Male Entitlement - Dittany, SGB, AF, BOF and all others please explain to me.....

[shimmerysilverglitter]

in simple terms why a man who has:

Shagged around on his wife throughout their marriage
Used prostitutes during the marriage
Controlled his wife/partner by making her fear his verbal and physical tirades
Kept his wife short of money causing her to claim benefits fraudulently just to live while he kept all his wages to himself
Pawned all their stuff to go out on the piss
Done not a jot of housework
Made his wife feel worthless by ignoring her dreams, ambitions and opinions

This is all stuff I have read on MN recently.

Still thinks he should be living in the family home with his wife and children.

I really want to understand, I really do.

I know some of you have done degrees in Women's Studies and subjects like that and some of you just have the life experience so I would like to hear how your knowledge relates to a man like this.

Yes, I am afraid he was. Divorcing him now though, hence his rage at no longer being allowed to live with his dc.

I just want to understand how someone can treat someone like that and still think that person should stay with them to the point where he is enraged by my refusal to do so, please note, not particuarly remorseful, enraged.

I am with you on this Anyfucker

I was in a verbally abusive relationship with an alcoholic, fuckin sky high debts, mood swings, you name it, he made my life a living hell for 4 years I was living in hope that it was going to get better.

I think your OWN life is about choices and he chose to drink which then lead to his own abusive behaviour towards me and our family.

I am not saying that woman who stay in these abusive relationships whatever the reason are asking for it or deserve it, but it is there choice to stay and put up with the shit and be on the recieving end of adultery, his fist, alcoholism etc etc. Its not rocket science is it?

I believe I never deserved it however I contributed to it because I was there taking the shit day in day out.

I am so glad I got out when I did.

I think the answer to "why do they do that" always varies, but in addition to the societal stuff that others are better placed to comment on, I think that three basic drives are often responsible:

• Selfish pleasure (partly) drives sexual infidelity, not doing housework, keeping the money, pawning household goods
• Vicious remarks, violent behaviour, keeping the money may all be driven by selfish and abusive pleasure (he gets his rocks off my knowing she's suffering)
• Vicious remarks, violent behaviour may be due to an inability to control anger. I see this as pathetic no matter how tragic the upbringing.

the problem I see here is (prepares for bashing...) that you cannot seperate the abusive behaviour of men from the fact that some women will tolerate it

I cannot seem to express this very well (have tried repeatedly and got it wrong, I know)

if nobody ever tolerated it...if society and the community as a whole had a zero tolerance policy towards it...then these men could not flourish in their abuse of others

surely that has to start in the home ? Why do women not run away from it when it first rears it's ugly head, before they get trapped with children and the gradual eroding of their self-esteem (I don't have an answer, btw)

the problem a lot of the time (as I see it) is the shame that women feel...it is still rather taboo to be an abused wife/partner

when a man behaves like this it should be shouted from the fucking rooftops...they get away with it by everyone, including the abused woman, colluding with a cloak of secrecy about the problem

red, congratulations for getting out...I salute you

Do you have to have a degree in Women's Studies to understand that? It's not rocket science. Some men are total shits. Just as some women are. Thankfully, most are not.

No you don't need a degree in Women's Studies but I was interested in the view point of someone who may be does or has experience in that area as I have not reached any understanding from any other source.

You don't need Women's Studies in particular, because bullying is not a gendered issue. The entire process: dehumanisation of the target; systemised denial; blaming the target; etc, etc; is exactly the same whether it is workplace abuse, playground bullying, gangland victimisation, or any other form of abuse. It is also the process used, illegally, to break down prisoners for greater compliance.

Male entitlement....Think the word comes ime is denial of there own behaviour and lack of conscience and pure selfishness. The phsycology behind it I will never understand

look at

That is true AF - the cloak of secrecy thing. I haven't spoken to any of the mutual friends me and XP had (who were his friends in the first place anyway) about how he was in the relationship, because I don't want to be seen as bitter/spreading crap about him. I haven't even gone into detail with my own friends, barring a few, because I don't want to seem I am complaining, I just get on with it now - and there's nothing concrete to say that he did wrong either, he never hit me, cheated on me, etc (that I know of anyway).

ItsGraceAgain I identify particularly with your point B - I found this blog post last night, which I made when I was first with XP:

"[long ramble about making small sacrifices for those we love]... I am losing sleep because sleeping in a single bed really doesn't work with two grown adults for very long, and I know he has to get up for work earlier than I do, even though I know I need the sleep more and he'll only moan at me having ten minutes' lie in."

Back to the OP... I think that some men genuinely don't know another way to be towards someone, especially a partner. If you look at the person who treats his or her partner with little respect, they often have little respect for anyone.

• This can be a defence mechanism - you often find they are very paranoid as well, are obsessed with the idea of revenge and have the mentality "Hurt before you are hurt". They feel the world and his wife (and mostly his wife!) owes them something back, they have probably been badly hurt in their childhood destroying their ability to trust. It's very sad, actually. But you have to remember that just because they know no other way to be, it doesn't mean you should put up with it, and it's not your job to change them, it takes a lot of work and a lot of specialised training and above all, the ability to stay emotionally detached. Someone in a relationship with an abuser doesn't have a hope of changing them or "saving" them, whatever our romantic intentions may be. And in trying you can lose your sense of self.

• The other reason most commonly behind the lack of respect is a person who believes themself to be superior to everyone else and for that reason has no regard for anyone else. They are addicted to power and like to control. It is a thrill for them and they thrive off it. These are the people doing it with purely nasty intentions.

Just my thoughts anyway

BB...you should tell people...why should he continue to enjoy the status of a "nice bloke", "pillar of society" etc

He isn't any of those things

(I understand why you don't though, because these men are clever...and many people are too uncomfortable to rock their own perceptions of how people really are...it is easier to deny and rationalise)

it is totally a gendered issue - i remember someone posting a while back abot working in A&E and seeing hundreds of obvious cases of DV against women, and a few against men - those few being mostly gay men with abusive partners.

Physical size & strength does come into it - socialisation comes into it too.

don't these men start off with families where Father is an arsehole and Mum tolerates it?

In the case of my exH his mum was an arsehole too, but his dad had a god complex, imo (his mum was certainly one of the chief worshippers). It was only the fact that his dad was out of the house most of the time saving lives in an operating theatre that kept him from throwing his weight around at home. He broke the leg of one of exH's sisters once while spanking her, though, and he got away with it.

Don't worry AF - according to a few people I've spoken to, he's doing well enough to tarnish that reputation by himself

First he slept with his best mate's sister (the mate in question had put him up with no notice because he insisted he couldn't pay the rent on the house without me)

Then when she got fed up of him, he started going out with someone else, announced she was pregnant 8 weeks into the relationship, they are now engaged and apparently nobody even likes her.

He's also messing around at work (he works for the mate now who put him up when I first left, and he puts up with everything from him and is also starting to get fed up apparently).

I am quietly amused by all this.

Thanks, BB and others. I did say, on the other thread I think, that male-on-female bullying is more pernicious because of the abuse of the strength differential. But I do not see the practice of men abusing female partners as a separate issue from other bullying. They all follow the same pattern. I don't actually believe it's got much to do with 'entitlement' either. Most bullying is born out of fear, one way or another.

The business of male entitlement in our societies, and parallel female disentitlement, is a whole other question to my mind. It often does lead to unfairness & imbalance in domestic partnerships. But only a bully will use that against his partner.

i suppose it makes sense that typically male abuse towards partner and/or children is often physical and/or sexual while female abuse tends to be emotional.

if you look at how the genders express feelings or how they try to CONTROL a situation, men often tend to use their physicality and women tend to use their oral skills.

both mine and my DH's parents are the perfect examples- both fathers are drinkers/sexually abusive, both mothers are emotionally manipulative.

AF, my new website (not finished yet) has a 'name & shame' section I hope you'll encourage people to use it!

AF - As to why women don't leave sooner, I can only speak for myself but it was because I didn't realise what was happening.

It starts so slowly - a "small" compromise, initially. You'd feel silly, unreasonable, for not agreeing to it. Or maybe, your DP has hit on a vulnerable spot, something that you already believe is true about you......You might already suspect that you are say, boring. And then, someone you love, who knows you better than almost anybody else thinks it too.

It's insidious. And confusing. YOu know something is wrong, but you can't put your finger on what it is. You think and worry about it all the time - what do I do? How can I fix it?

Of course, you can't. The problem isn't with you, it's with him.

I would definitely recommend the Lundy Bancroft book to anyone.

As to secrecy - Only my sister knows most of what's gone on. My Mum a little bit less.

I've told my friends and work colleagues some of it, but no where near everything.

As to why - shame, mostly. I am ashamed of how I let myself be treated for so long.
All I can say when someone asks how I put up with it is "I don't know"" and try to explain that it didn't START that way......

Sorry for the ramble and threadjack!

BB...just you continue quietly watching

karma is a wonderful thing

It doesn't start out bad, or no-one would ever end up so desperate. I've seen it compared to boiling a frog -- if you put one in a pot of cold water and bring it slowly to the boil it stays there until boiled, but if you drop one into boiling water it will try to hop out immediately.

tippytap...don't be sorry for rambling

I really can see what you are saying...I have to, because I have heard it many times before

the "death by a thousand cuts" thing...seems typical

the not seeing what is happening until it is too late...I can see that

Just because I advocate getting out at the earliest opportunity doesn't mean I can't empathise with some who didn't (or couldn't)

never too late to get out though...and I have the utmost respect for people who do...no matter how long it takes

I think that some women will justify men's behavior, and try to fix it, as if somehow responsible for it.

Also, it's infinitely easier to be objective about someone's behavior if you aren't in a relationship with them, so comments from friends/family can be met by the defence mechanism, and in some cases draws the couple closer together in a, 'you and me against the world' scenario.'

As yet, no human society has developed a way to function without a slave class. The whole of human social history is about identifying that slave class, labelling it as such and persuading the slave class to LIKE slave status.