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Tactics

Tactic #5 Over-Protection and ‘Caring’

by Clare Murphy PhD on April 23 2012

This is the fifth of 16 blogs discussing the patterns of tactics from my power and control wheel – Over-protection and ‘caring’.

Beliefs lead to behaviours

Many men who psychologically abuse and control their female partners do not define their behaviour as cruel or abusive. This is partly because their behaviours make perfect sense when viewed from their belief system – their socially reinforced belief system. Family violence including non-physical control tactics are motivated by beliefs based on – men’s sense of masculinity – their gender as a man – that is, the ways men have learned that they should behave in relationship. Men seeking to change by attending counselling or stopping abuse programmes describe being motivated by beliefs such as:

  • Men should be top dog, the boss, the one in control
  • Women should do as the man says
  • Men are entitled to correct or discipline their partner if she strays from behaviour he expects from a female partner
  • Men are entitled to define the rules
  • Women are possessions

Over-protection and ‘caring’

These kinds of beliefs lead to behaving in over-protective ways in the guise of caring. This includes begging the woman not to go out alone or she might get raped, telling her she never has to work (even though she wants to) because he wants to take care of her, taking her to and from work so her co-workers will not get ‘ideas’, or attempting to keep her at home by saying he worries when she’s away.

Women I interviewed for my Masters research gave some examples of experiencing over-protection in the guise of caring:

Sally said, “There was one group I went to for a year, a women’s group, which Dylan didn’t like me going to and he did try to stop me quite a few times and I did stop going when he tried to stop me.  I would do what he said and I would be confused about that because he would say some rational thing like ‘because it’s really bad weather out there.  I don’t want you driving’ and because I was nervous at driving myself, I wouldn’t drive.  I wouldn’t go to this women’s group.”

Karen said, “I did have access to the car then, that’s right I claimed it (laughter). I remember for a long time Felix would say, ‘Those roads are far too dangerous, you haven’t got experience, it’s not warranted or registered, we could be in real trouble if you stuff up out there’. I’d say, ‘How about we warrant and register the car and get it insured?’ ‘Oh we don’t have enough money for that.’ It was his vehicle, he bought it, he was the one who fluffed over it. I was asking a favour of him by wanting to use it. I was really really sick. I was really depressed and I think quite mentally ill at that stage. I knew I was and I do intermittently get convoluted in my head space. That was the worst state I’d ever been in.”

Possessive jealousy in the guise of ‘caring’

When men operate from possessive jealousy, many women perceive this to be a sign of love and commitment – especially during the dating and early phases of the relationship. However this is a notion learned from places such as fairytales, romance novels and movies – it is absolutely not true. Jealousy is about the jealous person’s own beliefs. At the personal level, a jealous man’s feelings stem from beliefs about himself such as believing he’s inadequate, unworthy, or not good enough. At the social level a jealous man’s feelings stem from the belief that as a boyfriend or a husband they own their female partner.

Belief that marriage implies men’s ownership of female partners can be traced back to ancient Greek and Roman times. Manuscripts dated during the medieval period (900-1300) state that the Church, for instance, pushed for the idea that women should obey their husbands, and men were granted the authority to castigate their wives and beat and otherwise control her to correct her behaviour.

Whilst men’s sense of ownership of their wives has been played out for centuries, not everyone has always agreed with this form of relationship, and for the past 50 years there have been consistent major challenges – by men and especially by women – to dismantle such inhumane forms of relationship.

The problem is that gender socialisation in western societies continues to be steeped in subtle (and sometimes very obvious) social support for men’s ongoing ownership, control and enslavement of intimate female partners.

Some of the men I interviewed for my PhD research talked about love being linked to ownership and the socially reinforced double standards accompanying such beliefs. Alex said he used to think “love was an ownership type of thing, you love someone you’re with them 24 hours a day.”  David said that a man, “loves his wife to do everything that she’s told to do, and be obedient.” James said “most guys would like their wife or partner to be subservient to them. And be agreeable with the ideals of the husband.” Sam said he used to believe that women had to be a slave. Bob said the husband was entitled to sex every night because “That is really part of the culture.” Bill said that men marry “to tie up the mini me (laughter). Get her off the market… Men want to go back to the market and the women can’t. I dare say that’s 99 percent of men.”

Obsessive possessive jealousy leads to hyper-vigilance, anger and sometimes to murder

Men’s possessive sexual jealousy is used to justify isolating women from social opportunities, as well as for monitoring women’s whereabouts and as an excuse for stalking women. Possessive sexual jealousy is often at play when a controlling man kills his wife or his ex-wife and and sometimes her new boyfriend.

Donna said, “once I started having sex with him and he was madly in love with me he started displaying his jealousy and his possessiveness.”

Heather said, “Luke was just ultra jealous about anything especially my ex-husband. I think one of his main things that he was jealous and that I was close to our son and that we were away from him having that time together.”

Harasses her about imagined affairs

Susan said, “When I was living at dad’s it was good coz I had my money every week and I had the support and then Anthony came down and accused me of playing around on him. And that wasn’t me.”

When she is out, he is extremely jealous

Heather said “Luke used to complain about the clothes I wore, said I dressed like a whore, didn’t like the way I had my hair because I attract the guys, that I wear fuck-me pants and just want to get guys after me. And if I wanted to take our son to the beach, Luke would pass a comment, ‘Oh you just want to go to the beach and flounder around in your skimpy bikini in front of guys.’ In the end anything I put on I was thinking ‘is this looking tarty?’ I got to the stage when I thought I really should change my hair colour, even though I’ve had this hair colour my whole life.”

“Even if I stopped and talked to a guy he’d say, ‘I’ll poke his fucking eyes out.’ He was really anti. We were in the supermarket and a friend of my cousin’s was there and we stopped and talked and he goes, ‘What took you so long, the supermarket’s only across the road?’ I said I was talking to Joey and he said, ‘I can see that.’ I just stepped back. I felt like a little child being told off. At the supermarket if someone asked me where the bread was Luke would say, ‘Why didn’t he fucking ask me where the bread was he’s just trying to get into your pants.’ It was constant. So I didn’t even talk to a person let alone look at them when I was in his company. And I never would tell him if I saw any guy and spoke to him.”

He frequently phones or unexpectedly goes to her work to check up on her

Teresa said a warning sign that something was not right was Patrick’s “constant wanting to know where I was and what I was doing, which started right in the early stages in the relationship, the ringing up and checking all the time, from home, from work, from everywhere. Sometimes at midnight to see if I was there, or to make sure that no-one else was there.”

Possessive sexual jealousy leads to stalking

Heather said “Luke would drive where my house was being built and say, ‘I’ve sussed out who your plumber is, he’s not that nice looking, I’ve sussed out who the builder is, he’s ok, I’ve looked at the concrete guy and I reckon he’d get his rocks off on you’.”

Accusations based on possessiveness and jealousy lead women to doubt their version of reality

Heather said, “I didn’t really know what Luke expected of me. Even now you kind of think, coz he’s built this belief into me, ‘how am I coming across, does it look like I’m flirting with this person?’ You’re analysing everything you do coz I think I don’t want to come across like that, ‘Am I coming across like that? I don’t want to talk too much to this guy, he’s married.’ Really silly things you wouldn’t have thought of before.”

Possessiveness and jealousy lead women to find ways to protect their integrity

Raewyn said “Brian was jealous of me teaching art because he would make it very difficult. He would never comfort the children when I left. He would never try and keep them happy when I left, they would be screaming at the door. When they were younger they would be crying and he would do nothing, but I would never say anything. In some ways it was more to protect myself because I didn’t want to have a big fight about it, but yeah I knew he didn’t like the fact that I was teaching art, so I didn’t make a big issue of it either because I didn’t want to make him feel even worse.”

It is important that women be honest with themselves about their gut feelings

Believing in Knight in Shining Armour stories can lead to confusion for some women when their partner tries to stop her from leaving the house for fear she will be harmed. Early in a relationship this can sound charming and be thought of as a sentiment that means he loves her. It is often only after months or years of an ongoing pattern of feeling controlled and restricted that some seemingly innocent behaviours start to become of major concern. It is important for women to trust their perceptions about their partner’s motivations. When women are continually being blamed for making their partner jealous – yet are not actually doing anything that is dishonest or untrustworthy – it is important that the woman not doubt herself – that she does what it takes to maintain a belief in her own integrity.

It is important that men be honest with themselves about their beliefs, feelings and needs

Many men’s possessive and jealous behaviours are motivated by beliefs that they have to stay on top, otherwise they believe they will fall prey to condemnation from others (often other men), many believe that they are a failure as a man if they do not appear to be ‘wearing the pants’. Some men have experienced bullying by other men aimed at shaping this kind of masculinity, so to avoid victimisation they do what it takes to show their masculine prowess for the sake of being accepted by other men. And if there are no other men to prove this to, some men have learned that controlling women and treating them as possessions is a way to feel they have succeeded.

But many men want a caring relationship. But a relationship is about team work – doing what it takes so that all team members can flourish. When one team member (in this case the man) plays by a set of rules that controls and restricts the other team member so that the man comes out the winner – that’s not only destructive for the woman – but it is also destroying the man’s sense of wellbeing and happiness. It is also destructive for any children growing up in this atmosphere. Sam, one of the men I interviewed, said that challenging peers to stop controlling, abusing and using women “does cross your mind” but what “does play on your mind more is that my mate can’t see that soft side.” And here’s the paradox – ‘real men’ are supposed to have courage and strength – yet many don’t use that courage and inner strength to stand up against social pressures to control the women they love – because doing so has been labelled “soft” and that’s not manly.

Watch out for blogs on the following control tactics:

One-Sided power and control
Mind games
Inappropriate restrictions
Isolation
Emotional unkindness & violation of trust
Degradation
Separation abuse
Using social institutions & social prejudices
Denial, minimising, blaming
Using the children
Economic abuse
Sexual abuse
Symbolic aggression
Domestic slavery
Physical violence

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Tactic # 4 Isolation

by Clare Murphy PhD on February 9 2012

This is the fourth of 16 blogs discussing the patterns of tactics from my power and control wheel – Isolation.

Isolation is a powerful tactic used by controlling partners

Isolation is a pivotal tactic that controlling partners use in order to weaken their victims, prevent them from hearing others’ perspectives, and to bring them into line with his own beliefs and requirements. Often possessiveness and jealousy play a part in some men’s motivation to isolate women from social contact with friends and family. Some tactics aimed at isolating the victim include telling her that she cares more for her friends, family and pets than for him, telling her he’s the only one who understands her and loves her, controlling incoming information including what she reads, calling her names if she spends time with friends and family, purposefully moving towns or countries, and there are a whole lot more tactics that women describe below in interviews from my Masters research.

Isolation is a debilitating consequence of abuse and control

Anyone who lives with an ongoing experience of being abused by a family or household member can become isolated as a result.  For instance, the victim may withdraw from friends and family to save face or because they feel misunderstood, judged, stigmatised, or not supported. Particular tactics aimed at isolating the victim can lead women to become extremely dependent on their controlling partner.

He controls the money to prevent her use of the car

Elsie said her husband had the money for the petrol, “so I could only go and see my parents if he gave me petrol money. So I’d only go sometimes. I still saw them. As Leon’s control over me got higher and stronger over me he would let me go more often. Near the end of our marriage, friends would come and he would open the door this much (indicates two inches) and say I wasn’t home. That way I never ended up with anybody to counteract what he said. It did start to wear me down.”

He turns off electricity to prevent her exiting through the electronic gate

A couple of friends of Heather’s said, “’I don’t know how you live here with these gates around you all the time. It’s a fully fenced section with these gates.’ They said they’d feel a bit trapped, it’s like Fort Knox in there. I started to think, yeah, I’d gone to go a couple of times and Luke stopped me coz he switched the power off and I couldn’t get in to turn it back on. There were just a few things like that that started to scare me. That’s when I started to panic and thought I’ve got to get out of here and have some time on my own to see what’s happening.”

He manufactures situations aimed at isolating her

Heather would tell Luke, for instance, that she “was going out with a friend on Saturday and he’d say, ‘Oh didn’t I tell you, I was planning on going away, ring and tell them you can’t, I’ve already planned it.’ Sometimes now I think he really hadn’t planned it, he’d just ring at the last minute, so any time I went to go to an outside activity, ‘Oh didn’t I tell you mum wants to come over’. There was always something stopping me getting contact with the outside world. He’d say, ‘Let’s go fishing, it’s too nice a day you can’t go shopping today, I’ll go and pack and we’ll go to the lake fishing.’ So I’d ring my friend and say, ‘Can we go shopping on a wet day, it’s such a nice day Luke is off to go fishing’. In the end I was realising that I was spending all my time with him. Then when he was doing that with the phone calls I started to get a bit scared. I was scared more than anything.

Says what she does makes him jealous so insists she not do it

Karen said her partner Felix “was a very jealous person, he was afraid that I’d be running around screwing everyone. I learned how to shut myself down. I stopped seeing my friends as much. Once the baby came there was utter isolation, poverty, and loss of trust.”

Attempts to isolate him and her as a couple from the rest of the world

Teresa said her partner “didn’t want the world encroaching or shining its bright light on anything in the relationship, that it had to be exclusive and separate from the rest of the world. I thought it was quite nice. It meant that you were really special (laughter). Somebody loved you that much.”

Heather’s partner attempted to isolate her from family and friends “mainly because my parents didn’t really like him that much and my friends didn’t like him that much he’d say, ‘Oh if just you and me went to live in Australia it would be amazing. We wouldn’t have your family and everyone against us. They’re all against us here. If we moved away it would be just us. We would be so much happier. We wouldn’t have the interference.’ I didn’t want to move away. I liked having my family. But I must admit there was one stage he’d say, ‘They’re just against us because we’re so happy’. I started to believe maybe my aunty and uncle aren’t very happy, and maybe my grandparents haven’t got anything else to do but think that their granddaughter should have something better, I’d start going through all that. But I couldn’t make that move to Australia.”

Demands loyalty to him, not to others

Elsie said she really adored her stepson, Jeremy, but if ever her husband “saw us get close he’d really get stuck into me, and to Jeremy too, coz that was like disloyalty to Leon. It would really hurt because I really did adore my stepson. He was just adorable. He wouldn’t let Jeremy ever come near me, it would be like total disloyalty.”

Tells her she is not allowed to see certain people

Sally said, “I was not allowed to keep in touch with my male friends. I made the assumption he was jealous but he’d never admit to it – he had no comprehension that my friendship with these men did not mean I loved him any less or that they’d get more attention in anyway whatsoever – it was so immature and pathetic of him and ignorant that he refused to even meet these people.”

Dismissive of invites to participate with her friends and family  

Teresa said her partner Patrick “very strongly tried to prevent me from continuing and developing relationships with other people. I did what he wanted. Again it was quite subtle. It wasn’t, ‘I don’t want you to have any friends, I don’t want you to talk to your family’. It was – he’d refuse to come and visit my family for weekends or Christmas. The first Christmas I stayed, I didn’t want to stay, I’d much rather have gone to visit my family, but I felt sorry for him being left all alone, even though it was his choice to be left all alone. So I told my family I had to work because I didn’t want them to know that he was the kind of prick (laughter) who didn’t want to come and be with the family. Then with friends, he didn’t like it when they came round and he’d go and shut himself in the study and be quite dismissive to them. I was especially confused for a long time about the friends thing because my idea of living with someone was that you could have friends around for dinner and drinks and lunch, and that wasn’t the right thing to do. It took me a long time to figure it out.”

He puts limits on her visits with friends and family

Susan’s sister lived three quarters of an hour away. “But Anthony didn’t like me going over there and spending the day with her because I wouldn’t be home doing things. We were allowed to visit my cousin who was 15 minutes drive away. Anthony would go off and do a job. When he got home I thought he’d been working the whole time, but he hadn’t, he’d been visiting. I didn’t know this for a long long time, but I know he used to call into various people’s places whenever he was going past, but he used to put a time limit on my outings. I used to argue with him and he used to just look at me like I was an idiot and said, ‘well I’m not talking to you’. And he didn’t. He’d stop talking to me completely.” However Susan would still visit but would “only visit if I had to go and do something such as grocery shopping, because otherwise you have nothing if you don’t have friends.”

Teresa “narrowed the range to what was acceptable to her partner.” She used to go away for a weekend with girlfriends every four or five months “and drink lots of Lindauer and eat chocolate and cheese and crackers and I didn’t do that at all when I was with him because he was really threatened by it and didn’t like it.” She said that, “At work he didn’t like it if I spent too much time with other people, or did things when he didn’t know what I was doing. He had to know what I was doing all the time. He used to ring up every hour when I was at home and say, ‘What are you doing?’”

Tells her that her friends or family don’t care about her

Heather said Luke “was starting to set me against my parents, saying, ‘They’re just being mean, they don’t like me, they just want you to go back to your ex-husband and they’re not giving us a chance’.”

He attempts to divide and conquer by provoking jealousies and rivalries

Teresa said that her partner Patrick would tell her, “That people at work had said things about me, that they had said that I was this, that I was that, horrible things, which I believed and I don’t know whether they had said them or not. I think that he probably twisted a lot of things like that and I believed him, so that would change my judgement.” This led Teresa to reduce her interactions with other people, “and my job which I previously really enjoyed, I’d just go to work and do my job and go away as quickly as I could so I wasn’t around people. And I wouldn’t phone people or do things with people at all.”

He’s rude, critical or dismissive of her visitors

When Sally’s “best friend travelled from the North Island to visit her and Dylan in Nelson, Dylan, who was not usually very active when it came to renovating the house, suddenly appeared ‘busy’ renovating the house. He didn’t want to go out, and spent most of his time making my friends wrong or visiting with his alcohol drinking marijuana smoking buddy. My best friend told me I had become a clone of Dylan’s, which I had not realised. He did not want me to keep in touch with her after that and whenever I wanted to get in touch he disapproved.”

Sally also said that “one year, my sister did not tell Dylan she was coming up to surprise me for my birthday coz she knew he wouldn’t let her stay. And another time one of my friends rang to use our shower because her electricity had gone out and he said ‘no’.”

Teresa said Patrick “came down to my parent’s place once and that was the only time he would, and he was rude and I was really embarrassed by it.”

Elsie said, “If I had a friend that was my friend and not somebody that Leon had introduced me to, he’d run them down, he’d say they’re not like you, they’re a bitch and stuff like that, to get rid of them, put them off. It would work because it was so unpleasant to listen to all the time and he’d embarrass me if they ever visited, so I wouldn’t encourage people to come and see me. Friends would ask me to go out or something. I just kept saying, ‘Oh no, no.’ There was one young girl, she was such a nice girl, we really got on well, and she said when I was leaving work – we’d worked together – she said, ‘I’ll come round and see you, we’ll still see each other eh?’ And I said, ‘No we won’t.’ And she was really hurt I know, but I never explained why. I think she just thought I was a nasty (laughter) person.”

Karen said “Felix accepted my involvement with my family more than with my friends, but he was very critical, especially of my mum, which is understandable. And it used to drive me nuts that I couldn’t have my brother there coz I sort of brought up my little brother and I felt very closely bound to him. He would let me have him, but there would always be a bloody hassle, there would always be a row when my brother was there, always. I felt terrible about that because I wanted to give him support and love.”

Elizabeth “would go to groups or do personal growth type things and I’d meet people and I’d maybe have them over, and David would say to me things like, ‘Why are you making friends with her she’s separated, why don’t you make friends with married people?’ He would be quite cold to them when they came to the house. I would be quite reticent about having them back, or I wouldn’t go to things that he couldn’t come to. If I got invited to something on my own I wouldn’t go unless it was a couple invitation. So I only really did couple things.”

Friends and family decide to stay away because of his abusiveness

Elsie said “I was isolated in the sense that Leon would have a guise of being nice to my parents, but then he would be rude sometimes, enough for them not to like him and they wouldn’t want to come round and see me. He was unwelcoming and unfriendly to anybody who knew me, so people just started to stay away.”

Victoria’s “sister came to stay once, my sister and I aren’t particularly close, it was getting close to the end of the marriage and Graham did one of his ‘behaviours’ and it was the first time that my family had actually seen him in action. And it wasn’t nothing, it was like, ‘you think this is a problem, you should see him on a good day!’ My sister said, ‘I’ll never come and stay with you again because I couldn’t believe the way he acted.’ So it wasn’t about, ‘Oh my God let me support you and help you’. It was about, ‘I’m never coming back, I’m not going to associate with you guys because this is stuffed’. So through the dysfunctions we were having people pulled back, and I didn’t want people to see that. So it was best to pull away and not engage in too many behaviours with others. I didn’t want to admit that this was my lot. If they saw it I’d have to admit it to myself and I wasn’t ready to admit it to myself.”

He makes her feel bad for pursuing friends of her own choosing

Elizabeth said, “I used to try and do any socialising that I wanted to do during the day when David was at work, but in the hours that were acceptable to him. I didn’t do separate things in the evenings although I did join a quilting group and I remember getting a real sense of belonging because it was all women.”

He requires relationship issues be kept secret

Teresa said, “Whenever I’d talk to people on the phone Patrick would make it really clear with body language and non-verbal behaviours that he didn’t like it and he’d sulk afterwards. He’d say things like, ‘What happens between you and I is just between you and I and it’s nobody else’s business. I don’t think you should ever tell people what’s between you and I. It’s special, it’s just ours.’ I did still talk to my friends a little bit, but I really cut myself off from people to keep him happy.”

Elsie “made the mistake of saying something to mum one day. It was something really harmless about something in the house and Leon waited until we were out of earshot and then let loose. So no I never talked to anyone about it, and my parents to this day don’t know. They still don’t know what it was like. I’ve never talked to anyone.”

Pauline’s husband came from parents who thought very highly of themselves and had to keep up appearances. “So his parents believed that if anything went wrong, ‘God you should not tell people because if they think badly of you, you’d go down the ladder!’ Yeah so I had to come to terms with not telling anybody if bad things happened. When we were finally separated, my family just went into total shock because they thought it was an absolute perfect marriage and they were just stunned.”

However Pauline did share some traumatic experiences with her friend. “My friend went ballistic at him when she found out about the miscarriage and he was like, ‘Oops I feel a bit awful someone has found out I can get rather nasty and everyone thinks I’m Mr Wonderful’.”

Pauline “was so confused and I thought I was going quite crazy because he acted like nothing’s wrong. So I’d think well maybe it’s me, it’s all my thinking, my perception.” However she finally experienced validation for her perception when her friend, who lived miles away and had not visited for a long time, arrived for a visit and her husband was home on shift. Until that visit her friend had “thought my husband was an absolute angel, she went to school with him.” But at this visit her friend told Pauline, “All these months you talked to me on the phone about what he’s been like, I didn’t think you were lying, but I couldn’t see that’s how he would be, because that’s not him.” But she said, “Now I’m here today, I can see this is for real, it’s happening.”

She chooses to isolate herself to save face

Teresa said, “I didn’t really want to talk about it to friends or family because I felt that they would see me as a failure and that I’d buggered it up. And I guess also that they would want me to do something that I wasn’t ready to do, like you have to leave. Whereas my feeling was that if you’re in a relationship, then you have to do everything you can to make it work and you can’t just get up and walk out, because you’ve made a commitment.”

Victoria said she and Graham “were very quite secluded and isolated as a couple, so the opportunities to talk weren’t greatly there. I never spoke to Graham’s family about the relationship because they were in their own dysfunctional homes. My family wasn’t particularly close and I certainly wasn’t going to tell them that I was in trouble. Secrecy was more about my perception of saving face than it was about an overt ‘You mustn’t tell’.”

She becomes isolated due to fear of consequences

Raewyn said “I didn’t go and see my family as much because Brian really used to get pissed off with me travelling up there. He’d say, ‘Oh it costs so much money.’ That’s probably one thing I did restrict myself in because he was so anti it.”

Victoria said she and Graham “reduced social activities. The only ones we did were involving his family, what Graham wanted to do. And that’s also because I didn’t want anybody to see us function, or dysfunction is probably more appropriate, as a couple. So I’d go to his family because they were all dysfunctional anyway, and he’d have a tantrum if we didn’t go to his family. His tantrums had to be seen to be believed.”

Susan said, “I was scared that when I got home Anthony was going to get angry and not talk to me. He’s always sulked. If he didn’t like something I did he wouldn’t talk to me. But usually it was for a day. The two weeks he ignored me was far out, it was unbelievable. He still would sleep with me. We wouldn’t have sex, but would sleep in the same bed. I’d talk to him and he’d just turn his head and walk away.”

Karen said she would sometimes “stop and have a jug of beer with people after uni and I knew there would be hell to pay, I knew there would be a problem. I was fearful, dreading, just the dread. I couldn’t enjoy spontaneity. I couldn’t enjoy social things because of the fear and the guilt, so I would withdraw and just choose not to do it, it would be too much bother.”

Reference:

Murphy, Clare (2002) Women Coping with Psychological Abuse: Surviving in the Secret World of Male Partner Power and Control. Unpublished Masters thesis, University of Waikato, New Zealand. Available here.

Watch out for blogs on the following control tactics:

One-Sided power and control
Mind games
Inappropriate restrictions
Over-protection and ‘caring’
Emotional unkindness & violation of trust
Degradation
Separation abuse
Using social institutions & social prejudices
Denial, minimising, blaming
Using the children
Economic abuse
Sexual abuse
Symbolic aggression
Domestic slavery
Physical violence

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Warning signs of coercive control

by Clare Murphy PhD on February 1 2012

I wrote a blog post Warning Signs of Coercive Control by Your Partner for the Home & Family Counselling organisation’s Blog to give women some pointers about warning signs of coercive control by a male partner.

Clues to warning signs that you’re in a relationship that is highly likely to continue to get worse – exist on many levels – including . . .

  1. Things your partner thinks, says and does
  2. Things you think, say and do in response to his attitudes, words and behaviours
  3. Things other people observe and tell you about that they see going on – or that other people don’t see it or get it
  4. Your feelings
  5. Your fears

To read about the warning signs click here. If you’re isolated, or silencing yourself, or just don’t feel safe to be your authentic self – it’s totally ok to seek help from an organisation or a person who UNDERSTANDS family violence and the dynamics of power and control. If you ever seek help and the organisation or person do not understand or make you wrong or minimise your experience – it’s a very good idea to continue to seek support from a safe place that CAN and WILL support you.

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Tactic #1 One-Sided Power Games

by Clare Murphy PhD on May 17 2011

This is the first of 16 blogs discussing the patterns of tactics mentioned in my power and control wheel – One-Sided Power Games.

Research with men and women reveals that men who engage in one-sided power games show more concern about gaining something for themselves than showing concern for what they are actually doing to their partners. In other words – what matters to him is not what he does, but the benefits he gains. There are multiple one-sided power games played by a person determined to maintain power and control. If one tactic does not work, he will merely change to a new tactic.

When I interviewed the men for my PhD research I asked why they’d bother committing to a monogamous relationship if they were so keen on playing the field and seeking sex from multiple partners. I was so surprised when most of the men said they wanted to build a life-long caring relationship. Several of the men said their partners were their best friends. And it was her they wanted to turn to for support when they were jailed, or punished in some way for abusing her.

I also posed the question, “If men took an unwritten contract into marriage what would it say?” All the men said things like:

The unwritten contract would say: “I can do what I want but you gotta do what I tell you to. That’s the way I’d see 90 percent of marriages, from a man’s point of view.”  (Bill)

“Most guys would like their wife or partner to be subservient to them. And be agreeable with the ideals of the husband.” (James)

The man should “have the final financial decision and the final direction for the family.” (Brendan)

And Sam said that in the past he used to believe that women “had to be a slave.”

These are examples of one-sided power games where: He makes the rules, he makes all the big decisions and he has the last word.

Ruler of the castle

Indeed these men’s views of how a marriage should operate fitted with women’s experience of being dismissed and disregarded as an equal partner. Several women I interviewed said their partner had to have the final decision about everything, and regularly ignored them if she had something to say. Susan said her partner “made the major decisions and if any were decided jointly, he did things his way in the end”. Pauline’s husband treated her in such a way that meant she had no right to have judgements or make decisions. On the other hand, Karen made the major decisions such as where to live – however, ultimately if Felix felt a decision needed to be blocked he’d block it.

His wants are most important – He does most of the receiving

Lazarus, a man I interviewed, was of the opinion that the unwritten contract that most men take into a relationship states: “Trust, honour and obey.” Then he added, “Although if I said the ‘obey’ bit, the missus would get upset [and say] ‘You’re not my boss’.”

Other men said the unwritten contract would say, “Do as the man says” and that men can be very domineering. Max said, “We want it our way. Our way or the highway girl.”

Geni said he’d “Think the majority of men would think the wife is like the doting little servant, slave, there to do everything” and that when the man comes home from work in his suit and drops the briefcase “he expects the beer there and the meal on the table.” When this expectation is not met, men say they feel disrespected as a man, that the failure of the woman to carry out her feminine role hurts a man’s pride.

From the women’s experience, Elsie said that everything she and her husband drank, ate and did, including sex, was mostly what he wanted and the way he wanted it. He made all the decisions for his own benefit and nothing else mattered. Whatever these men want takes precedence, therefore the men get most of the receiving.

Victoria said it was vital she ensure her partner’s needs always came first. It had to be his way first and then, maybe, he might think about doing something for Victoria. When the couple went to marriage guidance, Graham agreed with things the counsellor said, but when they got home he said that what the counsellor said was, “All rubbish and that he was not going to f…ing do that, she doesn’t know what she’s on about that woman”. This is a common experience women tell me in counselling. Their partners may say they love her, want the relationship to improve, so agree to go to counselling, but the role they are playing is a major way in which such men gain any sense of self-esteem. Counselling inevitably means having to face feelings these men spend a lifetime denying.

So, these men continue to ensure that all the attention centres on themselves

Elsie’s husband Leon was jealous and aggressive toward his new-born son. From then on there was a huge increase in abuse. All the attention had to be centred on him. He yelled at the baby when it was one week old telling the baby that it had to shut up and not start running the house. To gain further understanding why men engage in these one-sided power games you can read here and here.

Wearing the mask of the Master, he monopolises the woman’s time and energy

An extremely common tactic of the one-sided power game entails the man monopolising the woman’s time and energy. Most women experiencing control by their loved-one say their partners make many promises but never deliver. Susan said that her husband took no responsibility for fathering or household duties and he told people that he had a lazy wife. Yet Susan was overburdened with responsibility, which included being in charge of the finances – which he continually sabotaged.

Most women I talked to expected equal role sharing when they began living with their partners. But, as Karen said:

“Eventually it worked out that I was doing all the girly jobs and he was doing the boy jobs, but then I was doing the girly jobs and the boy jobs. I can remember that being very frustrating and having that argument a lot”.

The burden of these kinds of responsibility increases over time for most women in partnership with men who hold beliefs about male entitlement. Donna said that “When we got married my workload just got heavier and heavier and heavier and heavier and heavier. As the years went by I worked my guts out and I got less and less and less and less for it.”

He has his own selfish way at her expense

Donna said that everything was about what her partner Frank wanted. And what Frank wanted, Frank got. His pattern was to get his own way at her expense, for example, he ate steak three meals a day, gave steak to his friends, yet Donna’s sons were made to eat mince and sausages. Teresa said that if she disagreed with Patrick or said “no” to sex, he would get really angry, nasty and sulk for days. Likewise, if Susan’s partner did not get his own way he would ignore her or disappear for days or weeks at a time.

When a man believes he’s superior she is not allowed to contradict him

Raewyn said there was a great deal of pressure to act, think and be like her husband because he said his way was the only and right way, even though his behaviours were not always congruent with his philosophies. Sally said the exact same things about her husband.

He determines how, when and what things get communicated

Karen’s partner Felix would pull a blanket over his head and hum when Karen wanted to communicate. He would always say that Karen was wrong and that the opposite of what she said was true. Pauline’s husband always avoided talking about issues, he never raised his voice or got angry. Sally said that because her husband would not take responsibility for his behaviours she would get angry in an attempt to be heard and to resolve issues. But . . . then he would say the problem in the relationship was her anger. He always refused to answer the phone, which meant Sally could never get hold of him if she was away from the house. Victoria said that nothing was open to discussion unless it suited Graham’s needs. He walked away when Victoria wanted to talk or he would respond with, “I don’t know” over and over.

His previous marriage makes him right and her wrong

Teresa had a high public profile job working under her intimate partner’s management and they both earned good money. When they first met, Patrick was seemingly happily married with a baby but he pursued Teresa relentlessly, yet blamed Teresa for his marriage break up. When Teresa and Patrick separated he pursued her relentlessly again. Because Teresa had not been in a relationship before, he controlled her by insisting that she knew nothing about relationships, and that he did. Likewise, Sally’s husband claimed to be always right. He, too, had previously been married for ten years and insisted that he knew how to have a relationship, that Sally did not, and he therefore knew best.

And the result of one-sided power games?

As you can see from men’s and women’s stories, one-sided power games don’t always entail physical violence for the man to ascend to the  superior gender status and get the rewards society tells him he deserves. It doesn’t take physical violence for him to ensure she descends into a downward despairing spiral and a position of servitude.

The irony is that men are not truly getting what they really want – which is safety, trust and a caring connection.

As I wrote in 2009:

“Not everyone is safe and free. Huge numbers of people live in fear. Trapped, damaged and in pain. Isolated by perpetrators who are not free either. Masked, driven control freaks lashing out; unhappy like their victims. They emotionally abuse as a way to feel safe. But when they get real – and slip their quest for power and control – they have to admit they are not truly free or safe themselves.”

Watch out for blogs on the following control tactics:

Mind games
Inappropriate restrictions
Isolation
Over-protection and ‘caring’
Emotional unkindness & violation of trust
Degradation
Separation abuse
Using social institutions & social prejudices
Denial, minimising, blaming
Using the children
Economic abuse
Sexual abuse
Symbolic aggression
Domestic slavery
Physical violence

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No bruise no victim?

by Clare Murphy PhD on April 28 2011

Why women and society miss the cues of psychological abuse

What have I done wrong? Am I going crazy? Is this normal?

One of the most common problems for women experiencing psychological abuse, is that they do not realise what is occurring in the early stages and are often not able to put it in context of their normal lives. When psychological abuse begins it will often creep in over time; a subtle edge of voice tone, the odd ‘put down’, a criticism here and there, seemingly uncharacteristic selfish acts.

Little behaviours at odds with the norm. And so it grows. Conquest by stealth – psychological abuse knows no bounds. It can be a soft pattern of almost unwitting abuse or a planned campaign of immense cruelty.

Instead of being able to name their partner’s behaviours as ‘power and control’ or ‘abuse’, lots of  women can only think of their partner’s actions as ‘puzzling’ in its early stages. Then ‘odd’, ‘weird’, and ‘bizarre’ as it escalates. As power and control is exerted, women become more and more confused, and self doubt causes women to blame themselves and desperately rummage through their own behaviours for clues how to please their partners and make the problem go away.

They may simply feel that what they are experiencing isn’t right, just or fair but will search for answers within themselves and their own psyches. What am I doing wrong that he is angry with me? What’s changed in our relationship that he belittles me? Why can’t I see my friends? Why can’t I use the car?

Karen, a woman I interviewed for my Masters research said, “I knew that I was angry, but I didn’t really understand what was happening”. Several women said as Teresa did: “I didn’t notice this until I looked back and realised. It was gradual and insidious and you just slid slowly down the slope”.

Psychological abuse is either hidden or is considered less important than physical violence. This could be because of the imminent life-threatening nature of physical violence and the visible bruises and broken bones that some women experience. The media sensationalises physical violence and it’s extremely rare to read of a critical analysis of the perpetrator’s use of non-physical control tactics.

When the man is not using physical violence the woman usually thinks like Teresa, that psychological abuse “was something I knew absolutely nothing about. I thought abuse was hitting”. Most men and women think that physical violence is the only legitimate reason to leave a relationship. Most women respond as Elsie did:

“If he’d hit me I would have left, it would have been a really justifiable reason to leave. I did not think psychological abuse was a legitimate reason to leave because you explain it away, you rationalise it and it’s not as accepted the way physical abuse is by society. You’re just supposed to lump that, you’re supposed to put up with it.”

All the women I interviewed believed that psychological abuse is trivialised, misunderstood, or dismissed by friends, family and society in general. The psychological abuser relies on this, so feeds off the confusion, doubt, disbelief and the trust of his partner. To deal with a lack of support from others, Victoria said she just told people that her experience with her partner “wasn’t particularly pleasant. I could justify it if he beat me. It would give me more credibility”.

Raewyn never sought help for 12 years of psychological abuse, but sought help immediately when her partner hit her – because physical violence is seen as a credible form of abuse.

Elizabeth said, “If I had been hit, we all know that being hit is not okay, so if I had been hit it would have called my attention to something being wrong sooner. There is more press about it”.

Violence not only means physical abuse and sexual abuse, it also means psychological abuse.

The New Zealand Domestic Violence Act states that psychological abuse includes, but is not limited to, intimidation, harassment, damage to property and threats of physical abuse, sexual abuse, or psychological abuse.

The Act also states that when a tactic appears “minor or trivial when viewed in isolation or appears unlikely to recur, the court must nevertheless consider whether the behaviour forms part of a pattern of behaviour”.

Psychological abuse may, or may not, be written into civil and criminal laws in the country where you live. Either way psychological abuse is a form of intimidation that is not readily understood and continues to avoid the spotlight. Victoria said, “We see ads all the time about women’s refuge and the women on the ads have black eyes, but what about the women who’ve just been worn down day in and day out, do they get to go to women’s refuge? What happens to them?”

Women are able to see that there’s “something wrong” because of the impact they’re experiencing. Heather said, “You think that every relationship has to have some problems, it can’t all be smooth”.

Some women find it difficult to distinguish between the constraints of motherhood and the constraints put upon them by their partner’s power and control tactics. For instance, Karen said:  “It’s difficult to know whether the responsibilities of motherhood isolated me more than he did. I could fight against it while I was still me, but when I was me plus one and me plus two you are a lot more vulnerable and the opportunities are lessened.”

The lack of awareness about psychological abuse causes women to assume they are experiencing “normal” relationship problems. This makes women extremely vulnerable to developing mental or physical illnesses and to experiencing more and more abuse. This is because women often have no knowledge of how the pattern of power and control forms over time.

To address this knowledge gap, I’m going to post several blogs to elaborate on the following patterns of psychological abuse which are outlined in my power and control wheel discussed here. I’ll link to each one here as and when I post each blog:

One-sided power games
Mind games
Inappropriate restrictions
Isolation
Over-protection and ‘caring’
Emotional unkindness & violation of trust
Degradation
Separation abuse
Using social institutions & social prejudices
Denial, minimising, blaming
Using the children
Economic abuse
Sexual abuse
Symbolic aggression
Domestic slavery
Physical violence

NOTE: Perpetrators of abusive power and control can be of either gender. This article is based on my research on women victims and male perpetrators.

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Warning signs that your male partner is emotionally controlling you

by Clare Murphy PhD on August 20 2010

You’re dating or living with this good looking guy, maybe he’s charming and you feel wanted . . . but things he says or does make you feel bad about yourself – and you can’t really figure out why. You likely question yourself asking whether it’s something about you – because he doesn’t seem to think it’s about him . . . Somehow whatever negative things happen between you, you’re left feeling that it’s you with the problem.

Perhaps you got into the relationship quickly, maybe had sex much sooner than you wanted. Maybe you didn’t develop a friendship before suddenly spending most of your time with him and hardly, if ever, seeing your friends or family any more. Your life may have narrowed so that you’re no longer pursuing your own interests – life may seem to be all about being with him . . . waiting on him . . . thinking about him. If he seems jealous or possessive maybe you find that enticing because it makes you feel wanted and special.

Have you started changing?

Have you started changing for him, to keep him, to make him happy, to prove you’re lovable? If your old friends were flies on the wall, what might they notice that is different about you? Will they notice you’ve changed your appearance? That you’ve become secretive, dull, lost your sense of aliveness?

Has your mind started to go crazy after arguments – as if anything you thought was logical before meeting this man now seems confusing?

Have you started to feel guilty about all sorts of things? Yet deep down you know you have not done anything wrong. But then instead of admitting to yourself that you feel uncertain or unsafe, you start hiding things you do so you can feel the freedom you had before the relationship.

Or do you find yourself lying to him – yet that’s not something you usually do? But if you slow your thought processes down and explore your intuition, you may discover that you started lying because he has a way about him that makes you feel uneasy. Perhaps you started lying to yourself because he’s so sensitive you don’t want to hurt him – yet if you were honest with yourself, is something going on whereby it is you who is feeling hurt?

Do you think you’re not good enough?

If you ever had beliefs before that you weren’t good enough, something wrong with you, or you were stupid or ugly – have those thoughts become worse since being with this new man? If they got worse it’s highly likely you started changing yourself to seek his approval and to prove to him that you were good enough, that you are capable and good looking enough. But all your efforts are not working . . . is that true?

Can you answer ‘yes’ to these questions?

  1. I trust this man 100%
  2. He respects me totally without a doubt
  3. He’s always honest and I feel completely safe to be honest with him
  4. He definitely respects my privacy
  5. I feel totally free to be myself round him anywhere anytime
  6. I adamantly feel safe with him – always

Be honest with yourself

If you answered ‘no’ to these questions – it is very probable you are with a man that is engaged in a slow process of gaining more and more emotional control over you and your life. To check how real this may be I urge you to download this list of tactics that some men use to control their female partner. Go through and check if he is using any of these behaviours.

Just in case he is controlling you . . . it may not be safe to show him the list. If he is using ongoing emotional abuse, then it may be supportive for you to take the list – and discuss what’s happening to you – to a trusted friend or family member (possibly someone he has said he does not like or does not want you to see), or a counsellor. Or contact a local domestic violence agency as they are trained in helping women make sense of subtle emotional abuse and control.

Trust your gut instincts

Some aims of checking this list and seeking support outside the relationship are to empower yourself so that you have greater choice over your life and all your current and future relationships. Another aim is to do what it takes to care for yourself, and to trust your gut instincts about what’s really going on with you and your partner.

Ultimately relationships have to feel safe

Markers of a healthy relationship – whether that’s a dating partner, someone you live with, a workmate, a school friend – are when you can say to yourself, “Yes this person is honest, trustworthy, respectful, honours my privacy, is safe to be around and I feel totally free to be myself”.

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Power and control: Lawyer-client relationship

by Clare Murphy PhD on June 27 2009

A power and control wheel has been developed as a tool for recognising abuse and psychological assault by lawyers against their clients. This Lawyer-Client wheel was motivated firstly by the book Lowering the Bar: Lawyer Jokes and Legal Culture by Marc Galanter, and secondly, by the State Bar of Texas ethics rules (which reflect ethics rules for lawyers across USA generally).

Marc Galanter made a point in his book that lawyers are widely mistrusted by non-lawyers in many societies, and their victims are afraid to speak out loud because of fear of retaliation. But their need to vent is so great that people use humour to express their outrage, and this humour serves as a safe cover. When challenged, the joke-teller can say, “I was just joking!”

Power and Control: Lawyer-Client Relationship Abuse and Psychological Assault Wheel Diagram:

Power and Control: Lawyer-Client Relationship Abuse and Psychological Assault Tactics:

Using Coercion and Threats

• making or carrying out threats to do something to harm the client

• threatening to withdraw as counsel of record on the client’s case

• threatening to commit incompetent or unethical practice by violating the State Bar disciplinary rules of professional conduct

• threatening to request the court to order a psychological evaluation of the client without just reason

• ambushing and railroading the client to prevent informed decisions

• exaggerating the harmful outcomes to the client

• pressuring the client to accept a plea deal offer

• pressuring the client to do illegal things

Using Terrorism and Assault

• making the client afraid by using looks, tones, demeanors, gestures, actions

• staging temper tantrums

• violating rules of politesse; rules of orderly, fair meetings; and the State Bar ethics code

• displaying weapons or other objects or images of violence

• terrorizing the client

• sadistically manipulating the client

• psychologically assaulting the client

Using Emotional Abuse

• putting the client down

• making the client feel bad about herself or himself

• calling the client names

• making the client think she or he is crazy

• playing mind games

• humiliating the client

• making the client feel guilty

Using Isolation and Guilt

• isolating the client and forbidding client to consult with other lawyers without permission

• using presumed guilt or suspicion of guilt of client to justify abuse

• using private meetings instead of telephone, mail and email communications

• refusing to state the purpose of meetings

Minimizing, Denying and Blaming

• making light of the abuse and not taking client’s concerns about it seriously

• saying the abuse didn’t happen

• shifting responsibility for abusive behavior

• saying the client caused the abuse

Using Information Abuse

• misrepresenting the experience and specialized knowledge of the lawyer

• using asymmetric information to mislead the client

• preventing client from seeing all the evidence

• providing insufficient information for client to make an informed decision

• using misrepresentation, double-talk, stonewalling and obfuscation to prevent informed decisions

• not informing the client about public access to the case file at the Court house

• refusing to communicate, explain and clarify in writing

• failing to disclose State Bar ethics rules existence and contact information

Using Attorney Privilege

• acting like the boss

• treating the client like a servant

• making the big decisions

• ignoring client’s instructions, decisions and best interests

• failing to get client’s consent

• being the one to define lawyers’ and clients’ roles

• not writing a fee contract

• preventing preview of contract before signing

• making unilateral changes to contract after initial agreement

• using vague, ambiguous, ineffective language that protects the lawyer but not the client

• refusing arbitration

Using Economy Abuse

• making the client pay more money

• not refunding client’s money if not used for the stipulated purpose or if not earned

• using bait-and-switch tactics after receiving advance fee payment

The wheel is available for reprinting and distribution for non-commercial purposes. You may download the pdf of the wheel and the complete list of tactics from the originators of this wheel here. Or, you can see the welcome page that discusses the making of the wheel and provides other useful links here.

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Men’s tactics of power and control against female partners

by Clare Murphy PhD on January 29 2009

Today I uploaded an extensive list of power and control tactics as used by those men who abuse and control their intimate female partner.

Click to see Tactics

Types of tactics

The following list of tactics of power and control summarises the list that you can view by clicking on the image to the left. It’s a pdf so you may save a copy. This short list barely scratches the surface of the range of ways women experience abuse and control at the hands of the man they love:

  • One-sided power games including behaviours that ensure he has his way at her expense
  • Mind games including guilt trips and confusing her in ways that make her feel crazy
  • Inappropriate restrictions including refusing to let her work
  • Isolation including controlling incoming information such as what she reads
  • Over-protecting and ‘caring’ including dissuading her from going out alone in case she gets raped
  • Emotional unkindness and violation of trust including promising to help and then ‘forgetting’
  • Degradation including criticising her strengths and achievements
  • Separation abuse including stalking such as leaving flowers – this sends a threatening message that he can always find her no matter where she is. Whereas, an outsider might look at this act, and think of it as a caring gesture.
  • Using social institutions including engaging in child custody battles to maintain power over her
  • Using social prejudices such as saying to a disabled partner that she can’t even walk out the door – this reinforces his power
  • Denial including refusing to take responsibility for the harm he causes
  • Minimising by saying “it wasn’t that bad, get over it”
  • Blaming by twisting the story so she appears responsible
  • Making excuses such as blaming stress at work
  • Using children for example saying he wouldn’t get so angry if she kept the children quiet
  • Economic abuse including not allowing her access to any money, or putting her in charge of the budget, but then spending all the money and abusing her when the debt mounts
  • Sexual abuse including pressuring her to have sex when she is sick
  • Symbolic aggression including threats to harm her family, friends, pets
  • Domestic slavery including punishing her for not carrying out duties he claims she should have, while not carrying out his own
  • Physical violence including hair pulling and dragging her along the floor

Systematic pattern of power and control

As the above list suggests, physical violence is just one tactic among many that some men subject their female partners to. And not all these men use physical violence – ever. Rather they use some, or all, of the above psychological and structural forms of control.

Each behaviour, when looked at separately, could seem justifiable. Each singular behaviour could look like something minor. Each behaviour on its own could appear that the woman provoked it. Just one of these behaviours viewed from the outside – out of context – could appear like he was just having a bad day.

However, look at this short list in its entirety. Now consider this mass of behaviours as a systematic pattern. Also know that women who are subjected to this pattern of abuse and control experience MANY of these tactics – every day, every week, every month, every year – for years and years. Then ask yourself if you think this systematic pattern of power and control is about the man just having a bad day. Or is there a campaign (whether it is conscious or not) to win at all costs and to maintain power and control?

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