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OMG. MY jaw dropped in disbelief when I read this post.
The kind of self-reflection that you've accomplished is extremely rare in a man, IwOn. Gosh, even the fact that you WANTED to change and made a conscious effort to do so is incredible.
Your post is truly one of the most intelligent, insightful, humble and mature that I've ever read on CD!
Sorry, I'm still trying to wrap my head around why being reserved around a screaming, out of control person is now considered passive aggressive?
IMHO it's almost never a good idea to engage a screaming person. I thought that was pretty well understood.
Sorry, I'm still trying to wrap my head around why being reserved around a screaming, out of control person is now considered passive aggressive?
IMHO it's almost never a good idea to engage a screaming person. I thought that was pretty well understood.
Well, you could also ask IwOn that question.
Not all men who remain reserved around a "screaming, out of control person" are passive-aggressive. You're right - it can sometimes be the ONLY way to diffuse an emotionally-charged situation.
But routine stonewalling, dismissing, stubbornness, sarcasm, sullenness, condescension and other forms of passive anger (i.e. angry "smiling" and "laughing") are typical (conscious and unconscious) tactics of passive-aggressive men.
Oh, and when her kids (including a teen son) come to her, literally crying and distraught over the same kind of treatment from him, then a woman knows she hasn't been imagining it all those years.
I used to think a crazy bi###, was a woman, who would scream in an argument....back in the day, when I didn't want to really deal with an issue, I would try to maintain a civilized environment, by talking in a calm voice, whenever I had a yelling female arguing with me. I knew that the demeanor would push buttons, but they were the crazy ones, because they would yell so loudly, the kind of frustrating yelling that neighbors can hear. As I got older, I realized that my passive aggressive behavior, was manipulative. Refusing to discuss some issue they had, by turning my back and ignoring them. All passive aggressive behavior. This is something I worked hard on, and have made a positive change about 10 years ago. I actually am friends with a few of those women, and 10 years ago, I reached out and apologized for my behavior....they all dropped their jaws in disbelief..lol
Whenever you do those things to a woman who is mad, you are telling them to ****, that they aren't important, and you dont care what they have to say...it's a big FU, so how else are they going to get your attention? You pressed all the buttons for detonation.... At least in my experiences the crazy women, were made that way because of my actions....I'm betting that's the case with many who have been called crazy.
Refreshing to see someone own up to something like this. Identifying your own negative behavior & how it causes others to escalate &/or react negatively is not something many easily do, man or woman.
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I have long noticed that a female perspective is easily dismissed as being emotional, dramatic, crazy, &/or hormonal. This reaction & knee-jerk labeling is the other party (often male) being illogical. They attack the woman & not her "argument", and they do so because the argument is unpleasant to them. If the argument were truly invalid, then why not prove it so? Why instead try to discredit that person? Most of the time, the point of the woman has not even been properly grasped. There is a lot of presumption & straw men being created to avoid seeing it, much less addressing it. If it were properly understood, then yes, it might ask you to change something, to compromise, to be inconvenienced, etc, and perhaps rightly so. Easier to invalidate it...
These men (and some women) may dismiss what is being expressed because of its manner of delivery, not the content of the message. This reacting, not understanding with powers of reasoning, which does not make these men any less emotionally driven.
This reacting instead of understanding & reasoning is done to avoid any action on their part that they do not want to do - it's highly manipulative and extremely selfish. Men can continue to justify this sort of thing & have unhappy results in their relationships or they can choose to take responsibility for their part in a negative dynamic.
Of course, women have negative communication patterns also, which push buttons & create negative cycles, but this thread is not about those.
Last edited by orangeapple; 07-28-2014 at 01:06 AM..
I didn't know where else to put this, but I'm just going to leave this right here....
Men, you're welcome.
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