feel compelled to violate that rule, to prove that you are powerless to enforce it, and powerless to impose consequences. So that they can take the dominant position.
Personality-disordered people are also profoundly lacking in empathy. This isn’t simply that they cannot “feel your pain”. It is that they cannot anticipate or understand your motivation for responding negatively to their actions. Or your motivation to impose negative consequences.
They also lack the empathy to understand anyone else’s perspective on consequences. They will never respect your right to control your own behavioural choices, based on rational anticipation of consequences.
Answered Oct 24
Yes. They are abusers. It’s what they do. It’s who they are.
They abused someone before getting involved with you? They will abuse you.
There is nothing so special about you that it will change an abuser into a nice person.
They abused you, and then moved on to another partner? They will abuse that person.
There is nothing so special about the next person that it will change the abuser into a nice person.
Sure, there may be a temporary period of acting nice to lure you in, or to lure in the next victim. But that is all a game, just to manipulate you/them into getting emotionally invested.
Then, the abuser shows her/his true colours. Which stay true with each and every partner they will ever have.
Once an abuser, always an abuser.
Answered Oct 24
Real conversation:
Me: “We have had these arguments over and over and over. I do not consent to anything being stuck up my anus. I will never consent to anything being stuck up my anus.”
Idiot: (With stone-cold personality-disordered expression) “It’s going to happen”.
Me: “You need to decide if you can be happy in a relationship where that does not happen, because, if you can’t, then the relationship is over right now”.
Idiot: “Whine! Whine! Whine! Oh gawd, I am a victim of you and your hangups! Whine! Whine! Whine!”
Me: “The relationship is now terminated”.
So, at that age and point in life, the breaking point was the idiot directly stating the intent to sexually assault me. The whole “relationshit” was about five months of gradually escalating conflict up to then.
An important point was the choice of words: “It’s going to happen”, as if a violent sexual assault was an event that just inevitably “happens” without either party having any control, or any responsibility.
I really should have bailed out before that, due to the person’s generally obnoxious, negative, controlling attitude. In retrospect, the red flags were there right from the beginning.
On the bright side, that situation helped to cure my expectations of rationality in other people. Sexual relationships are a major focal point of their senses of entitlement, and belief that they can do any bad behaviour they want, without any negative consequences. Many people seriously believe that, a sexual relationship (or even a platonic “friendshit”) is literally a license to commit ongoing acts of violent crime.
This is also important for anyone evaluating prospective partners. Vital points include evaluating their senses of entitlement, and also looking for any fixations on particular sex acts, fetishes, etc. Because they will never stop pushing those fixations onto you.
The anal obsession seems to be quite common, and they will keep it up for weeks, months, and even years, making the relationship into one long argument about it. When they get sufficiently frustrated and tired of arguing, there is a high risk of physical violence.
Regardless of the particular form of abuse, as long as the relationship is going on, the abuser simply cannot grasp that the target has the right or ability to leave. This includes situations where the target is not in any way financially or materially dependent on the abuser, and can even be a situation where the abuser is dependent.
After you terminate the relationship, you should cut off all contact with the abuser. Because any conversation will be all about trying to manipulate you into getting re-involved.
When I scan over local and national news headlines, and see something like, “Woman found dead in her home, stabbed fifty times”, my first guess is that the perpetrator was someone known to the victim, and most likely an estranged spouse or partner.
Updated May 21
This sounds like something they would say after you had just talked about the negative impact that their behaviour has had on you.
To some extent, it is a deflection, to avoid engaging the specifics of what you had just said. But it is mainly a part of the relentless manipulation and gaslighting.
What they really mean is…
“It is unfortunate that you are so dysfunctional, deluded, immature, irrational, unstable, and ungrateful with your failure to appreciate the wonderful way in which I have treated you”.
Trying to understand or analyse one of these people is only useful to the point where you can recognise the presence of their personality disorder. After that point, it just becomes a waste of time and energy.
At that point, the bottom line is to just disengage. If you feel you have to interact in a workplace, then disengage emotionally. If they are only in your personal life, I recommend disengaging entirely.
The main lasting value of analysing these kinds of statements is so that you can recognise the next personality disordered person that you meet in the future.