What is "abuse"?

I suppose one might ask "what exactly is abuse"?

Well, abuse comes in a variety of forms. There's physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, manipulation, lies, betrayal and a lot more. There are subtle and gross forms of abuse. The main feature of abuse, though, is objectification of someone else.

When a person has been objectified - that is, one's own demands are placed above the needs and/or requests of the other - one has abused that person in some way.

The moment we demand a person does something they're not ready or prepared to do, or just don't want to do, we're abusing that person. Whether we're demanding money from them; sex, attention, or even just help from another, if we're demanding it, we're abusing that person.

If we deliberately mislead someone we're abusing them. If we're manipulating them into doing something we're abusing them. If we force or coerce or hit or scream at or pester or keep phoning someone, or turning up at their home uninvited, we're abusing them.

If we cheat on someone we're abusing them. If we betray someone we're abusing them. If we borrow money and fail to pay it back we've abused them. Whenever we see someone as a source of our needs but don't respect their needs, privacy, space, time or life we're abusing them.

To sum it up perhaps more succinctly, the abuser believes they have some right to another person's life in some way, and when they want it. Pretty much what slavery was all about.

My phone has rung three times and I don't want to answer it because the person calling has been abusive several times. Why on earth should I open myself up to more of the same thing? I don't trust this person any more. One reaches the point when enough is enough when you've encountered demand after demand, and been as supportive as one's seen fit.

One of the most pertinent things I learned from therapy was that when one is expected to be responsible and at the same time be powerless, one is most ripe for going completely bonkers.

Responsibility without authority is always a dead end.

But the abuser looks at things differently. The abuser demands authority, yet fails to act responsibly. The abuser demands power, but only over another person. The abuser always feels weak and helpless inside. It's their terror that demands the absolute submission of others. Abusers are always terrified.

That's what makes them so terrifying.

DH Lawrence said it well:

We are Transmitters

As we live, we are transmitters of life.
And when we fail to transmit life, life fails to flow through us.

That is part of the mystery of sex, it is a flow onwards.
Sexless people transmit nothing.

And if, as we work, we can transmit life into our work,
life, still more life, rushes into us to compensate, to be ready
and we ripple with life through the days.

Even if it is a woman making an apple dumpling, or a man a stool,
if life goes into the pudding, good is the pudding
good is the stool,
content is the woman, with fresh life rippling in to her,
content is the man.

Give, and it shall be given unto you
is still the truth about life.
But giving life is not so easy.
It doesn't mean handing it out to some mean fool, or letting the living dead eat you up.
It means kindling the life-quality where it was not,
even if it's only in the whiteness of a washed pocket-handkerchief.

Abusers are the living dead. They're the ones who'll eat you up. They're the ones who'll steal your life energy if you're not careful.