Has gaslighting conditioned women into thinking they’re emotionally unstable? Yashar Ali thinks so.
You’re so sensitive. You’re so emotional. You’re defensive. You’re overreacting. Calm down. Relax. Stop freaking out! You’re crazy! I was just joking, don’t you have a sense of humor? You’re so dramatic. Just get over it already!
Sound familiar?
If you’re a woman, it probably does.
Do you ever hear any of these comments from your spouse, partner, boss, friends, colleagues, or relatives after you have expressed frustration, sadness, or anger about something they have done or said?
When someone says these things to you, it’s not an example of inconsiderate behavior. When your spouse shows up half an hour late to dinner without calling—that’s inconsiderate behavior. A remark intended to shut you down like, “Calm down, you’re overreacting,” after you just addressed someone else’s bad behavior, is emotional manipulation—pure and simple.
And this is the sort of emotional manipulation that feeds an epidemic in our country, an epidemic that defines women as crazy, irrational, overly sensitive, unhinged. This epidemic helps fuel the idea that women need only the slightest provocation to unleash their (crazy) emotions. It’s patently false and unfair.
I think it’s time to separate inconsiderate behavior from emotional manipulation and we need to use a word not in our normal vocabulary.
I want to introduce a helpful term to identify these reactions: gaslighting.
Gaslighting is a term, often used by mental health professionals (I am not one), to describe manipulative behavior used to confuse people into thinking their reactions are so far off base that they’re crazy.
The term comes from the 1944 MGM film, Gaslight, starring Ingrid Bergman. Bergman’s husband in the film, played by Charles Boyer, wants to get his hands on her jewelry. He realizes he can accomplish this by having her certified as insane and hauled off to a mental institution. To pull of this task, he intentionally sets the gaslights in their home to flicker off and on, and every time Bergman’s character reacts to it, he tells her she’s just seeing things. In this setting, a gaslighter is someone who presents false information to alter the victim’s perception of him or herself.
Today, when the term is referenced, it’s usually because the perpetrator says things like, “You’re so stupid” or “No one will ever want you” to the victim. This is an intentional, pre-meditated form of gaslighting, much like the actions of Charles Boyer’s character in Gaslight, where he strategically plots to confuse Ingrid Bergman’s character into believing herself unhinged.
The form of gaslighting I’m addressing is not always pre-mediated or intentional, which makes it worse, because it means all of us, especially women, have dealt with it at one time or another.
Those who engage in gaslighting create a reaction—whether it’s anger, frustration, sadness—in the person they are dealing with. Then, when that person reacts, the gaslighter makes them feel uncomfortable and insecure by behaving as if their feelings aren’t rational or normal.
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My friend Anna (all names changed to protect privacy) is married to a man who feels it necessary to make random and unprompted comments about her weight. Whenever she gets upset or frustrated with his insensitive comments, he responds in the same, defeating way, “You’re so sensitive. I’m just joking.”
My friend Abbie works for a man who finds a way, almost daily, to unnecessarily shoot her down and her work product. Comments like, “Can’t you do something right?” or “Why did I hire you?” are regular occurrences for her. Her boss has no problem firing people (he does it regularly), so you wouldn’t know that based on these comments, Abbie has worked for him for six years. But every time she stands up for herself and says “It doesn’t help me when you say these things,” she gets the same reaction: “Relax; you’re overreacting.”
Abbie thinks her boss is just being a jerk in these moments, but the truth is, he is making those comments to manipulate her into thinking her reactions are out of whack. And it’s exactly that kind manipulation that has left her feeling guilty about being sensitive, and as a result, she has not left her job.
But gaslighting can be as simple as someone smiling and saying something like, “You’re so sensitive,” to somebody else. Such a comment may seem innocuous enough, but in that moment, that person is making a judgment about how someone else should feel.
While dealing with gaslighting isn’t a universal truth for women, we all certainly know plenty of women who encounter it at work, home, or in personal relationships.
And the act of gaslighting does not simply affect women who are not quite sure of themselves. Even vocal, confident, assertive women are vulnerable to gaslighting.
Why?
Because women bare the brunt of our neurosis. It is much easier for us to place our emotional burdens on the shoulders of our wives, our female friends, our girlfriends, our female employees, our female colleagues, than for us to impose them on the shoulders of men.
It’s a whole lot easier to emotionally manipulate someone who has been conditioned by our society to accept it. We continue to burden women because they don’t refuse our burdens as easily. It’s the ultimate cowardice.
Whether gaslighting is conscious or not, it produces the same result: it renders some women emotionally mute.
These women aren’t able to clearly express to their spouses that what is said or done to them is hurtful. They can’t tell their boss that his behavior is disrespectful and prevents them from doing their best work. They can’t tell their parents that, when they are being critical, they are doing more harm than good.
When these women receive any sort of push back to their reactions, they often brush it off by saying, “Forget it, it’s okay.”
That “forget it” isn’t just about dismissing a thought, it is about self-dismissal. It’s heartbreaking.
No wonder some women are unconsciously passive aggressive when expressing anger, sadness, or frustration. For years, they have been subjected to so much gaslighting that they can no longer express themselves in a way that feels authentic to them.
They say, “I’m sorry” before giving their opinion. In an email or text message, they place a smiley face next to a serious question or concern, thereby reducing the impact of having to express their true feelings.
You know how it looks: “You’re late 
”
These are the same women who stay in relationships they don’t belong in, who don’t follow their dreams, who withdraw from the kind of life they want to live.
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Since I have embarked on this feminist self-exploration in my life and in the lives of the women I know, this concept of women as “crazy” has really emerged as a major issue in society at large and an equally major frustration for the women in my life, in general.
From the way women are portrayed on reality shows, to how we condition boys and girls to see women, we have come to accept the idea that women are unbalanced, irrational individuals, especially in times of anger and frustration.
Just the other day, on a flight from San Francisco to Los Angeles, a flight attendant who had come to recognize me from my many trips asked me what I did for a living. When I told her that I write mainly about women, she immediately laughed and asked, “Oh, about how crazy we are?”
Her gut reaction to my work made me really depressed. While she made her response in jest, her question nonetheless makes visible a pattern of sexist commentary that travels through all facets of society on how men view women, which also greatly impacts how women may view themselves.
As far as I am concerned, the epidemic of gaslighting is part of the struggle against the obstacles of inequality that women constantly face. Acts of gaslighting steal their most powerful tool: their voice. This is something we do to women every day, in many different ways.
I don’t think this idea that women are “crazy,” is based in some sort of massive conspiracy. Rather, I believe it’s connected to the slow and steady drumbeat of women being undermined and dismissed, on a daily basis. And gaslighting is one of many reasons why we are dealing with this public construction of women as “crazy”
I recognize that I’ve been guilty of gaslighting my women friends in the past (but never my male friends—surprise, surprise). It’s shameful, but I’m glad I realized that I did it on occasion and put a stop to it.
While I take total responsibility for my actions, I do believe that I, along with many men, am a byproduct of our conditioning. It’s about the general insight our conditioning gives us into admitting fault and exposing any emotion.
When we are discouraged in our youth and early adulthood from expressing emotion, it causes many of us to remain steadfast in our refusal to express regret when we see someone in pain from our actions.
When I was writing this piece, I was reminded of one of my favorite Gloria Steinem quotes, “The first problem for all of us, men and women, is not to learn, but to unlearn.”
So for many of us, it’s first about unlearning how to flicker those gaslights and learning how to acknowledge and understand the feelings, opinions, and positions of the women in our lives.
But isn’t the issue of gaslighting ultimately about whether we are conditioned to believe that women’s opinions don’t hold as much weight as ours? That what women have to say, what they feel, isn’t quite as legitimate?
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Yashar will be soon releasing his first short e-book, entitled, A Message To Women From A Man: You Are Not Crazy — How We Teach Men That Women Are Crazy and How We Convince Women To Ignore Their Instincts. If you are interested and want to be notified when the book is released, please click here to sign-up.
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This post originally appeared on The Current Conscience.
—Photo lempicki.maciek/Flickr
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Read Mark Greene’s response:
About Yashar Ali
I appreciate your thoughts… and I agree with much of what you have to say here, having seen and experienced it myself firsthand.
But I think perhaps this goes even deeper – to the very nature of the person. Somehow we have managed to equate emotion as a negative quality, rather than part of what it means to be human. The “overreacting” or “just being emotional” arguments are designed to cut women off from their own genius- that ability to intuit the needs of others. And we women, afraid that our intuition and emotional aplomb will define us apart from any other gifts of intellect or ability, take the advice to grow thicker skins or be “less emotional” somehow, as the only way to be successful or have a voice. But in doing so, we ultimately are giving up our own womanhood, turning from it as if the only way to be human and have value is by becoming a less-than-woman, or heaven forbid, trading in our amazing womanhood for a virtual “xy”.
Well said Christine!
My boyfriend grew up with some awful women and recently my expressed concern over some misbehaviour was put into this bullshit category of ‘women are just bitchy’ and I was going to have to like it or lump it. Fortunately I was confident enough in myself to lump it. Most women are unwilling to walk away over something stupid… but if you have a good upbringing and friends and self-esteem you can smell the gas.
Hope I don’t get flamed for this.
Why is the the implication that this is a problem that women face more than men. All of the gas-lighting phrases described above are phrases I have heard over and over again through out my life. And I’m sure most men hear it all the time as well.
I am highly empathetic, as are my two boys. We cry when we hear of the misfortune of others, get angry when we hear of injustice and feel unable to act. The reason it appears as if this is an issue facing women, is that most men in society are conditioned to mask, hide, and suppress their emotions. In my generation this emotional connection was beaten out of you. “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about”.
These phrases are used by anyone who is inconsiderate, and is unable to accept fault. Women are as capable as men to dish out this type of emotional manipulation.
To say that emotional intelligence is a women’s genius is plane old sexist. Anyone man or woman connected to their own feelings have the ability to intuit the needs of others and empathize. It is also a skill most primates have. All human’s are born with the ability to look at someone, and mimic their state of being both emotionally and physically. It is how our babies learn. Men have had the disservice of having this ability on the emotional side, stripped out of them usually by age 6. That is the real tragedy here.
Lastly, men and women are different, equal in being, but different. Anyone that says otherwise is ignoring science, and has never had a cross-gender-ed friend. Men produce WAY more testosterone than women, women produce way more estrogen. These hormones affect the way we look and feel. Testosterone is what gives men additional aggression, competitiveness and upper body strength. Estrogen gives women the ability to carry children, and make them more resilient to environmental hazards like disease and starvation. It is why women tend to live longer.
But regardless of the differences programmed into us genetically, we experience emotion the same way. And how we react to that is not a Man woman thing, but an individual thing.
I agree, it can happen to men as easily. The first time I read this article I realized I do this to my boyfriend (a very compassionate and empathetic person) and male coworkers on a regular basis. It’s very effective in making them shut up about whatever tactless, hurtful thing I did or said. There’s virtually no argument they can offer in return without risking further embarrassment. It’s a cheap, awful tactic.
But I think the author is also shedding light on the sentiment (about women) that it supports. I’ve never heard proposed the idea that men shouldn’t go into politics (or a number of other fields requiring level-headedness) because they’re just too “emotionally unstable”. In fact, I can’t even fathom receiving such an argument. I have received the argument for women. From women. We’re all just such flighty, undependable creatures!
It doesn’t seem to be a widespread notion that men are, to a fault, emotionally volatile. I would argue (could also be read as: agree with you) the opposite assumption- that men are perpetually stoic, unemotional creatures- is equally damaging, inaccurate and incapacitating, in an entirely different way.
I hope this goes over well, but can we say that in the majority of the cases presented both people are acting in an emotional way. For example the Boss sounds like he’s trying to fulfill and emotional need to have complete dominance over his employees. Where as the employee is subjecting herself to a solicited emotional response cause by the boss in order to maintain his dominance. Now if we separate the emotion from the decision making process (dont let guilt make you keep a job) you can make the decision that best serves you as an individual. The solution is that the emotional impulses that we have, which has , in my humble opinion, an evolutionary significance equal to that of the appendix, needs to be controlled by the intellect. If an individual realizes that a person or action is causing feeling X, and instead of having an emotional response, (breaking down crying, going into a violent rage, etc. ) they use reason to find ways to prevent or avoid the cause, would that not stop the manipulation because it then becomes ineffective? Then i think it would be fair to say that every one involved would like more fulfilled and meaningful lives.
It’s true that the above examples do not qualify as “crazy”. No one is really arguing that they do. But you know what does qualify as crazy? The following:
- “Oh my gosh you’re such a nice guy! I need to find a guy exactly like you…but not you.”
- “I can never find a nice guy anywhere! Lets go look for one at a bar.”
- “Everyone thinks that my boyfriend is an a**, but I know he’s really a sensitive, caring guy underneath. Trust me, I’ll get him to change”
- “If I want him to like me, I have to wait at least 20 min in between each text. Otherwise he’ll think I’m desperate:
- “Oh my gosh, why don’t guys pay me any attention? I could go up and talk to them, but that would be putting my self out there and making myself vulnerable. That’s their job.”
- “You know what would be an awesome way to attract guys? Act like we want nothing to do with them when they come up to talk to us!”
- “You’re so caring and deep! I love talking to you! But you know what? That dude’s got a nicer car., so see ya later buddy”
- “Oh my gosh, you know who I can’t stand? Becky at the office. She is such a B****!” “Oh hey Becky! How’s it going girl? I love your skirt!”
Women pull that stuff ALL. THE. TIME. I’ll stop believing they’re crazy when that stuff stops.
Let’s “be honest”. You’re a sexist, gaslighting, prigg.
Way to generalize an entire gender!!!
-Because men never miss the perfect woman who has been under his nose all along.
-I know absolutely NO women who thinks they can find anything other than a one night stand at the bar!
-Because no man has EVER stayed in a bad relationship for too long!
-Maybe she had something better to do than have a lengthy text chat with the likes of you…
-In case you didn’t notice, times have changed…women are a lot more pro-active now a days!
-Maybe they DIDN’T want anything to do with you. Lol!
-Right, because ALL women are materialistic. (In case you didn’t notice, that sentence was dripping with sarcasm.)
-Oh, yeah…and we are all two-faced!
Moderator Note: Edited to remove personal insults
While I don’t disagree with very much of what was said, I think there’s another important point that is less intentionally malicious: If I don’t understand my wife’s feelings, they’re likely to sound crazy. I’m learning that she may act differently than I do (“overreact” is a false perception, but is still how I tend to see it), but that the “level” of her reaction does not negate its validity.
I think this difference between the genders is, however, largely societal. If men are taught to bottle feelings and women are taught that it’s crazy to have them, we create a rift. Men seem better at hiding feelings than women do, so women let theirs out and look crazy.
Having said all that, I’m just learning to not be a jerk, so none of it is set in stone. This was a good read and I plan to learn from it.
You’re unemotional, you’re closed up, you don’t express your emotions enough, you don’t understand me enough, what are you thinking, you’re such a neanderthal. Sound familiar? If you are a man, it probably does….
So what happens when the woman in this case decides to abuse you, you try to address their bad behaviour by telling them to calm down, don’t say that stuff, ask them to show some respect or at least stop the highly abusive speech? Is that gaslighting still or is it acceptable? If I do something wrong, fine, correct me on it but if they go “off” and abuse the hell out of me for it then they are performing a bad behaviour and need to be corrected.
I’ve noticed some people will hide behind various excuses, a license to be a b*tch, using a small incident as an excuse to really abuse the hell out of someone verbally or using PMS as an excuse to act like a realll *********naughtyperson*******. Then there is the gaslighting they do back, accusing you of being inconsiderate to their feelings, having low emotional intelligence, using those kinds of words in a negative way not to correct you on bad behaviour but to truly treat YOU like the bad person for their behaviour.
Gaslighting swings both ways people, it’s wrong to treat someones feelings like they are nothing but it’s also wrong to just abuse the hell out of someone for expressing their own. There are positive ways to express anger, showing negative behaviour towards someone that showed you the same can be quite manipulative. It’s important for people to try understand the other but remember, it’s a 2 way street.
Many of the descriptions I see of women being crazy by friends I’ve heard are more to do with strange behaviour, behaviour that to these men DOES appear crazy, stuff like getting yelled at over something they see as quite minor when really the gf is angry over something totally different, stuff where the one calling them crazy cops an earful over stuff he didn’t even do. Imagine seeing a woman yell, scream, and slap their bf over something small like spilling the milk, or making a silly joke. Basically behaviour that these guys wouldn’t tolerate from men, but they’ve been raised to believe it’s acceptable for these women to slap them, yell over small stuff, be emotionally manipulative, control where they go or use emotional manipulation to guilt them into avoiding a weekend with mates for instance (you don’t love me, you don’t spend enough time with me). Another common one is a woman all hot for a guy and then just suddenly goes ice cold, behaviour that varies wildly and flip-flops. It’s hella confusing and rightly so, especially without explanation.
Not all women are like this of course, it’s just SOME can be like that, and some women really do appear crazy. There are plenty of men who also appear crazy. We all need to find acceptable ways of expressing our emotions, but our need for expressing them shouldn’t override respect for others. It all needs to co-exist or you end up with imbalance, guys being slapped around thinking that is what women are like and just accepting it as a fact of life for instance. Women aren’t crazy, SOME HUMANS are “crazy”, although their behaviours are probably just foreign to what we know or expect.
This is highly problematic and abusive toward men. Now a man can’t clarify a situation without abusing a woman? Yes, “crazy” is a bit of a strong word, but so is “abuse.”
What if I told you that it’s abusive to overuse words like “abuse”?
This article seems to outline exactly what’s wrong with the world of modern feminism and “good men.” A “good man” is a man who indulges a woman’s every emotion, every whim, every desire and mood swing without question or clarification. He doesn’t dare remind her that reality may, on occasion, disagree with her feelings. In addition to abusing men, this does women a huge disservice. They grow into this constant indulgence and start thinking that anything or anyone that doesn’t bent to their feelings must be at fault in some way. They must be ABUSIVE.
I know it’s unpleasant. And in our “princess” culture it’s unheard of, but it’s not abusive. It’s life: there is an entire reality outside of your emotions.
I understand what you’re saying I believe, I think it boils down to that potentially the article has merit for some men and women, that both men and women can do this. But on the flipside questioning their behaviour isn’t always abuse.
Calling them as crazy because they are women = wrong
Telling them they are over-reacting because they are women = wrong
Telling them they are over-reacting because they are making a massive issue over what you see is small = A tricky thing to deal with.
They may have been triggered by a past abuse, they may just speak in a way that is dramatic or over generalizes (you “ALWAYS” do this). Telling them they are acting crazy isn’t really helpful. I’d suggest saying “I feel you are over-generalizing by saying I always do this, it feels like an unfair attack on me”. A simple change in how people express their feelings could help a lot, especially for those who focus a lot on the spoken words vs trying to guess what the person is implying. “You always do this” can be taken as you ALWAYS do this, or it could be her saying “I feel you do this a lot”, the first one I think is going to make people far more defensive than the latter.
The tricky thing with all of this is that some women and men actually do act outrageously, over the top, far past what you may experience from 99% of other people so how do you tell them to calm down their actions, tell them to drop down from extremely aggressive to just angry. Some folks are very volatile, the slightest thing can spark them off and if you aren’t use to people like that it can be seen as crazy, I myself was like that but in going through that I now understand a bit why others do it. Identifying why they act that way is very important, you (anyone, not you in particular) may find they aren’t crazy but have very valid reasons for flying off the handle BUT that doesn’t mean it’s acceptable for you to be abused by them.
I believe people should ASK others to find a way to express their feelings without being abusive, try avoid saying calm down but basically something like “I realize you’re angry but can you please not hit me, I’d love to talk about it with you but it becomes very hard to discuss this when I am afraid you’re going to hit me/whatever”.
Accept their emotions (don’t have to indulge them), but don’t accept their abuse basically. If you’re going to call them crazy I really suggest not saying that word but explain what is making you feel like they’re acting crazy. People shouldn’t feel crazy for having the emotions, but it’s important they know that some forms of expressing emotion are intimidating, and don’t really help explain them.
I have been following this post as well as had been a commentator on the subject. This really has gotten intense thus I think it deserves attention not only of a professional but as a spectator seeing what it has done to the PEOPLE involved with such dire situations. The gaslighters I have observed are normal people that use people that are low self-esteem or at least look like they have low self-esteem. By using these people then no one can suspect that they are actually gaslighting another individual. Yes it happens to male and female; and here is an even bigger surprise; it happens to children. This is a present phenomenan because there are so many adult children; these are children that have to fend for themselves because of various reasons. Children are babysitting before they are even twelve years old. They are models before they are three; adults mold these children into adult mini’s in order to supplement incomes leaving the adult with more “play money”–money for socializing, drugs, alcohol, new toys (cars, motorcycles, gym memberships other various “stress alleviators”. With the new IRS refund laws parents want their children because a net refund could equal as much as an $8,000+ income tax refund at the end of the year. (yes I have/had three children, so I know; one deceased daughter). A true gaslighter can not be spotted unless you pay attention to the partner being gaslit. If they look ragged and you think they could look better; if they act irrational and you think there is no apparent reason for their irrationality; if they are dirty and you want to tell them to shower; then someone in their life is messing with them. Human nature is not to be any of the above, dirty, ragged and irrational. So stop and think better yet stop and talk and LISTEN to them you just might learn something—I did…As far as the answer; I do not know; but I am working on it….
@ Sandra Cecconello
Gaslighting might have a different term to describe it in psychology. I’d be surprising if it wasn’t known to psychology.
I want to point out the danger to this thinking. Just having the word ‘gaslight’ on hand sets up women to participate in reverse-gaslighting by *saying* that you’re gaslighting them. I say this because it of course happened to me. I was trying to clear up a situation with a girl and I told her what I thought happened, and she immediately reverted to the word ‘gaslighting’. I effectively couldn’t say anything back . . . because she was the victim, and I was the perpetrator. In reality, I was giving the issue a lot of thought and was not telling her that she couldn’t say what she wanted about the situation. But she thought I was trying to trick her into thinking that something that was true was false.
My general view is that you shouldn’t turn people into systematic victims. You could do it with anyone if you wanted to. I’m a victim of the suburbs/overzealous high school athletic coaching/America’s public schools/images of unemotional men/the media…and blah blah blah. You should talk about moral issues without branding the world into boolean types of perpetrators and victims….because that is not how the real world works. It is a lot more complicated than that. You take out that complication by stating the issue without making it seems like all men everywhere are doing it to all women everywhere. Then that might make people more discriminating about whether it is actually present in a situation, and people wouldn’t whip it out simply because of the genders cast in a given situation. To figure out what is happening in the real world, you need a lot more information than that.
Yashar Ali: thank you for your insighful article. It was true, generous, and courageous even in supposedly advanced 2012. Women: don’t take this as an excuse to torture men. Men: think about what he is saying and try to do a little better even if you’re already doing pretty good.
It must really be hard for some men to drop the pride thing and just admit that the article hit the truth right on the head.
Great article, one massively pedantic point– the ’44 film is a remake of a 1940 film (I know, shameless): http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031359/ starring Anton Walbrook who is brilliant.
My opinion is that when people use the word “crazy” to describe someone, what they really mean is “I don’t understand your behaviour – you are doing something and I don’t know why”. A lot of trouble could be avoided by people saying that to each other, and giving the other person a chance to explain what’s going on for them.
I guess that supposes an interest and a willingness to listen that isn’t always there.
Yep, quite true. I’ve had people act “crazy” to me before, I tried hard to understand their behaviour but it was very difficult. Major emotional mood swings, taking things I’ve said way wrong and using their pain n experience from other people to colour the way I am to them, I guess it is triggering. One experience was a female friend who was a victim of abuse, we had a disagreement that every other friend I have wouldn’t have thought much of, even friends who’ve been abused, but she was triggered and I guess I reminded her of him. She would pay attention to only some of what I said, ignore the rest, and automatically I’d be thought of as the abuser. It was heartbreaking to see and that friendship died, I couldn’t handle her extremely personal outbursts of anger such as saying hello when she wasn’t in the mood to talk yet was in the mood to talk 5 minutes before, it was like this switch would flick over and turn her from nice into a total bitch, to me the behaviour was pretty fucking crazy but on thinking about it the only thing I can guess as to why it happens is her mental health had suffered tremendously under the abuser’s reign, made her so volatile and sensitive that it was near impossible for me to have a normal conversation with her.
It reminded me of myself years ago after going through a lot of bullying, I took everything to heart and very seriously, any criticism was like a stab in the heart and I’d lash out. To others that’d look crazy, and I don’t blame them, it’s not a normal behaviour (by normal I mean the average behaviour of most humans) but it probably is normal behaviour for those who have been through abuse. It can take a lot to understand why people act the way they do.
@ Archy…. co-responsibility? Ludicrous!
To the writer of this article; while you do bring up a valid point by saying that “gaslighting” does happen to women, you also use invalid points to illustrate this point, and ultimately completely discredit your work. First of all, you cannot lump all men and all women together. This is an incredibly reckless way to present a subject that OBVIOUSLY affects men and women, and if you do not believe it does affect both parties, you are sorely mistaken. You should have also made the distinction that there is a genuine difference between telling someone they are f#$ked up and gaslighting. I tell my friends when they are f#$cked up, completely different from gaslighting, regardless of gender or any BS societal label, in fact if anything I say to any of my friends borders on gaslighting it is, 9 times out of 10, directed at my male friends.
The one thing that I would like to caution you on, sir, is that the psychology of the human race goes far beyond your specific personality, what you’ve experienced, and what you know to be true, so please refrain from making such vast generalizations which undermine every male human being on earth.
I’m a little late in finding this, but thank you for taking the time to write and post this piece. I’ll try it out in meat-space to see how it works in practice, but based on my current preconceptions it seems like a valid point. I expect I’ll try to update my cached responses a little after I gather some experimental data via this method.
This is what I have been trying to tell others for so long. I have been through too much gaslighting in my life from males and females, females who want to defend the male gaslighters. If only more men can stand up and speak up as you just did.
Read this book by Patricia Evans: Controlling People. Its about mind games people in engage unsuspecting others in. Usually men who don’t want their female partner to be confident in the truth that he doesn’t respect her.
Nice article and all, but was the sexism and woman-victimization really necessary?
Seriously, you’re constantly assuming that men are the sole perpetrators of this and women are all innocent victims who can’t take care of themselves. Look at this shit:
“Because women bare the brunt of our neurosis. It is much easier for us to place our emotional burdens on the shoulders of our wives, our female friends, our girlfriends, our female employees, our female colleagues, than for us to impose them on the shoulders of men.”
You take a very real concept, wait until people start to agree with it, then slide in your extremist woman-demeaning, man-hating agenda.
For anyone who wants a less biased version of the same principle:
http://www.abuseandrelationships.org/Content/The_Con/gaslighting.html
Thankyou, sir. This article is very heartening.
Part of the greater issue here is one of emotional intelligence. Those crazy, irrational emotions that are branded as “crazy emotions” are reactive and poorly expressed – no wonder they’re not well received. Who wants to be yelled at? I don’t think that kind of behavior is justifiable at all. And I’m a woman who used to be intensely that way. Now I am working on expressing myself thoughtfully rather than reactively. I feel better for it. And I think I communicate my feelings much more effectively.
I can not believe that this post is still going….has there been any resolution on agreeing to disagree; or is this still “social communication”? There have been so many good responses and even the “jerky” responses hit on a touch of truth. At this moment, I am studying Abnormal Psychology and was looking through my notes and books to find no mention of “gaslighting”. It appears to me that this entire discussion consists of people that are either being gaslit or gaslighters that are trying to reform….either way my own input was based on experience of a lifetime as well; plus people in my life that their lives had been ruined because of gaslighters. Will this ever surface into the light as it should or are we all just going to be called “crazy” or “drama retards” our entire life? I know myself this is as real as cancer and I am not going to just sit by and be a victim my entire life; that is why I am studying and participating in these forums; I appreciate knowledge and I always hope for resolution….
Constructive criticism—malicious comments—talking at someone; talking with someone; talking down to someone; —communication—listening–yelling–talking–whispering–screaming–meaningful words, just words, —I didn’t mean to; it was intentional; so what who cares—I said it, they weren’t listening anyway; so what–why didn’t they, they were stupid, lazy, –
but go figure everyone expects age appropriate to mean communication appropriate; all of the above are used; some directly others indirectly. This is just but a few examples; the list could become endless or infinite.
I have often said the biggest battle of all time to me is with women; we are fighting so hard to survive that the food chain amongst women really has no prejudice, discrimination only self-satisfaction; after all it appears that nothing or no one else can satisfy the individual woman.
Against other women one woman must always be right, must never need help; only give help; must never need advice; only give advice; must never need money; only be able to give money and above all else only agree with another woman if there is something or maybe someone in it for you, the individual woman.
Hey,
Just thought I’d point it out. Gaslight was originally a play which was later adapted into a movie.
Oh yeah Yashar, women are *real* compassionate. The compassion just fairly radiates off them.
Give me a break.
I would just like to point out that this happens to men as well, and I find it offensive that this article fails to mention that at all. Instead it gives – at first glance – the impression that all men do this sort of thing, and that it happens to only women. I can assure you that that is a fallacy, as I have suffered this from both women and men (my parents included). I a not belittling any of your statements, I would just like to say that it’s not just women.
I think men and women project our junk onto the other sex a lot.
If you take everything women say about men, and everything women say about men, and reverse it all, you might get close to the truth.
Women say men can’t be faithful, men are insensitive, men are only interested in sex.
Men say women are overly emotional, prone to hysteria, and illogical.
But it’s the guy who buys the Harley because ‘ we need one’;; the man who needs a lifetime to get over a relationship; and if you don’t think men are prone to hysteria, try moving his toolbox and see what happens.
Women? Well of course they’re all paragons of virtue; do they care about men’s feelings? I think most are oblivious to the fact that men have them; and if you’re not jumping them on the first date they think you’re gay.
’bout sums it up…