The core theme to most red flags for telling if someone is abusive, is the question:
"Am I human to this person?"
And by extension, so you don't turn into a flying monkey:
"Are there people who aren't human to this person?"
It all shows up in how they treat you and others.
And if they'll do it to someone else, they can easily turn on you too.
I think to the scene in Les Miserables where Jean Valjean is forgiven by the priest and saved from the soldiers, and decides to turn his life around.
In this case, Valjean wasn't really an abuser type. He wasn't stealing because he craved power, but because society had put him into a powerless place where he had to steal, and then abused him heavily and repeatedly for it.
Conversely an abuser type, like Thenardier, would not have learned anything from the priest's kindness, and would've taken the silver as a victory. As he later shows when Valjean lets him go after seeing how he'd abused Cossette.
So it's important to know the signs. How do you tell the difference between Valjean and Thenardier when deciding how to handle wrongdoing?
Kindness to an abuser type will only be seen as defiance if it goes against what they *really* want even if it complies with literal orders (malicious compliance) OR if it comes towards them when they have been utterly defeated.
In the latter case, kindness undermines their worldview and the basis of the power they once held. If you can act from free will to be kind to them when you've got the chance to pwn them, what does that say about how much freedom they really had when they were top dog?
In this class, kindness is better known as "mercy." Mercy requires a power imbalance, and can only come from the person with the most power in a situation. Even a powertripper can show MERCY, and in their case, they get off on it, because they know they had the ability to choose the opposite. It becomes evidence of their power.
As such, unlike in the movies, they will be unlikely to learn any actual lessons from being shown mercy, and will return to powertripping the second they can. The moment they can save face through revenge, they will.
Thus, any kindness shown (to them MERCY) needs to NOT allow them back into power or positions of causing harm. That is not, in fact, kind, because it puts someone undeserving in harm's way.
Towards them? They don't see anything as kindness.
They see it as subservience.
In fact, kindness when you don't have to be kind is one of the greatest acts of free will you will ever have.
But they won't see it that way. They understand it to be the opposite.
But there are times when kindness will seem to them like rebellion.
Act accordingly. And wisely.
Also the economic system of Zion, The United Order, is basically communism, which the LDS Church fights tooth and nail.
The lyrics to John Lennon's Imagine basically described how things would be in New Jerusalem, and as a child this was crystal clear to me. (No religion either, because everyone would believe the same thing because Bro Jesus is like *right there*, so that's just "reality".)
But John Lennon was a hippie pinko commie so I was supposed to hate him. This was in fact one of the earliest items on my shelf. I might have been 7 when I had these thoughts. I never did, in fact, hate John Lennon. I mean, how can you?
I explored some of the logic of Zion awhile back, but more to do with power structures.
What does it say of a God that erases nearly all trace of a city that managed to eradicate poverty and abuses of power? Such that any knowledge of *how* they did it no longer exists, so that anyone hoping to replicate it will have to start from scratch?
If you've never been Mormon, keep in mind that Mormons do hope to replicate Zion. But that's kind of difficult when its leadership and perhaps even its God keeps putting up barriers.
Along the lines of what I've been saying about asking questions, being curious and promoting curiosity, avoiding talking points, and sticking to core values in discussion.
This applies to political dogma as well.
"The only thing that can get someone to think critically about their dogma is to think about their foundation for the dogmas, which is their sense of themselves, their worldview, and their social identities that are important to them."
(Probably paraphrased slightly.)
Acali Expedition, for the readers.
I discovered a new mid-century unethical sociology/psychology experiment!
This one is really funny. Turns out that once you remove active external dehumanization pressures from people, they tend to naturally rehumanize each other, even when the experimenter is trying to do the opposite. (I'm the one adding the dehumanization model to the outcome.)
Also thoughts about experimenters who design social experiments via projection.
And how the real subject of this experiment was the experimenter himself.
CW for depictions of a bigot being a bigot.
If you're playing a social deduction game, (say mafia werewolf, Among Us type video games, or a competition reality show like The Mole, Devil's Plan, or Million Dollar Secret), where everyone playing has consented to a ruleset where lying is a core component of the game, do you believe it is it immoral to lie during the course of the game?
Practical thing for do for fight triad of abuse/rape culture and fascism?
- believe survivor/victim and support
- foster athmosphere of respect of boundaries, limits, feelings, needs and wants
- #ConsentCulture be of import and be for sex and for nonsexual thing as well
- practice respect of body and bodily autonomy for self and other
- celebrate joy of life!
more concrete example:
- someone say "not can do task"? you not push. task maybe important for cause, but friend/comrade IS cause!
- someone upset, sad, have strong emotion, dissociate, leave suddenly? offer help if can guess what is needed, go after person for offer support, ask how help and then do
- make sure everyone (include you!) have food and rest and check in regular, make habit of check in: Need of body?
- have snack on table in in-person meeting or living space
- be connect to body of self and other (if consent) and be good friends with. learn and practice communicate with own body and other (if/when wanted)
- learn own body signal for distress or need or enjoy, learn friend signal, learn what different stim of autistic friend mean
- make space accessible, ask of accessibility need, normalise talk about, respect conflicting needs and invite creativity for find way of handle
- learn listen to instinct/ gut feeling/ vibes! this very important and no substitute for, because abuser good at twist word, like (fascist/enabling) politician
- if person give bad vibe, or you notice feel worse in body or mind if person around? GET AWAY from person, no matter who, even mother. catch breath. reflect. talk with trusted friend if possible. then decide if still be let bad vibe person in life.
- support self and other for cut contact with abuser, even if parent, and unlearn feeling of obligation to abuser (is same as unlearn loyalty to unjust government)
- listen to vibe be process of learn. bring feeling of vibes together with other sense, with feeling of body, with emotion, with knowledge and logic and with what other ppl know. make choice base on all those
- be you and obey only own value, not any authority you not trust. support other in do same, even if they be wrong, even if they question YOU. you stand by own opinion but respect friend have other view
- admit mistake and learn and grow and support other do same
- no shame to make friend change, no shame to shut down or cut off friend from group - goal be reconnection (unless it not friend but abuser)
- celebrate weirdness, craziness, difference, surprises in how people are or feel or act
- value fun, celebration, joy, light heartedness and childishness
I want point out tho: This not make fight harder, or add more different fight to fight against fascism, because:
BEST and MOST POWERFUL and MOST RESILIENT and FEARLESS of antifascist comrade and activist and warrior be SURVIVOR WHO HAVE SUPPORT NOW.
This interconnectedness of abuse culture, rape culture and fascism not mean "oh no, antifa work already hard enough, how I ALSO fight fight against abuse/rape" — no it mean you have better understand of enemy and see clear: Be good person and nourish athmosphere of respect in (found) family, friend, social, religious/spiritual, or activist/political group be double effective.
You already want that, you not want be in athmosphere of abuse. So it not extra burden, it be of free for you and nourish and help thrive and FEEL GOOD for you too.
Is aspect of selfish, but I not lie, is also hard. Face fact of abuse and hurt and suffer of relative, friend, comrade (whenever it come up), is emotional labour. Is good for whole of group, which include you, so is good for you.
You be scared of issue of rape/abuse, not know how handle, not want do/say wrong thing, feel like not be expert, feel disempowered, feel like other people should handle? WRONG. Not need be expert. Not need be perfect. Not need special, scarce skill. Just be ally, be accomplice, be friend, just be HUMAN — or entity of choice .
Do not dis-able own movement by make hostile to most valuable fighters! That DOES, AUTOMATICALLY and inevitably make environment friendly for abuse, for ppl who drain of energy, even for rapist and for wannabe fascist.
Not can be neutral in question of abuse, rape OR fascism. And that GOOD THING!! Because that mean each choice have double impact.
They aren't mad that we claim things are social constructs. They're mad that they're losing control of the construct.
@BathysphereHat There's also my reaction, "Everyone wants attention, it's an actual human need, and anyone so desperate to seek attention by hurting themselves apparently can't get it any healthy way or they would WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU, YOU SOULLESS VOID??"
Tends to be my way of thinking lately.
We've got to flip this completely upside down, our society's complete lack of empathy for the most hurting person in any situation. It's not *normal* or *ok* to hate on someone *because* they're hurting, but abusers have been running the show so long they've got everyone morally twisted.
We're moving from the "surround yourself with yes-men" to the "execute the no-men" phase of pursuing excellence.
An excerpt from the most recent issue of ICSA Today, on how to help someone escape coercive indoctrination, by Dr. Janja Lalich, one of the cult researchers I quote in Recovering Agency.
In short, DON'T PREACH. DON'T ARGUE.
Instead, show someone what having a choice looks like.
"Effective Intervention Approaches
"1. Creating Safe Spaces for Ambivalence: Rather than demanding immediate recognition of abuse or control, effective intervention allows people to safely explore their doubts without threatening their entire meaning system at once. This might mean supporting someone in questioning specific practices while temporarily accepting their continued commitment to the group’s core beliefs.
"2. Reconnecting with One’s Pre-Group Identity: Helping individuals reconnect with aspects of their identity that preceded their involvement in the totalistic environment. This isn’t about erasing their experience but about expanding their frame of reference beyond the bounded system. I describe this as doing something that will hopefully tug at their emotional heart strings, reawakening thoughts, feelings, memories that have been suppressed by the group’s indoctrination processes.
"3. Addressing Practical Constraints: Understanding that bounded choice operates through both ideological and practical constraints. Effective intervention often requires addressing concrete obstacles to leaving—financial dependencies, fear of social isolation, lack of practical life skills—along with psychological barriers.
"4. Building Alternative Support Systems: Recognizing that totalistic environments become self-reinforcing partly because they meet real human needs for belonging and meaning. Intervention must include helping individuals find alternative sources for these needs."
This honestly reminds me quite a bit of the troubled teen industry. They both bear similar MOs.
I'm watching this docuseries on HBO called Telemarketers, but it really buries the lede.
It's actually about police union corruption, how police unions hire ex-con telemarketers who can't get jobs elsewhere to use the names of officers killed or injured in the line of duty without compensation to scam money out of old ladies' social security checks to pay for political protection to run amok in society, and how those same call centers also run scam PACs.
Only the first episode is about telemarketers.
"Police State" is not an exaggeration.
