Weird gaslight-y thing from visiting male friend...

[Margerine78]

I already know IANBU and my ‘friend’ behaved badly but this post is more for my sanity…

Has anyone read ‘Flowers in the Attic’ and do you agree there’s a subtle storyline about the brother and sister having an incestual relationship. I mean, the sister is pregnant with her brother’s kid in the prequel so…Sorry for the dark book choice but it came up in conversation somehow and my friend point-blank told me I was wrong as he couldn’t remember it happening.

This friend stayed over (support bubble thing) this weekend, I was so looking forward to it after being on my own all lockdown, but he spent whole weekend telling me I was wrong about literally everything - books (as above), films, TV series, how I washed up, how I cooked, how I mixed drinks, my music taste, even how my oven worked! He's normally a nice guy but he turned into a chauvinistic arrogant, argumentative and gaslighting douche this weekend when I most needed to have nice company.

For some reason the book thing pissed me off the most as instead of admitting he may have missed that subtext as he read it 20 years ago and taking my word for it as someone who reads a lot, he instead spent hours making me feel like I imagined it and I’m losing my mind!

He sounds like a right idiot. Good friends will pick you up, not bring you down. Get rid of him.... at least you found out what he was really like....

The incest things is the most memorable thing about the book!! I have to say I’ve really realised in the past few years how far we still have to go with feminism. I find men continuously tell me I’m wrong about things, assume I don’t know things they do or if I’m particularly intelligent. I have a v creative job but a lot of education and more often than not men assume I’m an idiot.

@itsbetterthanabox...he said he had read it but perhaps. The issue isn't him getting confused though (I get stuff confused all the time!), it's his total dismissal and belief that I'm wrong and he's right as he doesn't remember it the way I do (even after I brought up reviews online backing up exactly my view of the book). It's so arrogant of him its off the chart, alongside the insinuation (not even thinly disguised) that my opinion counts for nothing.

@Teddybear27..on the above note, you're spot on, a friend should not have made me feel as rubbish as he did this weekend (and seemed to take pleasure it).

@winniestone37 I did wonder if my 'friend' would've disregarded a male friend in such a rude way if they had been the one telling him he had forgotten part of a book. I didn't have my friend pegged as a misogynist but I didn't have him down as an arrogant rude sod either!

@Margerine78 I know what you mean though!! When I started noticing then I really Started noticing. It’s actually changed my life. I had to work out boundaries and how to tell a man that they were patronising without letting anger get the better of me. It’s a work in progress but it really is everywhere and I constantly ask myself that exact same question would they have said/done this if I was a man...

I hope ‘friend’ doesn’t have a key to your home. I’m pleased you have mutual friends, you might want to confide what happened so that they understand why you are distancing from ‘friend’ and I think they’ll be disgusted.

It’s sometimes said that weed isn’t addictive; I don’t believe that. I think the more it’s used the more it’s craved, and I think the ‘friend’ is becoming reliant and it is damaging his brain and altering his personality.

I can't be the only one to keep seeing "friend" and reading it like The Inbetweeners?!!

Anyways your "friend" sounds like a total toss pot, you are well rid.

Out of interest Op have you heard from him since? Maybe lockdown has revealed a few deep seated issues with him...so sorry you were on the receiving end whikat you just wsnted some company....ive unfortunately dates a few guys like this, almost sounds like your friend could be one of them tbh.

He sounds like a twat, limit contact until he learns to behave himself.

@Apossibility84 the point isn't that he forgot something about a book he read years ago, that is obviously no big deal at all. The point is when I told him I remembered this subplot clearly he told me flatout I was wrong and that I was a pervert for thinking it was about incest. When I brought up info online about the part of the book he forgot to prove I wasn't mistaken, he still refused to accept it. It was odd behaviour, he just flat out wanted to dismiss me and this was a theme of the whole weekend. He told me I knew nothing about film (my degree is in Film but he told me my degree was s**t to my face), he criticised my cooking, the drinks I served, the wine I bought, the music I played, how I used my oven (which was apparently completely wrong even when I showed him the manual), he argued with me about feminism which apparently he knows more about as a man. He even explained to me how periods work - no joke. He insinuated several times that he didn't value my opion as I wasn't as intelligent as other people he knows..the list is kind of endless and this was two days of hanging out. I didn't put everything in my op as it was so much to unpack. So I foused on the Flowers in the Attic example. He used to be a lovely man, he's an old friend, so my post is not to criticise him for a small forgetful moment, I'm genuinely upset by how he treated me this weekend.

@Sissyjd nothing since he left, which I am glad of as I need time out for a bit tbh!

It'll be very interesting to see if he acknowledges that his behaviour was out of order & contacts you with an apology. But even if he realises he was a massive cunt, will his ego let him?

Is he one of those people that if his life isn't going great, he feels he has to prove you are inferior to feel better? Do you out earn him or something?

Ive read it and watched the film 2x. They definately had a relationship and went on to have children and lived together.

I can see why you're infuriated. I would be too. I hope he does contact you with an apology, as that would be a nice ending to the friendship. But sadly he probably really thinks like that and you've seen the real him.

@Thelnebriati He earns way more than me (rich family too, I'm working class). That was another thing. He talked loads about money, his big property, how rich his friends were, his generous gifts to people - bizarre as he knows I'm a bit of a hippy and money doesn't impress me. Sure he never did that before.

I've just remembered another argument! He always goes out with women who seem a bit damaged/lost. (It came up as was blowing trumpet about how he 'saved' his last gf from herself). It started a chat about depression, and I said I felt there was a difference between having clinical depression and just having issues which meant you self-destruct (I used examples of people I know so this wasn't me talking about his gf). He said he "knew loads about depression" and had never heard the words 'clinical depression' before and that I made that up too. Apparently depression being caused by a chemical imbalance is wrong too as its something he doesn't know about.

Crux of it is, I think I outsmarted him rather than outearned him.

The incest thing is the only thing I remember from that book!

This. The weirdest books I've ever read.

Sounds like lockdown has got to him. He was clearly being difficult and rude. He owes you an apology if your friendship is going to continue.

Him saying that he saved his last gf from herself is very revealing and a red flag. Sounds like he seeks out vulnerable people to control and/or to make him feel better about himself.

I read FITA as a teen 30 years ago. Yes, incest was the main theme of the book.

Wikipedia is not a valuable source of information, as anyone and their dog is able to write a while bunch of anything on Wikipedia. We've recently told our 9 year old to avoid reading anything on Wikipedia when researching for school work.

*a whole bunch of anything on Wikipedia

Your mate is thick as pig shit. Cathy and Chris are blatantly shagging.

I was initially going to say he sounds like he's having a bit of a mental health crisis (seeing as this was such a change of character) but your more recent posts make him sound like a straight-forward dick.

Either way I'd cut contact.

Plus, a whole load of people are now waking up to the fact that some of their friends, family, colleagues, neighbours, etc:
gaslight, are narcissists and/or racists (thanks to Trump, Boris, Covid-19 and lockdown).

What a lovely World to live in! 🌎
What must the aliens be thinking!? 🤣
Does anyone feel like they are on the Truman Show!?? Lol

IIRC most of her books (the ones actually by her, not ghost written) feature incest. Your friend is an idiot.