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sarahsweets · Jul 15, 2019, 07:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by golden_eve

About blaming the abuse victim, blaming them for staying or for even getting involved:

There is usually some rationalization for blaming the victim, most commonly, that the victim could have escaped the situation or avoided it in the first place.

Victims may or may not be benefited by concrete assistance, but validation of their experiences are essential for sanity and growth. The tendency to blame survivors has some additional elements:

I find it ironic that people think a “tough love” approach is an acceptable way of “helping “ a victim or survivor. The “I told you so’s” seem endless both said and unsaid. Since when did shaming , scolding, blaming ever help anyone ever ? A victim doesn’t choose to be one. It’s not like they wake up one day and say “ today I think I will get in a relationship with an abuser”. Abuse is pervasive and sneaky. Abusers either trick you into believing them and their lies or they outright attack you.

Quote:

Failure to recognize the simple fact that attempting to leave a relationship is blocked or punished by the primary aggressor most of the time. Someone who has not experienced this may have trouble imagining this.
Confusion with the "duty to mitigate damages" from contract law. Abuse is not just a breach of contract, and human relationships are not subject to contract law!
Confusion of submission with consent.
Confusion of tolerance with consent. Most people endure some meanness from their partners because they consider it an aberration that won't be repeated. The systematic nature of domestic violence only becomes clear over time.
Survivors blame themselves for the abuse (this is victim self-blaming). They of course are aided in this by the primary aggressor who is constantly blaming them. Therefore, they for a long time stay in the relationship and try to change their own behavior to end the abuse. When and if they retroactively reframe the experience as abusive, they deserve validation, even if they stayed "when something was wrong."
Final clarity by a survivor that the relationship is abusive and unworkable can not be retro-actively applied to earlier in the relationship when the survivor was bewildered about what was happening.
Even where the survivor recognizes the abuse and its inevitability, she may stay in a relationship because it appears to be (and may in fact be) her best option in life considering the difficulties and lack of support she faces alone. Where all options are bad, a choice does not constitute consent to the the downsides of any option chosen, rather just acquiescence. If later, better options arise, validation is warranted about abuse when options were all poor.
The effects of abuse (confusion, low self-esteem, bitterness, lessened sensitivity to danger, etc..(many more)) are erroneously attributed to the survivor as personal characteristics that lead her to "choose" the abusive situation.

Staying where there has been abuse does not constitute consent or permission for the abuse!

Especially as it pertains to physical abuse, when you live in fear and are threatened daily and harmed you are afraid for your life ! Of course it’s not easy to leave. And leave where ? People always say go to a shelter- assuming one is nearby and has room and allows your pets or children. Leave all your possessions to be destroyed by the abuser. You don’t want to go to family because the abuser know where your family lives. If you share finances the abuser may have all the money. There is no tough love with victims. They have it tough enough.