Gaslighting: Psychological Manipulation to the Extreme
There are different unofficial terms for psychological attacks and abuse that people may suffer. Gang stalking has already been introduced in one of my earlier articles as a group of people in a community who target an individual with the end goal of breaking that individual down in a covert operation (mainly psychological, causing the person to think he or she is going crazy in some cases). This can be real or possibly a delusion of the individual, especially if that person has schizophrenia.
Gaslighting is another form of psychological abuse, and there are actually more online and text resources than for gang stalking.
For example, Robin Stern’s book, “The Gaslight Effect: How to Spot and Survive the Hidden Manipulation Others Use to Control Your Life” discusses the phenomenon.
The book reads, “The Gaslight Effect results from a relationship between two people: a gaslighter, who needs to be right in order to preserve his own sense of self and his sense of having power in the world.”
The person being gaslighted, or the gaslightee, “allows the gaslighter to define her sense of reality because she idealizes him and seeks his approval.” Although it appears that the gaslighter is generally male and the gaslightee is more often a female, they can be of both genders.
The gaslighting behavior also seems to happen with romantic couples more often than in other types of relationships, according to Stern.
Stern also defines gaslighting in another way in a Huffington Post article: “Gaslighting is the systematic attempt by one person to erode another's reality, by telling them that what they are experiencing isn't so and, the gradual giving up on the part of the other person.”
The most prominent expert on gaslighting appears to be Stern and she wrote about gaslighting in yet another media outlet, Psychology Today. In one of her blogs, she notes how to identify if you have been gaslighted. The first sign is that you are constantly second-guessing yourself.
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As someone who identified the bizarre happenings around me several years ago as organized stalking and has since been navigating the internet and all the wise fellow TI's, kooks who think they are, and everyone in between, it's a tough call to figure out. I'm not afraid to call out charletans when it's painfully obvious, why shouldn't I when their attention you-know-whatting affects me? I think those of us in this position should concede the fact some are in need of mental health evaluation as blind defense of pretenders does place YOUR credibility in jeopardy. The Psychiatric industry for its part has many fine qualified people but in general can be as much of problem as it will be a solution. Its very foundation deems that OS accounts descibe mental illness symptoms.
March 24, 2010 - 12:00pmThis Comment
Gaslight is one of my all-time favorite movies.
I think these are the tactics also done on prospective cult members. One friendly, concerned and educated cult member is sent to attach him or herself to a victim and proceeds to make them believe their families, friends and any one not associated with the cult is out to harm them or is truly not a legitimate part of the life the victims needs to live for fulfillment. The victim eventually questions her own reality and is convinced her reality does not exist - or if it does, it's destructive. Often times it's done in a group setting but there is also that one-on-one gaslighting that manipulates the prospective member into joining. Once she joins, she believes that her former reality was just a dream.
March 24, 2010 - 12:48pmI've experienced this effect within the context of being the only woman in a group of men who worked together (some of them unintentionally) to make me think that I'm wrong all the time, over-sensitive in the face of sexual harassment and other kinds of harassment, and bad at my job, so I don't think you should confine the definition of gaslighting as something that's done by just one perpetrator.
December 6, 2011 - 6:59am