I was in a relationship with (what I now realise was) a red piller. It was absolutely miserable, exhausting, scarring, and I think becoming emotionally abusive. Hopefully my description will help convince people that red pill doesn’t support healthy, fulfilling relationships! I’m also still processing this stuff, and trying to work out if the connection to emotional abuse is valid, so if anyone has any insights they’ll be greatly appreciated!

When I first started dating him, he invited me to talks at the feminist society, and proclaimed he was a feminist - by this he meant he wanted what was ‘best’ for women, I.e. traditional gender roles. We had a few debates about what I now realise are standard red pill talking points, but I didn’t research red pill until after the relationship ended. When we had these discussions, I tried to empathise with the underlying insecurities and anxieties, but I just increasingly got the feeling that I was paying for the sin of being Woman.

He said all sorts that looking back I can’t believe I tolerated! He believed that women are fundamentally emotionally manipulative and only cry for attention. He believed women lost value with age and number of sexual partners - on my birthday he joked about me being past my prime. He told me that if we met in twenty years time, he wouldn’t want to go out with me, he’d want to find a cute lil twenty year old - at forty I’d be unattractive but he’d be able to tolerate it because he’d remember finding me attractive when I was young.

One of our big arguments was that I should wear more makeup, spend my time doing my hair, paint my nails, get dressed up etc. When I did get dressed up he complained that that’s how I should dress on any given day, not a special event, so it didn’t count. He told me if I didn’t put effort in, he didn’t feel loved. I explained that for me, love is being able to be your full real self, whereas he wanted this constant performance of idealise femininity. I tried so hard to empathise, and eventually tried to mold myself to what he wanted, but there was always some sort of issue.

He would frequently comment on women he saw that he found attractive, would describe them as the ‘perfect woman’. I usually brushed it off because I was desperate to be easy and undramatic, and after our break up when I mentioned I found it hurtful, he said that he was annoyed that I brushed it off, that if I really cared about him I’d have told him off for going after other women. This was maybe the first thing that made me realise how glad I was to be out of the relationship - he wanted to have a constant cycle of making me feel insecure and starting an argument to reassure him that he felt valued!

He regularly made me feel small, pathetic, vulnerable, and in need of help. Often it would be under the guise of banter, (textbook negging) but with distance it seems like a sustained effort to foster low self esteem and dependency. He criticised all aspects of my physical appearance, my interests, the books I read, my ‘cultural capital’, my posture, my body, just everything. I remember him saying I was lucky to find him, one of the few people that didn’t find my nose actively unattractive. I’d generally agree with self deprecating humour, and I don’t think I really realised at the time how much of a negative affect it had on my self esteem - I remember towards the end saying that I wanted to be invisible, I didn’t want to be perceived.

When we were first together, I said that I probably didn’t want to have children. He told me that women that didn’t want children are a useless waste of space. A few months later I’d (unrelated) warmed to the idea of children, and he very much described a future of me being a SAHM homeschooling our children, potentially abroad (where I would be alone, unable to speak the language, and completely vulnerable and dependent!)

It was also my first ever relationship, while he had been in previous relationships. He could be very eloquent talking about communication and emotions, so I fully trusted him to judge what was and wasn’t appropriate. I frequently got told what I’d done wrong, and I assumed that he could do no wrong, if I did bring up things I’d found hurtful I thought I was either incorrect or hypocritical because I’d probably done something bad or worse. I don’t think this is uncommon in first relationships, but knowing that he’d said he’d specifically seek out a partner that is young, naive, not yet ‘old and bitter’ makes me think that really he was looking for someone naive enough to not pick up on all the bullshit.

Overall, I think redpill, insecurity, and manipulative tendencies all mixed together to form this horrible mess where he specifically wanted a young, sweet, naive, inexperienced girl, who he would then consistently reduce her self esteem to make her feel lucky to be chosen, to keep her held close by through insecurity, vulnerability, and dependence. That dynamic of insecurity would be present forever - her feeling insecure is what he needs to feel secure.

The whole time, right from the start, I felt miserable, exhausted, insecure, and like I was walking on egg shells, but I didn’t know any different and thought that was just what relationships were like. There’s so much I should have done differently - I also made my own mistakes hurting him in the relationship, and I should have communicated my boundaries better, and spotted the glaring red flags and left a lot earlier!

I’m so glad I’m out of there - it was actually him that broke up with me, and for a while afterwards I was upset that I couldn’t sufficiently mold myself into the perfect woman he wanted me to be. With distance, I’m so glad I’m out of that mess. But I’m upset with myself that I was so naive and that I let myself get into that situation. I like to think I know better, but I completely abandoned myself. I’m feeling so much happier and more relaxed now, and I’ve been in a relationship since that has been so much more peaceful and secure.

Point being - red pill tactics are, at best, manipulation, and at worst emotional (and financial) abuse. They do not create happy and fulfilling relationships, they create girls that have to go to therapy to unlearn this bullshit.