The Weaponry of Words

I am no longer a trusting person. I used to be. I was very savvy... I thought. Now I don't trust even those I think I 'know.'

Most especially, I don't trust myself. I rarely leave my home unless its for my children or chores. Often because I am too ill to go out. Thank goodness for my computer!

But the other reason? Is because I have been filleted. With words.

I have always enjoyed writing since I was a tween. As an actor I learned the power of words and inflections. I learned the power of intent. When I moved to NYC, the years I spent doing public relations work as well as schmoozing agents and producers for my acting career taught me a lot about promotion, image and some NLP (neurolinguistic programming) techniques as well. My father, of blessed memory, was in sales for 28 years and he was a very charming and persuasive man. He finally left to join law enforcement when he, as he told me, got "tired of selling lies to decent people."

Never in my life did I think someone I trusted, let alone loved or cared about would ever use words against me. Oh, yeah, in your teen years some guy will try to flatter you or butter you up - of course "I love you" is often the big lie to get "into a girl's pants." And these people have no problem with that abuse and using others. None at all. Unfortunately, some guys never change.

Then there are those who will lead you on for their own gain. Whether its sex, money or just the thrill of putting one over on you - they do it. And then they sit back and snicker at you, insisting you "knew what you were doing" Or that you agreed to all of it; you "played their game with them" knowingly & wittingly.

Never once do these emotional con-men mention their hidden agenda or that they lied or twisted the truth to get you to that point. Oh no! They are blameless... in fact, once caught they portray themselves effectively as your victim!

All this is verbal & emotional abuse. Once these emotional rapists have you where they want you, the verbal destruction of your selfhood begins. My friend Linda calls it "planting sleeper bombs in your brain." Years later, after you are out and have barely made a dent unraveling the verbal Gordian Knot that was done to you, the WORDS that were said to you come back to haunt you.

Words that put you down or raised you up. Words that make false excuses for real damage. And now the words have stopped because you stopped believing them. And you are left, gutted inside - looking for answers in total silence.

The abusive wordsmith has moved on to their next emotional meal.

And you have been thrown away after being picked clean.

Lyrics | Jann Arden lyrics - Insensitive lyrics
Women as Victims of Verbal Abuse
Michele Toomey, PhD

As members of the "weaker" sex, women have suffered the violence of physical abuse from the "stronger" sex. They have even suffered it at the hands of stronger women. Although there is not nearly enough of an outcry over this violence against women, at least there is a shared sense that it is wrong. Not so with verbal abuse. It leaves no visible wounds or scars, and can be hidden or denied with hardly a second thought. And, unfortunately, verbal attacks are not predominantly done by men. Since they require no physical prowess (although it helps, since it increases the fear and intimidation), verbal abuse can be as violent and as destructive when done by women as when done by men.

And there is no great public outcry against it, and certainly no laws making it illegal to verbally slice another, or especially a woman, to pieces and leave her emotionally bleeding.

Fathers and husbands can roar at daughters and wives, berating, belittling and pounding them into submission without being confronted or jailed. There is also a sad legacy of mothers verbally bullying and deriding daughters that goes virtually unaddressed. It is long overdue that we force ourselves to look at the suffering and devastation that verbal abuse exacts, and draw the line on tolerating it. The fear and pain are not as hidden as we would pretend. It can be seen and felt in the eyes and in the faces of the emotionally abused, without a word being uttered. Imagine what we could know if we actually talked about it.

It is the climate of pretense, denial and hiddenness that fosters the self-abuse that women get caught in when they have been victims of others' verbal abuse. My focus will be on this dangerous side effect, the abused woman's abuse of herself. This is a very deliberate choice on my part, because psychological oppression, unlike physical oppression, only works if we participate in it, and psychological liberation occurs only when we liberate ourselves. We are not in charge of anyone else's liberation, but we are definitely in charge of our own. Sadly, if we are abused in childhood we tend to learn abuse, and imitate the hostility directed at us. We may or may not abuse others, but almost surely we will have learned to abuse ourselves.

We must, therefore, look at the way victims not only become victimized, but victimizers, first of themselves and then, sometimes, of others. As women, we are members of the traditionally viewed "inferior" and "weaker" sex. Verbal abuse directed at girls and women has a greater chance of hurting our self-image and damaging our self-esteem, because we are already coming from a lesser position and a smaller "box". Male approval and male protection is subliminally, or even blatantly, communicated to us as a necessity for a safe and happy life. Even if we know better, we don't tend to want to fail that test. So, abusive men are very dangerous to women. On the other hand, if other women attack, deride or ridicule us, we are left to wonder what is so wrong with us that even women abuse us. We again question our own worth and worthiness. There is no easy escape route for women, out of the low self-esteem even self-hatred pit, when abuse is present.

Women, therefore, are very vulnerable to verbal abuse, and pay a devastatingly high price for it.

The inner voice of an emotionally abused woman is not only a voice of pain, suffering and anger, it is also the voice of an alienated woman who blames herself for how she's treated. For every harangue from others, there's most often a matching harangue from herself. Self-loathing becomes the source of her own self-abuse. Violators can die or be divorced or moved away from, and abused women are often still not free. The abuser has become herself.

This is not a new revelation, yet, still we tolerate verbal abuse. Why? Why do we as a society continue to deny the ravaging effects on anyone, but especially for our focus here, on women, of verbal innuendoes, attacks, ridicule and derision? Because we are afraid of exposure and we feel safer with hiddenness. We know so much more about psychological torment than we ever reveal. Coldness and silence, withdrawal and ignoring are not foreign tools of torture either. We know their power to devastate and create a feeling of powerlessness and panic just as we know the power of openly hostile acts.

Workplaces as well as homes can be emotionally abusive, only the style may change. At work, we excuse our tolerance for abuse by saying we fear we'll lose our job if we confront the abuser. At home, we excuse our tolerance because it's none of our business, if we aren't the one being abused, and if we are the target of the abuse, we deny our own power to free ourselves. We have the "someday my prince will come" complex, that looks to another to rescue us or rescue others, but we do not look to ourselves. And herein lies the rub.

The only way for a victim of verbal abuse to be freed is to free herself. Both the victimizing "other" and the victimizing "self" must be confronted. Both must be stopped. If all else fails, separating from the abusive other will stop that abuse. Since we cannot separate from ourselves, we are left to convert the hostile energy directed at and against us, to strong energy working for us. This is a complex process that takes commitment, courage and "know how".

The commitment must be to ourselves and our psychological liberation. The courage must be to face directly the forces within us that believed what was said to us and about us, and confront their hostility and bullying tactics, demanding that they stop. The "know how" is the psychology and the tools needed to convert the hostile energy into excited energy for a life fueled by desire not fear or anger. This is not easy, because victims become believers and imitators of the hostility to such an extent that self-doubt and self-blame, even self-hatred, become second nature. To free themselves, victims must draw upon all three elements: commitment, courage and "know how", with a depth of conviction and determination known only to the violated. Without it, there will be continued whining, complaining, crying, describing, repeating, but never moving and liberation.

Therapy would be my strongest recommendation for the committed, courageous women who want to learn how to free themselves. It would also be a good thing to join a group where discussions and sharing and caring are directed toward freeing yourself. [ ] Reading, studying and discussing what I have written would be a most helpful tool. It is hard work to free ourselves from the emotional attachment to psychological abuse, but it is the greatest gift you could ever give yourself. May you have the necessary commitment and courage needed to do the work required to psychologically liberate yourself.

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