Why do people think like this? Why are even abusive women more worthy of sympathy and understanding?

psychosythe · 2023-10-02T21:00:52+00:00

Even if the tweet is facetious what it's demonstrating is called The Empathy Gap and you can depress yourself reading about it and its causes to your heart's content.

soggy_sock1931 · 2023-10-02T20:54:51+00:00

Not sure why as I've never had that mentality, but people have a tendency to look for explanations when a woman commits abuse, such as mental health issues, past trauma, etc. Whereas with men, nobody cares. Some domestic abuse organisations in the UK claim that female abusers are simply reacting to abuse from their victims.

This spreads over to cluster B disorders as well. BPD is typically associated with women and NPD with men. With abusive borderlines you need to be understanding of their trauma or you get piled on, whilst abusive narcissists should just be locked up and thrown in prison.

untamed-italian · 2023-10-02T22:00:06+00:00

When women abuse there has to be an explanation because "woman" is societally conflated with the victims of abuse. So "abusive woman" is a seeming paradox according to conventional wisdom.

But "abusive man" explains itself, because men are conflated with abusers. So when an abusive mother ruins your life, it's because of XY and Z that happened to her. But when an abusive dad ruins your life, he did that because he's a man.

Troll4everxdxd · 2023-10-02T21:32:05+00:00

Gender essentialism, Women are Wonderful effect, Empathy Gap, and as for recent times, add the constant "men bad women good" message bombarding media and entertainment.

Lots of people subconsciously think that women in general are just better people than men in general.

On one hand, it's true that most violent crime is committed by men, but that's not reason for having stupid softer judgement on women's vile actions in regards to men's equally vile actions.

One of the few problems I have with an otherwise very good show called Bojack Horseman, was the treatment of the titular main character's parents. Both the father and the mother of the MC are assholes and horrible parents, but only the mother is given an explanation for her toxicity (and this has influenced a good portion of the fandom into infantilizing her and defending her heinous abuse of Bojack). The father is just dismissed as an asshole, a pathetic excuse of a man, and someone who "is just bad".

Come to think about it, I haven't seen many shows or movies in which the abusive mother of a boy/man is treated as irredeemable.

KordisMenthis · 2023-10-02T21:10:46+00:00

Honestly this is part of the reason men under-report abuse. I know several men who have been victims of clearly abusive/predatory women and often the men will be straight up unwilling to acknowledge that she is an abusive person. Even when they recognise that they are being mistreated and leave the relationship they are still primarily sympathetic towards her. Women are much more able to straight up recognise abusive men as being predators/abusive.

Enzi42 · 2023-10-03T12:17:21+00:00

This post triggered an unfortunate and infuriating memory of something I encountered on Reddit a few months ago. I recisely can't remember which sub it was, but it was one of the relationship advice ones.

The OP was a middle aged woman who admitted to emotionally and physically neglecting and even abusing her young adult son most of his life, literally from infanthood to his teenage years (there was a particularly disturbing example where she explained that she would let him cry for hours as a baby until he was too exhausted to continue).

She would visibly treat her second child, her daughter, fsr better and mentioned that he could never satisfy her no matter what he did. Because of this he had a far better relationship with her husband, his father, who actually took care of him and treated him well.

Anyway it came to a head when they got into an argument in his teenage years and she told him that the reasons for her behavior was that he was a product of rape by her husband---he had forced himself on her which resorted in his birth, and that she wished she had aborted him.

The OP was complaining that ever since then her son had a very polite but distant relationship with her and had stopped treating her like a mother and more like an acquaintance. She wanted a real relationship with him now that she had worked on herself and her issues and was frustrated that he wasn't interested in reciprocating.

Most of the comments ripped OP to shreds for her abusive behavior, but a good number of them used the "What you did wasn't right but I can understand/don't blame you" line. As if subjecting an innocent child to a lifetime of neglect, abuse and hate for his very existence is in any way excusable or understandable.

But one of the worst comments actually blamed the son for his behavior. It said that he should learn to grow up and understand what his mother was going through and stop "making it about him". It further blamed him for not immediately turning on his father---you know, the one parent he had that treated him with decency---because of what he had done to the mother. They even implied he had inherited the father's rapist genes.

I'm sorry for the rant/summary, this post just brought that flooding back along with the rage it triggered in me. That was one of the most cruel and insane takes I've seen on Reddit and I'm glad that at least most of the comments didn't excuse the OP.

National-Ostrich-608 · 2023-10-02T23:13:04+00:00

Society attributes hyper-agency to men, and hypo-agency to women. Its sad as it furthers the stereotype that women are weak and submissive.

HelpfulPause8115 · 2023-10-03T07:02:02+00:00

It is always like this. If a man cheats -the fucking pig. If a woman cheats - what forced her to look for something outside the marriage? Oh, that woman abused her husband? I am sure she was fighting back. The poor soul.

There was this video posted here a couple of days ago from the BBC with a chap trying to talk about men's issues while two feminists did the whole whataboutisms -it also was uttered there.

Women can only be victims. Even when they are the abusers.

oldfarmer6666 · 2023-10-03T05:16:00+00:00

My friends never believed me that my mom and grandma anally abused me bc moms always love their kids. lol

BKEnjoyerV2 · 2023-10-03T01:16:02+00:00

This was basically my Title IX case, as I’ve mentioned before it was complicated and not really about sexual misconduct and I know I didn’t do anything wrong. But we didn’t think it would go as far as it did so we tried to appeal it, we got copies of my old IEP and letters from my therapist saying I was on the spectrum and had anxiety and struggled with the social piece all that and had personal character references. Unfortunately they would only change it if the appeal showed procedural misconduct, which I think was just a lie to keep me away from campus as much as they could (I apparently was a threat and people thought I was going to shoot up the school)

Karglenoofus · 2023-10-03T04:17:07+00:00

Personally I'm the opposite (without the needless violence).

My dad has grown so much as a person, meanwhile my mother let her midlife crisis destroy her.

PossumPalZoidberg · 2023-10-03T03:08:36+00:00

Ruby Franke

that is all.

LeotheLiberator · 2023-10-02T22:47:50+00:00

People need to stop giving random internet opinions more validity than they deserve.

CoffeeWorldly9915 · 2023-10-02T23:39:00+00:00

Reading some of the comments in the OP is refreshing.

ChimpPimp20 · 2023-10-03T16:25:39+00:00

Come to think about it, I haven't seen many shows or movies in which the abusive mother of a boy/man is treated as irredeemable.

I can only think of a few.

Moon Knight; Split, Sixth Sense (funeral scene), Cinderella, Tangled, Daredevil (they were pretty harsh on her for the postpartum but she still could’ve visited her son when he health was better). I’m sure there’s others.

smorgasfjord · 2023-10-03T07:51:42+00:00

People with daddy issues also be like "I'll give you a private show for $50"

Gnome_Child_Deluxe · 2023-10-02T20:53:24+00:00

You misread this completely or you're dumb OP.

Key_Passage_1468 · 2023-10-05T14:23:25+00:00

I mean this is accurate to my feelings on my mother

astral-mamoth · 2023-10-08T21:34:43+00:00

I mean i have many problems with both my parents for both similar and different reasons simultaneously.

It’s a very important realization to have that human babies do not come with an instruction manual and that out parents are human just like us. With their failures and shortcomings in equal measure. I am of the belief that parents owe everything and lord to their children, you as a parent are the one who is dragging your child into the chaotic, dangerous and confusing world we live in. So you should be willing and ready to do everything, from changing diapers to listening to emotional breakdowns.

I feel many parents begin to fall if in their efforts towards their children as the children age, because as grueling and hard as tending to a baby is. Emotionally supporting and guiding a developing human is way harder. As other people have said, if you breakdown and shout to loud or are an asshole to your kids, that might be a bad Tuesday to you, but to then it’s a core formative experience.

As gender roles and maturity starts surrounding developing children the paths of two identical twin siblings may radically shift fast. The struggles of teenagers boys are totally different than teenagers girls, and from a purely logistical stand point Tern girls rack up hardships quickly:Periods, hormonal shifts, Breast development, changing or shifting fashion trends.

For boys things are easier at first, many parental advice can be pretty much limited to “Be confident and wear a condom” simultaneously if the young boy goes to his parents for advice he will get a mixed bag of answers. What makes you popular and what gets you dates has shifted to sone degree in recent years and many talks are being had about “toxic masculinity”. And the like.

This where the stranded relationships between father and son come quickly, the father not only can’t properly counsel his son over the shifting struggles of being a male teenager, but many of the things the father could tell him may Ño be socially shunned.

And I think it’s key to see within Abusive, Neglecting or simply not ideal father figures that they to were and to a degree are equally damaged men trying to navigate a wild world . without a movement for men, with a shifting world and with a father figure that actually may not know what the solutions to his sons problems may be , because he simply dosen’t have them himself. Many of this challenges can be really daunting.

Title	Why do people think like this? Why are even abusive women more worthy of sympathy and understanding?
Author	Jaffacakes-and-Jesus
Upvotes	251
Comments	100
Date	October 2, 2023 8:24 PM UTC (2 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/comments/16y7b20/why_do_people_think_like_this_why_are_even/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/LeftWingMaleAdvocates/why-do-people-think-like-this-why-are-even-abusive.1233787 https://theredarchive.com/post/1233787

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