Psychological Abuse: A Letter from a Friend

From Jim: This is fifth in a series of seventeen blog posts on workplace bullying and related topics running Monday, July 2, 2012 to Sunday, August 12, 2012.  
Folllowing is an email sent to someone who was targeted in a workplace bullying situation, by someone who understands it.  Reprinted with permission.  

Hi,

You may already know all this but I've sent it in any case.  You are experiencing psychological bullying.  Bullies feel completely justified in their bullying and escalate when confronted with it.  Their need to feel powerful and right clouds their ability to have empathy or understand the impact of their destructive behaviour.  They are deceived; they don’t get it, and feel discounted and wounded, if not enraged when their dysfunctional agenda is not taken seriously. 

Bullies can be even more powerful when targeting and/or supported by an extremely ethical Christian.  We are devastated to even acknowledge that someone we love, one of our brethren, is a bully.  We just don’t want it to be true.  We want to be in right relationship.  Our grief includes grief for the bully.  He is a child of God who lacks insight and we want to frame it any other way than bullying.  I know how much you want to salvage the relationship despite what is happening.  I'm praying for that too but mostly for your protection.

Psychological abuse is a pattern of negative behaviour performed by a person who is in a position of power (or believes he is in a position of power, has the need to demonstrate his sense of authority or need for power, or is jealous of a sense that someone is more powerful than themselves).  These negative actions include numerous components of psychological verbal and significant non-verbal communications.  The actions become tailored to cause the most damage to the target.  If each action is taken separately and out of context, it can probably be justified as legitimate workplace actions, minor, or simply non-consequential so the impact on the target seems confusing or unwarranted while each negative action targeted at the individual contributes to a meaningful assault.  When actions are targeted at an individual continually, the effect can be overwhelming as there is no time between bouts to recover and rationalize the behaviour.

The person chosen for psychological bullying is chosen for a reason.  Reasons may include having higher qualifications than the rest of the group, or having innovative ideas (which I trust in your case are for the most part Holy Spirit inspired ideas or plain old godly intelligence and wisdom over practical matters).  The individual is targeted for special treatment such as scrutiny (held to an impossibly high standard), exclusion (while the bully manipulates others into triangling against the target) and debasement (criticism, gossip).  When the target is isolated from co-workers, it leaves the individual vulnerable to further negative actions.

The negative impact on the individual is not easy to describe.  Before a meaningful pattern emerges, both for the target, and the onlookers, even the investigators, the actions can appear legitimate.  An outsider may not even detect the actions as negative, because the actions are often so subtle or deceptive in intention that they escape recognition.  The actions can be framed as even attempting to act in the best interest of the target.  The individual may even take a while to recognize the pattern of negative actions.

The actions have a purpose and a target.  They are directed at an individual with the intention of putting doubt into the individual's mind about the validity and value of their attitudes and potential and worth in the future of the organization (strength as a leader).  Frequently the target relies on the perpetrator for some reason such as access to necessary information or control of their work [or their job]. Their power may come from their control of some aspect of the work environment.  The perpetrator's position of power can attract supporters. 

Give your minds breaks in this crisis.  It is crazy making behaviour and can consume you.  Distract yourselves so you are not ruminating.



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