What Y’all Need to Understand About Abuse

I wrote this a few years ago, and like many musings, it became a journal entry instead of a blog post. All of my Facebook groups and GroupMe chats are abuzz with discussion of physical and emotional abuse after a video surfaced of a pro baseball player hitting his girlfriend. It’s also being fueled by Rihanna’s clapback about Snapchat making light of Chris Brown’s abuse, and this post where a man apologizes for the name-calling and harsh language he’s used with his wife.

These conversations are no longer triggering for me. I find myself checking in with the friends who also suffered abuse, and seeking out thoughtful, thought-provoking perspectives. Two things are very clear to me. First, some of y’all recognize abuse and are not only ok with it, but actually encourage it. I can’t do nothing with that but give it to God. On the second and slightly less fatalistic point, it’s clear a lot of y’all don’t recognize abuse. That we can work with. Here’s a few things to mull over, with links for clarity.

1. Y’all think abuse is only like Lifetime movies.

I wrote the status after seeing a classmate post a blog and video saying “Aw, Chris is so in love with Karreuche!”. The blog and video detailed Chris Brown following Karreuche Tran out of the club, forcing his way into her car, following her home, banging on her door, and following her to a restaurant. It later came to light that Chris pushed Karreuche down the stairs and threatened to kill her. And to both of those things I would like to say: I TOLD YOU SO.

Y’all think victims hide black eyes behind big dark sunglasses and cover broken arms with excuses that they fell down the stairs. No. Abuse is not just hitting. Abuse is threatening. Abuse is insulting. Abuse is isolation. Abuse is harassment. Abuse is embarrassment. Abuse is shame.

And when abuse is physical, y’all think abuse will always leave evidence. Abuse is pushing. Abuse is grabbing. Abuse is picking someone up or pinning them down. Abuse is squeezing. Abuse is pinching or arm twisting.

Abuse is the little things an abuser can write off as “the heat of the moment”, just to maintain control.

2. Y’all see the signs- and sometimes you unknowingly play a role.

For the most part, in the U.S., an abuser is not typically going to hurt their victim in public. No. Physical abuse is frowned upon in the dominant culture. Public abuse is much more cunning. Public abuse takes the focus off of the abusive partner, and puts it on the abused.

With abusers, the bigger the sorry, the bigger the blunder. Remember that scene in Madea’s Family Reunion where he had the bathwater and cellist and rose petals? It’s because he beat the breaks off her the night before. When Robin Thicke named that album Paula and went on a nationwide atonement tour, that was a CLEAR sign to anyone who’s been there and knows better.

These aren’t sweet apologies from men filled with remorse. It’s so that she can’t escape. So that even if she blocks his phone number, FB, Twitter, IG, LinkedIn, and whatever else (yes, you can block someone on LinkedIn), other people become unknowing minions, singing his praises and encouraging you to forgive him. If a grown woman decides she does not want to be with someone, that is enough for that person to leave her alone. She is an adult and she knows what she wants. She doesn’t need the abuser- or you– to “convince” her. This isn’t love and regret. It’s control and abuse.

Pay attention to the chronically on/off relationships around you. Because your homegirl could very well be trying and failing to get away from a master manipulator. And all of this goes for anybody of any gender in any relationship.

3. Y’all expect abusers to admit their fault.

People are amazed that the baseball player kept picking up her purse and putting her glasses back on her face after hitting her. Those of us who know better recognized it for what it was: gaslighting. He can hit you, deny it, and have you questioning yourself in the span on five seconds.

What did Blair Underwood tell ole girl? “The bath should help with your soreness”. She was not sore because she ran a 5k. She was sore because he ran her head into the wall. But he won’t say that. They NEVER say it’s abuse, and they rarely even admit they were wrong. Admitting guilt could mean criminal culpability, but it definitely means personal accountability. Admitting they are at fault means admitting their own issues, and that is among the things they fear most.

In a rare case, an abuser will admit he is just trying to make the person’s life miserable. Chris Brown has told us explicitly, implicitly, and everything in between that he is an abuser. Though he once apologized for his behavior, he hasn’t seemed to seek the real help to fix it. We’ve learned a lot about Chris: that he was raped(?) and that he grew up around domestic violence. Admitting his abusive actions would mean unpacking the raw emotions of the abuse he has witnessed and experienced in his life.

4. Y’all blame the victim.

One day y’all are gonna understand this abt Chris Brown, Robin Thicke, and the rest of’em: abuse is not about the victim, and it certainly is not about love.  If somehow an abuser admits to anything at all, they typically find a way to place blame on their partner.  To make matters worse, other people pile it on. I don’t even need to go into the completely asinine arguments about when abuse is warranted or provoked. I mean the victim blaming where y’all don’t blame the victim for JUST the abuse, you blame them for any and everything that comes after it.

It is incredibly sad to learn how many people blamed, threatened, and taunted the ex-girlfriend of the Cleveland Facebook Killer. She has been blamed as the cause for his murderous rampage for everything from being too good to him, breaking his heart, having “bomb p*ssy”, or cheating on him. I don’t know or care to know the details of their relationship or how it ended. What I do know is that their relationship was over, and somehow, she is still to blame. Which leads to the last point.

5. Y’all think it’s over when it’s over.

This may be the one time I envy someone’s ignorance and rudeness. Because if you’re unable to understand why someone stays in a harmful situation, it means you probably don’t understand what it’s like to try to think clearly despite mind games and fear tactics from a person who you trust and care about.  Staying in the relationship is sometimes about appeasing the abuser simply out of self preservation. If someone is an abuser when they are IN the relationship with them, do you think they just magically stop and give up when the relationship ends? No. They harass, embarrass, and blackmail. We saw how a teacher in San Bernardino left her abusive husband, only for him to kill her. What is it you would have people to do after they leave? Go into hiding and live in fear until the abuser finds someone else to victimize?

I’m working on a PhD in Educational Leadership. I can talk to you about leadership theory and state finance policy and critical race theory and many things. I can’t talk to you about the science of the brain. But those who can would tell you that abuse is traumatic. After physical scars heal, their mental and emotional counterparts take much more time. You can be triggered at any time.

It’s never over. It haunts you. The sick part is the abuser knows they will always have some tiny piece of control over you: fear. When the years pass, when the fear is no longer overwhelming, it will still be present enough for you to heavily veil your own story in a blog post in order to avoid retaliation from a person who still doesn’t think it was abuse.

If you are being abused, call 1-800-799-7233, or chat online at http://www.thehotline.org/

Infographic: The Universal Church