Why Does He Do That?: Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men (21 page)

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EASONS TO
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TAY THE
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To answer the question “Why Does He Do That?” we have to examine the foundation on which abusive behaviors are based. On the first level are the abuser’s attitudes, beliefs, and habits—the thinking that drives his behavior day in and day out, which we have been looking at. On the second level is the learning process by which some boys develop into abusive men or, in other words, where abusive values come from, which is the topic of Chapter 13.

There is also a third level, which is rarely mentioned in discussions of abuse but which is actually one of the most important dynamics: the
benefits
that an abuser gets that make his behavior
desirable
to him. In what ways is abusiveness rewarding? How does this destructive pattern get reinforced?

Consider the following scenario: Mom, Dad, and their children are having dinner on a Wednesday night. Dad is snappy and irritable, criticizing everybody during the meal, spreading his tension around like electricity. When he finishes eating, he leaves the table abruptly and heads out of the room. His ten-year-old daughter says, “Dad, where are you going? Wednesday is your night to wash the dishes.” Upon hearing these words, Dad bursts into flames, screaming, “You upstart little shit, don’t you dare try to tell me what to do! You’ll be wearing a dish on your face!” He grabs a plate off the table, makes like he is going to throw it at her, and then turns away and smashes it on the floor. He knocks a chair over with his hand and storms out of the room. Mom and the children are left trembling; the daughter bursts into tears. Dad reappears in the doorway and yells that she’d better shut up, so she chokes off her tears, which causes her to shake even more violently. Without touching a soul, Dad has sent painful shock waves through the entire family.

We move ahead now to the following Wednesday. Dinner passes fairly normally, without the previous week’s tension, but Dad still strolls out of the kitchen when he finishes eating. Does a family member remind him that it’s his turn to wash the dishes? Of course not. It will be many, many months before anyone makes that mistake again. They quietly attend to the cleanup, or they squabble among themselves about who should do it, taking out their frustrations over Dad’s unfairness and volatility on each other. Dad’s scary behavior has created a context in which he won’t have to do the dishes anytime he doesn’t feel like it, and no one will dare take him to task for it.

Any incident of abusive behavior brings the abuser benefits just as this one did.
Over time, the man grows attached to his ballooning collection of comforts and privileges.
Here are some of the reasons why he may appear so determined not to stop bullying:

1. The intrinsic satisfaction of power and control

The abusive man gains power through his coercive and intimidating behaviors—a sensation that can create a potent, thrilling rush. The wielder of power feels important and effective and finds a momentary relief from life’s normal distresses. It isn’t the woman’s pain that appeals to him; most abusers are not sadists. In fact, he has to go to some lengths to shield himself from his own natural tendency to empathize with her. The feeling that he
rules
is where the pleasure lies.

Yet the heady rush of power is the bare beginning of what the abuser gains through his mistreatment of his partner. If the rewards stopped here, I would find it much easier than I do to prevail upon my clients to change.

2. Getting his way, especially when it matters to him the most

A romantic partnership involves a never-ending series of negotiations between two people’s differing needs, desires, and preferences. Many of the differences that have to be worked out are matters of tremendous importance to the emotional life of each partner, such as:

• Are we spending Christmas (or whatever holidays are most important to a particular couple) with my relatives, whom I enjoy, or with your relatives, who get on my nerves and don’t seem to like me?
  
• Are we eating dinner tonight at my favorite restaurant, or at a place that I’m tired of and where the children seem to get wound up and irritating?
  
• Am I going to have to go alone to my office party, which makes me feel terrible, or are you going to come with me even though you would rather spend your evening doing almost anything else on earth?
  

It is important not to underestimate the impact of these kinds of day-to-day decisions. Your happiness in a relationship depends greatly on your ability to get your needs heard and taken seriously. If these decisions are taken over by an abusive or controlling partner, you experience disappointment after disappointment, the constant sacrificing of your needs. He, on the other hand, enjoys the luxury of a relationship where he rarely has to compromise, gets to do the things he enjoys, and skips the rest. He shows off his generosity when the stakes are low, so that friends will see what a swell guy he is.

The abuser ends up with the benefits of being in an intimate relationship without the sacrifices that normally come with the territory. That’s a pretty privileged lifestyle.

3. Someone to take his problems out on

Have you ever suffered a sharp disappointment or a painful loss and found yourself looking for someone to blame? Have you, for example, ever been nasty to a store clerk when you were really upset about your job? Most people have an impulse to dump bad feelings on some undeserving person, as a way to relieve—temporarily—sadness or frustration. Certain days you may know that you just have to keep an eye on yourself so as not to bite someone’s head off.

The abusive man doesn’t bother to keep an eye on himself, however. In fact, he considers himself entitled to use his partner as a kind of human garbage dump where he can litter the ordinary pains and frustrations that life brings us. She is always an available target, she is easy to blame—since no partner is perfect—and she can’t prevent him from dumping because he will get even worse if she tries. His excuse when he jettisons his distresses on to her is that his life is unusually painful—an unacceptable rationalization even if it were true, which it generally isn’t.

4. Free labor from her; leisure and freedom for him

No abusive man does his share of the work in a relationship. He may take advantage of his partner’s hard work keeping the house, preparing the meals, caring for the children, and managing the myriad details of life. Or, if he is one of the few abusers who carries his weight in these areas, then he exploits her emotionally instead, sucking her dry of attention, nurturing, and support, and returning only a trickle.

All this uncompensated labor from her means leisure for him. During the hours he spends talking about himself he is relieved of the work of listening. The long weekend days when she cares for the children are his opportunity to watch sports, go rock climbing, or write his novel. My clients don’t make the connection that
someone
takes care of the work; they think of it as just mysteriously getting done and refer to women as “lazy.” Yet on a deeper level the abuser seems to realize how hard his partner works, because he fights like hell not to have to share that burden. He is accustomed to his luxury and often talks exaggeratedly about his exhaustion to excuse staying on his rear end.

Studies have shown that a majority of women feel that their male partners don’t contribute fairly to household responsibilities. However, a woman whose partner is not abusive at least has the option to put her foot down about her workload and insist that the man pick up the slack. With an abusive man, however, if you put your foot down he either ignores you or makes you pay.

The abuser comes and goes as he pleases, meets or ignores his responsibilities at his whim, and skips anything he finds too unpleasant. In fact, some abusers are rarely home at all, using the house only as a base for periodic refueling.

5. Being the center of attention, with priority given to his needs

When a woman’s partner chronically mistreats her, what fills up her thoughts? Him, of course. She ponders how to soothe him so that he won’t explode, how to improve herself in his eyes, how she might delicately raise a touchy issue with him. Little space remains for her to think about her own life, which suits the abuser; he wants her to be thinking about him. The abuser reaps cooperation and catering to his physical, emotional, and sexual needs. And if the couple has children, the entire family strives to enhance his good moods and fix his bad ones, in the hope that he won’t start tearing pieces out of anyone. Consistently at the center of attention and getting his own way, the abuser can ensure that his emotional needs get met on his terms—a luxury he is loath to part with.

6. Financial control

Money is a leading cause of tension in modern relationships, at least in families with children. Financial choices have huge quality-of-life implications, including: Who gets to make the purchases that matter most to him or her; what kinds of preparations are made for the future, including retirement; what types of leisure activities and travel are engaged in; who gets to work; who gets to
not
work if he or she doesn’t want to; and how the children’s needs are met. To have your voice in these decisions taken away is a monumental denial of your rights and has long-term implications. On the flip side, the abuser who dominates these kinds of decisions extorts important benefits for himself, whether the family is low income or wealthy. One of the most common tactics I hear about, for example, is that the abuser manages to finagle dealings so that his name is on his partner’s belongings—such as her house or her car—along with,
or instead of,
her name. In fact, I have had clients whose abuse was almost entirely economically based and who managed to take many thousands of dollars away from their partners, either openly or through playing financial tricks.

An abuser’s history of economic exploitation tends to put him in a much better financial position than his partner if the relationship splits up. This imbalance makes it harder for her to leave him, especially if she has to find a way to support her children. He may also threaten to use his economic advantage to hire a lawyer and pursue custody, one of the single most terrifying prospects that can face an abused woman.

7. Ensuring that his career, education, or other goals are prioritized

Closely interwoven with financial control is the question of whose personal goals receive priority. If the abuser needs to be out several evenings studying for a certificate that will improve his job advancement potential, he’s going to do it. If a career opportunity for him involves moving to a new state, he is likely to ignore the impact of his decision on his partner. Her own goals may also advance at times, but only as long as they don’t interfere with his.

8. Public status of partner and/or father without the sacrifices

With his strong people-pleasing skills and his lively energy when under the public gaze, the abusive man is often thought of as an unusually fun and loving partner and a sweet, committed dad. He soaks up the smiles and appreciation he receives from relatives, neighbors, and people in the street who are unaware of his behavior in private.

9. The approval of his friends and relatives

An abuser often chooses friends who are supportive of abusive attitudes. On top of that, he may come from an abusive family; in fact, his father or stepfather may have been his key role model for how to treat female partners. If these are his social surroundings, he gets strokes for knowing how to control his partner, for “putting her in her place” from time to time, and for ridiculing her complaints about him. His friends and relatives may even bond with him on the basis of his view of women in general as being irrational, vindictive, or avaricious. For this man to renounce abuse, he would have to give up his cheerleading squad as well.

10. Double standards

An abusive man subtly or overtly imposes a system in which he is exempt from the rules and standards that he applies to you. He may allow himself to have occasional affairs, “because men have their needs,” but if you so much as gaze at another man, you’re a “whore.” He may scream in arguments, but if you raise your voice, you’re “hysterical.” He may pick up one of your children by the ear, but if you grab your son and put him in time-out for punching you in the leg, you’re a “child abuser.” He can leave his schedule open and flexible while you have to account for your time. He can point out your faults, while setting himself above criticism, so that he doesn’t have to deal with your complaints or be confronted with the effects of his selfish and destructive actions. The abusive man has the privilege of living by a special set of criteria that were designed just for him.

G
LANCE BACK QUICKLY
over this impressive collection of privileges. Is it any wonder that abusive men are reluctant to change? The benefits of abuse are a major social secret, rarely mentioned anywhere. Why? Largely because abusers are specialists in distracting our attention. They don’t want anyone to notice how well this system is working for them (and usually don’t even want to admit it to themselves). If we caught on, we would stop feeling sorry for them and instead start holding them accountable for their actions. As long as we see abusers as victims, or as out-of-control monsters, they will continue getting away with ruining lives.
If we want abusers to change, we will have to require them to give up the luxury of exploitation.

When you are left feeling hurt or confused after a confrontation with your controlling partner, ask yourself: What was he trying to get out of what he just did? What is the ultimate benefit to him? Thinking through these questions can help you clear your head and identify his tactics.

Certainly the abusive man also
loses
a great deal through his abusiveness. He loses the potential for genuine intimacy in his relationship, for example, and his capacity for compassion and empathy. But these are often not things that he values, so he may not feel their absence. And even if he would like greater intimacy, that wish is outweighed by his attachment to the benefits of abuse.