Being brave about therapist exploitation

I'd like to echo this, because the stupidity of the notion that no opinion can be invalidating of someone's experience is stunning. Of course, opinions can be invalidating! My goodness!

What about an opinion that a person (they could be a woman or a man) is responsible for someone assaulting/raping them, because they were dressed provocatively or behaved provocatively? As disgusting as this opinion is, it is an opinion nevertheless and, under our western principle of free speech, not only it has the right to exist but also to be expressed and presented at public discourse. But, are you going to tell me that this opinion doesn't invalidate the experiences of rape victims and doesn't re-traumatize them? Isn't it obvious that it does?

Why should it be different for anyone who has experienced violations in other ways? If a person tells you that they were abused by a therapist, isn't it obvious that a "different opinion" would invalidate their experience and re-traumatize them?

The only reason it's unthinkable for most people these days to tell a rape victim that they were responsible for the rape is because the public at large has already been educated on this issue. It's been in the public discourse for some time now because many victims have told their stories publicly and the public, at large, has shifted its attitude more towards compassionate understanding and away from judgment. But this has not always been the case. For centuries people were afraid to tell anyone about their experiences for the fear not only of judgment, but, at some point in history, of losing their lives. In recent history, people stayed silent mostly because they didn't believe anyone would validate and support them because the "different opinion" was prevailing until it changed.

I feel like when it comes to client abuse in therapy the public consciousness is "not there" yet to see this phenomena clearly for what it is. That's why victims are afraid to speak out publicly the same way people were afraid to tell their stories of rape and physical abuse before..because a "different opinion" was everywhere.

I can't wait to hear how offensive my analogy of rape victims was for real rape victims. Go ahead, tell me how insulting that was.

Lastly, I want to go back to the point of basic empathy.

By all means, have any opinion on this subject you want, but don't express it to victims or those who consider themselves victims of therapy abuse just out of basic compassion and empathy and basic respect for their need to process their pain. Just steer clear of their threads. And don't tell them to get their own group. Setting up a separate group here is a pain in the ***. You can set it up but it takes a long time before the system begins to post all threads separately, which makes it impossible to have meaningful discussions for a long time.

Just because you have the right to express your opinion doesn't mean you should do it. There are situations when it's a good idea to use some basic emotional intelligence a.k.a wisdom and to keep it to yourself. This is what I do when I see threads of those who dream of having an affair with their therapists and who want to see themselves as their therapists "equals". I have enough compassion and respect for their pain to avoid their threads and not to stick my "different opinion" into their faces. I don't understand why they can't show the same compassion and respect for me and others who see themselves as victims/survivors. Just because you get triggered by the topic, doesn't mean you have to come to these threads and "stick it" to us. I get triggered by your love sickness for your therapists and your whining about how much it pains you that you can't be friends/lovers/partners with your therapists. I find it pathetic and ridiculous, but I don't go to your threads to "stick it" to you because I have some basic compassion and respect for your pain not to do that. And the only reason I am doing it now is because you have not shown the same compassion and respect for me and other victims and you have come to the thread started by a survivor, so I don't feel any moral obligation to show respect for your feelings on this thread.

I haven't had time to read all the responses, but all day I have been wanting to say that I hit send on a post this morning that in retrospect I should have held. Can we agree to work each other through differences in understanding gently?

Clearly I’ve wasted my typing strokes here discussing respect for other people’s pain. Funny, the main reason I turned from therapy is the utter selfishness and self-absorption I felt it fostered.

This particular topic seems to bring out this same exchange over and over on this forum. I don’t recall seeing threads on other forums that go this way.

[OP indicates that s/he was traumatized by serving in combat]
“Some people grow more resilient by serving in combat though.”

[OP indicates that s/he is an African American traumatized by encounters with police]
“Some African Americans have really great experiences with police though.”

[OP indicates that s/he was traumatized by CSA]
“Some people feel it was beneficial for them instead of traumatic though.”

Honestly, it doesn’t seem difficult to me to divine that OP wanted support and understanding from people who have experienced or know about similar, not dissenting experiences or opinions.

People can and do on this board start threads and then ask others to refrain from certain kinds of commentary. Perfectly legit. But that hasn't happened here.

I don't know why I even have to say this.

I haven't had time to read all the responses, but all day I have been wanting to say that I hit send on a post this morning that in retrospect I should have held. Can we agree to work each other through differences in understanding gently?

As I stated in my previous post, some opinions are just too offensive and hurtful even to put myself in a position of debating it. I may be able to do it in a different environment that operates under different rules and when I am in a different state of mind. But when people get so triggered by the topic, regardless of their views, I think, it's much wiser just to give each other space to process our experiences with the like-minded people instead of forcing ourselves to "understand" the other point of view. I am not saying that debates should not take place. I am saying that people should not be forced to have them and shamed for not wanting to have them. Anyone who wants to debate this topic can open a new thread and make it clear that the thread is for a debate, not for support and validation. I will not participate in it, but anyone who wants to do that can.

Actually, differing opinions can be invalidating, or at least replicate the negation that survivors received from perpetrators and those who treat them in aftermath. Many times on PC therapist votaries have said exact things my bully therapist said to dismiss my assertions and pain.

When someone opens a thread to explore pain and struggle, I think the she should receive the respect and space to do that. She didn't begin a debate about whether an erotic relationship belongs in therapy. If someone else is triggered by the topic, perhaps she should leave the thread instead of being taunting, antagonistic or provocative.

Perhaps those who lust for their therapists and claim readiness affairs should start their own threads rather than taunt or "debate" someone in pain.

Clearly I’ve wasted my typing strokes here discussing respect for other people’s pain. Funny, the main reason I turned from therapy is the utter selfishness and self-absorption I felt it fostered.

Refusing to engage further with a viewpoint i find harmful or invalidating is not emotional manipulation on its face, it is not intended to change a mind or force someone to not talk, no one here has enough emotional investment in conversation with me to be even BE emotionally manipulated by my sharing my thoughts and excusing myself from further debate. it is announcement that I don’t plan to debate the subject extensively out of SELF PROTECTION ie I have PTSD from both sexual abuse and an exploitative sexual relationship and it is triggering to me and I feel panicked and cornered when I read it.

I thought the purpose of this forum is for support and validation. I'd thought that's the default here.

A debate thread then would be clearly marked the the debaters who relish contention are free to slug it out. They can bring their sources and citations.

Yes, the purpose of the forum is support and validation, but, frankly, I don't expect any public forum to achieve this objective precisely because support and validation often limits the freedom of speech. This is neither "good" or "bad". This is just an objective reality, so it is what it is. If you have a forum and want people to feel more or less free to express themselves, then this would inevitably limit support and validation, because even among survivors there are disagreements on the subject of therapy, therapy relationship, transference and many other therapy related topics. Let's face it, all of us, who agree on the fact that boundary violations is 100% a therapist's fault and abuse of a therapist's power, also disagree on some other therapy related topics and when that happens we don't feel completely supported and validated even by fellow survivors. Yet, each one of us also wants to preserve the right to express our opinion.

All that creates the need to maintain some kind of balance on the forum between a relative degree of freedom to express oneself and a relative requirement to be supportive. This balance is not easy to maintain. One way to do that, I believe, is to accept the fact that some topics are emotionally charged and are not wise to debate when people feel triggered. So, those who take these topics personally can avoid the threads of those who hold a different opinion, and those who don't feel triggered and who want to have a more detached intellectual panel discussion or debate can open their own threads to do that.

I certainly would never suggest that debates on any topic should be a taboo because it traumatizes the victims. If we were to adopt this rule, there would be no progress in the world. Before any new idea is embraced by the society, it always gets debated first. There is no other way. You can't simply force your position on others because it's very personal to you and because it reflects your own truth. It took many years of debating to finally legalize the gay marriage or to legalize marijuana in some states. Debates are necessary to push certain ideas into public consciousness.

What I am saying though is that people who feel too vulnerable and too traumatized to have those debates should not be forced to have them. They have the right to have their own safe spaces on every forum to be able to process their trauma the way they want to process it. That doesn't mean they should have their own isolated groups only. They have the right to post threads on general forum to inform others about the issues they discuss. But we, probably, should make it clear which threads we post are not for a debate unless we want to keep exposing ourselves to abuse over and over again. Yes, we do have the right to demand respect and compassion for our pain on our own threads, but we can't demand to turn the entire forum into a safe and comfortable space for ourselves because we are not the only ones who use it. Other people have different needs. If they have the need to debate whatever topic they want to debate, they also have the right to have their space to do so.

I see. It's the responsibility OP to divine how a thread can be triggering, go sour or south. So it's the original poster's fault if she's taunted or disrespected.

Thanks so much for "the rules."

Thanks - I do have to say I felt that I was being "trolled" - that every post about the topic was being turned in this direction which of course was not the direction I had hoped to go. However, I did used a potentially loaded word - lured. I reacted also in protection of others who might feel that the rug had been pulled out from underneath them.

You know how hard it was for me to start that thread. I'm not sorry I did. I learned that I am firm in my view of what happened to me, and protective of others who have had similar experiences. I got some good responses - and I got mad. mad is an emotion that has eluded me. It doesn't necessarily mean anything about whether or not the person had the right.

I just keep trying to help others as part of my healing.