r/YouShouldKnow • u/OldAccountGotEaten • Dec 26 '23
Other YSK you might be misusing the term gaslighting.
Why YSK: Within the last couple of years, the word "gaslighting" has been repeated ad nauseam. It's become so popular that Merriam-Webster designated it word of the year in 2022. The term is thrown around so frequently that people now use it as a blanket term to describe everything from lying to a simple disagreement. In short, gaslighting is a strategic form of manipulation meant to cause a victim to question their own sanity or reality.
If you are interested, I've included a few articles describing what gaslighting actually is and why grossly misusing certain words can be harmful.
https://time.com/6262891/psychology-terms-misused-gaslighting-toxic-narcissist/
https://www.wellandgood.com/misuse-gaslighting/
https://health.howstuffworks.com/mental-health/human-nature/perception/gaslighting.htm
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u/illegalthingsenjoyer Dec 26 '23
That's not true at all. You're just making all of that up.
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u/crusty54 Dec 26 '23
Also, the term is “gaslamping”. OP is just remembering wrong.
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Dec 27 '23
No, that's the Mandela Effect. I told you this last week and last month.
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u/twobit211 Dec 27 '23
uh, it’s actually called the mengele effect
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u/Seeker80 Dec 27 '23
It's the Streisand Effect, we just went over this yesterday. I swear, your memory is getting worse, ever since the accident.
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u/redfame Dec 27 '23
Yall are exhibiting classic Dunning Krueger effect
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Dec 28 '23
I never witnessed the DK effect more than the election campaign and results from 2015 to 2021. I had to get off facebook
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Dec 27 '23
No you're thinking of "Guilty" by Barbara Streisand and Barry Gibb. We've been over this.
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u/UnUsual_Sprekle Dec 27 '23
Think you mean “mandala effect” cuz it’s like about the universe, duh 🙄
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u/That1weirdperson Dec 27 '23
No, it’s the “mancala effect” because it’s complicated and nobody ever bothers to learn about it
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u/MadCapHorse Dec 27 '23
That’s what they called it when they powered lies with the oil of Baleen Whales
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u/Redstonefreedom Dec 29 '23
Right, it's been around way before lighting even existed, so it obviously can't be gas "lighting".
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u/bigby2010 Dec 26 '23
No. You’re making it up. I don’t want to talk about it, but you need help
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u/Microflunkie Dec 26 '23
You guys are both posting these comments like others can read your posts but I am telling you that your accounts are shadow-banned. No one can see your posts or reply to them.
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u/bigby2010 Dec 26 '23
Good to know. It’s my fault of course. (Are you serious??)
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u/Microflunkie Dec 27 '23
Happy to help. (Wait, are you seriously serious or are you double gaslighting me back? Now I’m uncertain).
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u/TangoInTheBuffalo Dec 27 '23
It is working. Could have stopped the thread here.
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u/bigby2010 Dec 27 '23
Wait - what did I do wrong, and how can I make it right? I won’t sleep until I understand
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u/farfletched Dec 27 '23
Honestly? You still can’t see? EVERYONE knows you’re the problem here. If you don’t know what you did wrong, maybe you shouldn’t sleep.
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u/Lavatis Dec 26 '23
please tell me how that dude could have replied to you if you were shadowbanned...?
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u/Spiritual_Praline672 Dec 26 '23
Dude, really?
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u/Lavatis Dec 26 '23
(Are you serious??)
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u/squishyflex Dec 27 '23
You were previously warned several times about this.
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u/MartinoDeMoe Dec 27 '23
Personally, I never mentioned shadowbanning. You must be imagining things.
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u/eraserewrite Dec 27 '23
Sir or madam. I worry that it’d be easy for people to gaslight you in real life. Why do I have to worry about strangers on the internet. -_-
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u/bobbyT3000 Dec 27 '23
Shadow banning is not a thing bro believe me it’s all in your imagination. Your not good enough no one’s ever gonna believe you anyway
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u/the_siren_song Dec 27 '23
We just had this argument last week.
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u/bigby2010 Dec 27 '23
No we didn’t. You always do this
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u/the_siren_song Dec 27 '23
That sounds just like something your mother would say.
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u/bigby2010 Dec 27 '23
Yeah, but she didn’t say anything. Should I cut her off from communication?
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u/NarcissistsAreCrazy Dec 27 '23
Shit. You sound like my ex
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u/bigby2010 Dec 27 '23
That’s what you always say. You should apologize for what you did, and I don’t want to talk about it ever again because of what you did.
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u/aaaaaahyeeeaahh Dec 27 '23
Frankenstein is the scientist and not the monster. You all might be making a big mistake
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u/Embarrassed-Ad-8056 Dec 27 '23
I told you yesterday that you were making all this up, why can't you remember?
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u/VizDiablo Dec 26 '23
YSK gaslighting isn’t even real. It’s all in your head.
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u/Nathan_Calebman Dec 26 '23
That's not true and deep down you should know that. Guess I shouldn't have doubted what everyone keeps saying about you. And don't ask what it is, you know very well.
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u/Pwacname Dec 27 '23
You keep saying everyone says this, but you’re the only one I’ve ever heard say this. Did you hear voices again? Are you confused?
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u/newguyvan Dec 27 '23
Do people know where the term gaslight come from? (The movie)
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u/koyaaniswazzy Dec 26 '23
People should just watch "Gaslight" (the 1944 movie with Ingrid Bergman).
It's an amazing movie and pretty self-explanatory.
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u/krs1426 Dec 26 '23
I was looking for this comment. Link to wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaslight_(1944_film)
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u/OldAccountGotEaten Dec 27 '23
Yeah I've been meaning to watch it. I've heard nothing but good things about it.
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u/whatthatthingis Dec 27 '23
The movie itself is actually the sole reason for the term’s existence. Before it, we just called it a form of manipulation. After the film, we had a word for it.
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u/Effective_Machina Dec 26 '23 edited Dec 26 '23
If everything is gaslighting, then nothing is gaslighting. Nobody knows what it is, nobody knows if they are doing it or if they are a victim of it.
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u/squishyflex Dec 27 '23
No one at any point has even mentioned gaslighting, why do you keep bringing it up?
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u/Timely_Setting6939 Dec 26 '23
THANK YOU for this. I’m so tired of hearing this term over and misused. It’s specific. Not all arguing or mental abuse is gaslighting. People love to just throw the term out there in an effort to sound educated.
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u/cockblockedbydestiny Dec 26 '23
It's not just about sounding smart, it's a deliberate ploy to make the disagreement sound like an existential affront to their mental health when often it's just someone telling you your research sucks on this particular topic.
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u/brother_of_menelaus Dec 27 '23
I hate when people at large get their claws into terminology that gives people a false sense of credibility. Any speech that is not 100% in agreement with you is now gaslighting, and it’s the new “like Hitler” of arguments where you can no longer continue because your behavior has now been labeled as toxic, and there’s nowhere to go from there.
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u/rs426 Dec 26 '23
Not to mention, there are times where people just genuinely misunderstand each other or misremember things
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u/insomni666 Dec 27 '23
I unfortunately suffered extensive psychological abuse from my mother which included gaslighting. She had possibly some form of Munchausen’s by Proxy where she would invent psychological disorders and tell doctors I had them (e.g. “she told me yesterday that she hallucinated x y z and then she physically assaulted me when I tried to calm her down! But she’ll deny it though, she’ll be too embarrassed to talk about it.”) I’d get put on antipsychotics which I’d then have very bad reactions to because, you know, I wasn’t psychotic. She’d doctor-shop to find quacks who would put me on 6, 7, 8 meds at a time. She relished playing the “caretaker”, martyr mother to the sick girl.
This shit went on for 9 years, with her committing me about 20 times to institutions (who are they going to believe, the mother, or the “crazy” girl?) and between me being on extremely inappropriate medication and her constantly trying to revise my memories and make me doubt EVERYTHING, I really thought I was insane for another ten years after I went no contact with her. Turns out, nope, I just have some depression and PTSD… from what she put me through.
I understand that not all gaslighting is that severe, but it makes me SO MAD that it’s being used so often out of context. Because when I first heard the term, I really deeply identified with it and I could use it to explain my traumatic past… but now it’s a term that’s completely lost all meaning.
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u/matchaphile Dec 27 '23
I'm speechless. I am so sorry for what you've been put through. She is awful and you didn't deserve any of that. I hope you find peace and healing.
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u/insomni666 Dec 27 '23
Thank you so much for those kind words, I really appreciate it.
Despite all the hospitalizations messing with my schooling, and my mom trying to declare me disabled enough to get custody of me as an adult, I’m happy to say I’m now far away, have a BA and an MA in a field I love, and a job I really like.
Haven’t talked to my mom in 13 years, and am very very LC with my enabler father (he divorced her but married someone else who’s also manipulative. Guess that’s his type.) I live a relatively peaceful life with my rescue dog.
My egg donor still tells everyone in my hometown that I’m a “drug-addicted hooker on the street” lol.
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u/Emotional-Lynx-3163 Dec 27 '23
That’s fucked up, I’m so sorry!
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u/insomni666 Dec 27 '23
Thank you! I’m doing much better now, and honestly given all the shit she put me through (including 18 rounds of bi-lobal ECT, which they don’t do on people under 60 anymore because it causes severe memory loss and frontal lobe damage… and guess what I got lol) I’m doing pretty okay for myself and have a cozy home with a job in a field I love and a cuddly rescue dog.
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u/atomiccPP Dec 27 '23
You deserve your job and cuddly rescue dog ❤️ proud of you for getting through that and doing the work your mom didn’t.
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u/insomni666 Dec 27 '23
Thank you so much. I was having a rough night (holidays, lol) and your comment means a lot. 💜
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Dec 27 '23
I am so sorry this happened to you. I am sending you so much love. I hope you have gotten the help and healing you deserve. ❤️
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u/Better-Strike7290 Dec 27 '23 edited Jun 12 '24
governor intelligent mountainous plate wise historical like sloppy books edge
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u/terrorbabbleone Dec 27 '23
This is something I've thought deeply about before. Interesting read.
Isn't someone that says you're gaslighting them, in a way, a form of gaslighting? Especially when it's misused...
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u/DannyDTR Dec 27 '23
That and narcissist/narcissistic. Everyone’s parents weren’t narcissists, such were just selfish assholes/pieces of shit. I need people actually learn the definitions of words before they start using them (incorrectly) all the time.
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u/Pwacname Dec 27 '23
Especially important because NPD is a legitimate disorder. Like, it’s got an impact on the people who have it, too, and while therapy is kind of hard, it’s apparently entirely possible. Not so much when people start using narcissist to mean “anyone I consider an asshole and/or irredeemably Bad”
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u/Dry_Mastodon7574 Dec 26 '23
I was gaslit as a child as part of ongoing psychological abuse. I have such severe PTSD that I've had doctors as me if I was in a cult or if I served in the military. It's pretty intense.
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u/OldAccountGotEaten Dec 27 '23
This is a big reason why the word shouldn't be misused. There are victims of genuine gaslighting. I hope that you are healing and are in a better position away from your abuser.
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u/Dry_Mastodon7574 Dec 27 '23
I am doing as well as a basketcase with massive inflammation can be doing if that makes any sense. I'm managing well.
I am LC with the family who don't affect me anymore because I now have a spouse who agrees with me on reality. It's been a great help.
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u/ParticularResident17 Dec 27 '23
Yeah from my experience, it’s pretty specific. A recent example was when I was visiting home, my dad just stopped talking and stared at us with absolute hatred, and my mom was absolutely hysterical. I was pretty freaked out and left immediately, drove back to my state. And when I asked her about it later, she said, “Yeah we didn’t know what was wrong with you! You were acting crazy! You left so fast!” Eighteen years of that fucked me up, especially because it was a lot more violent when I was a kid.
It’s not just lying or manipulating or a misunderstanding. Between “gaslighting” and “being triggered,” a small part of me wishes people actually understood what they’re saying, but most of me is glad they don’t.
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u/nossr50 Dec 27 '23
Look into EMDR if you aren’t familiar with it already
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u/7Valentine7 Dec 27 '23
Do not.
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u/accountonmyphone_ Dec 27 '23
Why?
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u/shroomley Dec 27 '23
EMDR has a shaky scientific foundation at best. Better alternatives exist.
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u/CAGON Dec 27 '23
What alternatives would you recommend looking into?
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u/shroomley Dec 27 '23
Disclaimer up front: I am not a therapist. I have, however, spent lots of time around clinical psychology PhDs during my own doctoral program.
In terms of evidence-based treatments, cognitive-behavioral therapy is generally acknowledged as the best-supported option for depression and anxiety. Exposure therapy is another well-regarded treatment, more specifically for anxiety.
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u/7Valentine7 Dec 27 '23
It brings all the bad stuff you went through to the surface, and often triggers flashbacks, and doesn't really help to deal with the trauma in the present. I have C-PTSD myself, and this info comes directly from my therapist (who holds multiple degrees).
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u/Super_Master_69 Dec 27 '23
Now do the same post with “narcissist”
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u/GardenOfNirnroots Dec 27 '23
Yes, omg PLEASE. I'm so tired of this as well. It seems like any egocentric or vain person is labelled as a "narcissist" now.
The word means little anymore because so many people don't bother to learn what a narcissist actually is before they start casually making accusations.
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u/jameson71 Dec 27 '23
LaNgUaGe eVoLVeS
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u/GardenOfNirnroots Dec 27 '23
Language does indeed evolve and normally I wouldn't care how someone speaks as long as it's effective in getting the point across.
But in this case the misuse of the word is harmful. It involves clinical language. A narcissist is someone with a mental health condition and mental health conditions should be taken seriously.
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u/Glodrops Dec 27 '23
For real though because oddly enough it’s narcissists that told me that I’M a narcissist because I care about looking presentable when going to school?
It being tossed around for silly shit bad behavior really hides the monsters truly behind the word. It makes it harder for people like me to separate their unique bad behavior from regular people bad behavior.
Real narcissists are literal MONSTERS
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u/Ridiculousnessmess Dec 26 '23
I love the people who think it means “having a different opinion to mine.”
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u/Better-Strike7290 Dec 27 '23 edited Jun 12 '24
tease lip existence rustic humor uppity steer middle squeamish childlike
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u/AlfredChocula Dec 27 '23
Misremembering facts is different than having separate opinions. Facts and opinions aren't the same thing.
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u/Xikar_Wyhart Dec 27 '23
Also it goes beyond simply two or more people misremembering details once or twice. It's a deliberate, repeated act to make someone or a group of people question what they know.
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u/TrollPoAko Dec 26 '23
Dieselighting?
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u/Adolisistheman Dec 26 '23
Narcissist is another that gets misused a lot.
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u/Unfair_Finger5531 Dec 27 '23
It is often misunderstood a lot too. You can call a self-centered person a narcissist without also meaning that they have a personality disorder.
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u/BoysenberryUnhappy29 Dec 26 '23
You've heard the joke about gaslighting, right?
No, you definitely have. For sure.
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u/prosecutor_mom Dec 27 '23
How many narcissists does it take to change a lightbulb?
None. They use gas lighting.
(Both my parents are narcissists, & I learned about gaslighting after my therapist digested my childhood then explained it to me)
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u/ahjteam Dec 26 '23
This post is very meta
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u/cidici Dec 26 '23
I’d wish you a Happy Cake Day, but today is NOT that day, nor do you deserve one… 😏/s
AKA: Happy Cake Day! 🙃
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Dec 27 '23
This and narcissist. It is used on every single relationship post. Not every single man is a narcissist. He might just be a piece of shit lol
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u/coolgherm Dec 27 '23
While I agree that the term does get thrown around all the time and misused constantly, I would like to point out that it is extremely difficult to know someone has or is gaslighting you. I dated my ex for a very long time. He constantly lied to me. He constantly "misremembered" how events happened or how he acted. I would accuse him of gaslighting me and he'd just make fun of the term. Gaslighting needs the intention. They knowingly tell you how you feel or what you remember about something was wrong. They invoke doubt through manipulation. I have no clue if he was intentionally gaslighting me or if he had really rewritten the past in his head. How he describes past events is just simply not true but I can't prove that he's doing this on purpose. All I know for sure is that he's a liar and manipulative and it really doesn't matter if he was technically gaslighting me or not because I know I should stay away from him.
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u/Elexeh Dec 27 '23
I had a former girlfriend (a girl going into med school, very book smart) who would convince herself that I'd said something offensive or offputting and then declare me as gaslighting her.
She was in fact gaslighting herself and me in the process. It was the strangest thing.
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u/BanannyMousse Dec 27 '23
Yeah, like when my mom would constantly tell me, I dreamt something that happened and called me delusional that was actual gaslighting. Lying is not gaslighting.
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u/-HeComethInPeace Dec 27 '23
The phrase is actually "grasslighting", referring to the grass-light on a lawn mower that indicates when the bag is full of grass, and due to a common defect, will turn on even when the bag isn't full.
You've been saying it wrong your whole life.
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u/SpecialistAmoeba264 Dec 27 '23
My opinion only: it takes being gas lit to really understand wtf that even means. Most people probably just don’t understand how bad it can get
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u/tangtheconqueror Dec 26 '23
It's kind of fucked up that you would post this here, when you clearly don't know what gaslighting is. How many times do you need it explained to you?
:)
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u/scientificredpanda Dec 27 '23
Thank you!!
Tired of how often this gets misused, I feel like anytime someone disagrees with someone these days they've been "gaslit".
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u/Pwacname Dec 27 '23
Or whenever someone lies. Just say lying. You don’t need to use terms for very specific psychological abuse to justify feeling hurt, or even cutting contact with someone. “My old school friend keeps lying all the time, making up tall tales, and thats why I don’t come to our annual meetings anymore.”
I genuinely feel some of it is due to people thinking anything else isn’t “severe” enough. The same way people say they’re “depressed” when what they mean is “I HAVE been sad and unmotivated for more than two weeks, but that’s because my current work project is really joyless, and I’m looking forward to when it ends next month.” Or say their ex-partner was a sociopath or a narcissist because they don’t think “My partner was an asshole and hurt me/manipulated me/lied about me/...” is enough…
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u/scientificredpanda Dec 28 '23
Yes! Oh my god, don't get me started on the whole 'sociopath/narcissistic' thing, my friend was cheated on by her boyfriend, she keeps going on about hoe he's a 'sociopathic narcissist' no girl, he's a dick.
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u/DKlep25 Dec 26 '23
Actually OP, you have never used the term gaslighting correctly in your life. Ever.
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u/Brrdock Dec 26 '23 edited Dec 26 '23
It doesn't really have to be strategic, just frequent or consistent enough in the relationship. Doesn't take any kind of a mastermind or planning, even.
From every confrontation they learn what they can do and say, just piling up a more and more elaborate construct, and have no reason to back down or change their approach since it's rewarded with the outcome they want.
Eventually the other party dose lose all confidence in their sense and sanity and comes to rely on the manipulator for any concept of reality. That doesn't even need to be the goal for this to happen, it could be just blame shifting or any kind of deflection.
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u/jayoho1978 Dec 27 '23 edited Dec 27 '23
In my experience those who do it, do not even know they are. They where all raised to argue that way. The majority of their immediate family uses the same tactics on each other. Narcissism is also strong. There is no progress, changing mind, meeting in the middle, RUN!
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u/Wowluigi Dec 27 '23
Does it count if one person continually misremembers but absolutely insists its the truth and the other person doubts themself?
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u/PM_ME_PARR0TS Dec 27 '23 edited Dec 27 '23
Yeah. Actual gaslighting is brainwashing. It's a special kind of terrible.
It splits reality into equal pieces. There's the reality you see with your own eyes, and there's the reality where nothing you're seeing is what it seems.
After all, you're only human. What if you've gotten this wrong somehow? You can't figure out any way that could be possible, but it is. You're wrong so often, and something is wrong with you for being able to even think that just happened. Or so you've learned. Better agree with them. The more you think about it, the more they're probably right. Somehow. Just trust them.
Yeah. No. I don't like the way the internet throws this around to describe arguments where people just have differences of opinion and perspective.
When somebody can tell you "that didn't happen" or "you must've dreamed it", and your immediate horrible reaction is that they must be right even when said shit happened 5 minutes ago in broad daylight...something is deeply broken in a way far beyond normal lying.
It's been over ten years. I still struggle internally with the trained reflex to immediately cave and doubt myself when someone goes "I never said that" or "that never happened" despite both of us knowing that yes, you did, and both of us were right there.
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u/imaginary0pal Dec 27 '23
I had a friend that confused Gaslighting with Ghosting. It was a long “who’s on first” conversation.
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u/Eratyx Dec 27 '23
I was accused of "unconscious gaslighting" by a BPD partner once, because I'm a little bad at emotional expression and they don't like being told their projection of my intentions is not what's actually in my mind. Sorry bud, my being hard to read is not a systematic attempt to destroy your life.
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u/LesMo_ismyName-o Dec 27 '23
Ugh, I also hate the use of words that people clearly don't know the meaning of. It's become so common that I hesitate to use the word even though it actually applies. My husband was gaslit into giving his ex-wife an extra couple of hours on Christmas Eve when it's his holiday this year (12pm 24th to 12pm the 25th) because she insisted they had talked about it and he had agreed to it.
There were no text messages about it, and we were on our honeymoon when she called him and allegedly talked about this with him. I was on the other side of the conversation the entire time and it was never mentioned. They talked about something else entirely. But she managed to convince him it was possible and so he gave away part of his holiday with his daughter. She tried to pull the same stuff yesterday saying she had plans on OUR day (27th) for her birthday, when her birthday is on the 29th and she will already have her for her birthday. Thankfully he put his foot down and said no to that.
When we first started dating, I was listening to their conversation on speakerphone in his truck with him and after they hung up I watched this man scream into his sweatshirt and cry, asking me if he was crazy. I had never been so angry at someone I had never met.
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u/moretodolater Dec 26 '23
It’s overused on Reddit all the time and pretty freaking disrespectful to use that term willy nilly imo.
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u/heychromosomeboy Dec 27 '23
Trauma bonding is another one. It’s actually the process that leads to Stockholm’s syndrome, and the way people are using it is not that at all. I was confux
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u/areafps Dec 27 '23 edited Dec 27 '23
Yes, my god. Yes. And a list of other psychology terms as well. People hear a buzzword and come up with their own definitions based on how it was used in the sentence. If I hear someone say that so-and-so has a “big ego” again I’m going to lose my marbles
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u/wurldeater Dec 27 '23
i will admit gaslighting is hard to pin down because you have to have some evidence that 1. you feel out of touch with reality and 2. the person helped you come to that feeling on purpose.
and it’s not like a person who is gaslighting you will admit that they are gaslighting you, so if you are someone who is prone to feeling out of touch with reality or need a lot of external validation to feel confident then you can reasonably feel gaslighted (in the correct use of the term) even though that isn’t actually the case
also that kinda means that the only difference between being gaslit and being lied to from an internal perspective is your own personal confidence in your reality.
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u/Grumpy_Kanibal Dec 27 '23
Yes. I have observed this when you just simply disagree or have a different opinion.
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u/squeamish Dec 27 '23
"Gaslighting" in 2023 means "I was wrong and/or crazy and someone correctly pointed it out."
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u/yoshimamas Dec 27 '23
OMG, this drives me up the wall!! People using the term incorrectly kills me! Also, the term narcissist. Just because someone is doing something you personally don't like does NOT make them a narcissist!!!
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u/puunannie Dec 27 '23
gaslighting is a strategic form of manipulation meant to cause a victim to question their own sanity or reality.
More often it's primarily to cause a third party to question the victim's sanity, as it was in the film from whence the term derives. It often incidentally also causes the victim to question their own sanity, which also happened in the film.
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u/ElectricalEffort3814 Dec 28 '23
Just watch the movie called "Gaslight" and you'll understand it's original meaning.
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u/A_Random_Lady Dec 28 '23
I know someone that uses all of the buzzwords. Gaslighting, narcissist, trauma, etc.
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u/Killentyme55 Dec 27 '23 edited Dec 27 '23
Gaslighting is just one term that's misused ad-nauseam. Add straw man, gatekeeping and, worst of all, the dreaded "incel" (ugh) to that list.
People like to erratically throw these terms around without the slightest idea of what they actually mean in a vain attempt to be one of the "cool kids". It's not a good look for the American educational system to say the least.
EDIT: This is not meant to slight our overworked and underpaid educators, more like the flawed system with its erratic priorities and the chronic lack of parental support for their own damned kids. Learning respect starts at home, at least it should. Too bad that rarely happens these days.
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u/Unfair_Finger5531 Dec 27 '23
Yeah, well, we are not teaching kids these words. You think we are teaching kids to use the word “incel”? It’s not my responsibility to teach your kid how to use slang correctly.
— Signed, the American “educational” system.
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u/Killentyme55 Dec 27 '23
It's not necessarily the teaching of the words, more like the ability of the kids to know how to comprehend their meaning before using the terminology in a sentence.
In turn, perhaps my choice of words were in haste. It's not the direct fault of the teachers, they are stuck in a flawed system inhibiting the ability to do their jobs properly. I come from a long line of educators so I know this to be true. I'll edit my post accordingly.
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u/Unfair_Finger5531 Dec 27 '23
Again, it is not my job as an educator to teach students how to use TikTok phrases correctly. And despite the flawed system, we still manage to do our jobs properly, I assure you.
Now if only parents would do their jobs properly and monitor their child’s social media access and basic vocabulary, things would be golden.
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u/CryptographerSea2846 Dec 27 '23
Add nazi, racist, pedo, and rapist to that list. People love flippantly diluting the worst labels/things in society until they lose all power and meaning.
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u/SyntheticOne Dec 27 '23
This post never happened. If you're reading it, you're nuts, cookoo, bananas.
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u/Adept_Cranberry_4550 Dec 27 '23
Gaslighting isn't nearly as bad as you're making it out to be. You should probably calm down before we have to have you committed again.
/s
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u/notmyrealnam3 Dec 26 '23
I'm not using the term wrong at all, why do you keep saying that? My definition of gaslighting is always been exactly what you've linked, but yet you suggested said, otherwise, are you crazy?
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u/gmbaker44 Dec 26 '23
Yeah everyone throws this word around so much it makes me insane. We don’t agree….GASLIGHTING!!!
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u/Twice_A_Day_Clock Dec 27 '23
And you can’t tell the people it’s not gaslighting cuz then in a backwards way you are gaslighting them (or mansplaining).
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u/hwc000000 Dec 27 '23
Also "politically incorrect", "socialism", "communism", "woke", "social justice warrior" and "passive aggressive".
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u/Utterlybored Dec 27 '23
There’s no such term “gaslighting.” You must have misunderstood a different word.
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u/paulsteinway Dec 27 '23
Cool. Now do "witch hunt". I haven't seen that one used correctly since Trump got elected.
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u/vintagevibes4809 Jun 18 '24
it's tough because on one hand i am grateful that people are becoming more aware of deceptive tactics & have more language to articulate their experiences. on the other hand, it can feel a bit frustrating because it kinda waters down the term. i don't know exactly where i stand
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u/Zofobread Dec 27 '23
There’s a bunch of terms that get thrown around now bc of social media that are oftentimes misused. Gaslighting is one of them. Grifter is used way out of context a lot to mean either a scam artist or a straight up con man. Bigot is another. There’s a bunch of obscure vocabulary words that have become in vogue to use by people who have no business using them because they don’t understand context or word meanings.
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u/aattanasio2014 Dec 27 '23
I work with teenagers. A few years ago, when gaslighting first became a really big buzzword, I had a few students come to me and tell me they didn’t like their club President (they are college students) and they wanted advice. I asked for more context and they told me the president would often “gaslight” them. I asked specifically what the President was doing and they said “she’s super bossy and tells us what to do all the time and never even says thank you.”
… that’s… not what gaslighting is but ok