Passive Aggressive Father

[TheSchoolofAthens]

Hello everyone! The other night, about two nights ago to be exact, I had a difficult conversation with my parents. I explained my interest in programs outside of college, such as Discover Praxis, and they really didn't want me to go into it. They think it is okay so long as I continue going to college, but I can't stand college, for reasons I wont go into right now, college makes me miserable and I'd rather be learning and building my skills outside of a college.  As the conversation continued, we ended up discussing far more than just whether I should continue my college education. I talked to them about how my bond with them feels very weak, and that I wish we had a stronger bond throughout my life, especially from middle school till now. My mom was upset, seeminly shocked, as well as offended. My dad was more angry than anything. I was honest with them.
 

We talked for hours. My goal was not to fix anything our relationship, but to explain why it was broken. I explained that we have different value systems and morals. My dad works for the city "government" and my mom works for the public school districty as an art teacher. (I had to put quotes around government, it is afterall the great ficition.)  I told them our morals were at odds and my mom and dad thought it was like a cult, that I was just blocking people off and my dad said "when you die you will have no one by your side" or something very similar to that because I "blocked them all off." I told them I would like to see a therapist, I am only 19 going on 20 so I am still dependent on them, and they asked me why I hadn't asked earlier. I replied "How am I supposed to ask for something as big as therapy? When I asked for a new mattress (I had thrown away my 10 year old mattress, and after a year or two I wanted a new one, I was sleeping on foam on the floor. I liked the simplicity but I had grown tired of it.) you didn't want to get me one!" I remember when we went shopping for that bed, yes we bought one but I had to put up a fight. My dad was annoyed that I wanted one and didn't want to spend the money, my mom took me shopping and got me one. I can't remember exactly, but it seemed like I had to do my fair share of asking for it, probably a week went by but I suppose that makes sense as finances were tough.

That was just a part of our conversation and what was said and discussed. My dad tells me he will look for a therapist and then he sends me this email: "Hey Nic- below are a couple emails showing cost and counselor options. Let me know if you have any questions. By the way, government is making this available to you. J Love you"

When I saw that email I was so frustrated, but I think his goal was to frustrate me. Why on earth would he tell me something like "the government is making this possible" if he knows we are completely at odds with so called government. I see it as a shameful passive aggressive attempt to do one of two things, or perhaps both. 1) To feel morally superior. I told them my honest views and that means I told them that I thought there jobs were immoral. 2) To get me to not want to go! This makes sense to me and it's sick. The fact that he knows that I am opposed to the initiation of force, and here he is basically saying that this thing that is important to me is thanks to the initiation of force, therefore I think it is him trying to passively convince me to not go at all!

I can't believe someone would do that in an email. If I had a son, and he ended up being a socialist, communist, fascist loving person then I would do two things. 1) Recognize that I failed as a parent to teach my son how to critically think, and 2) I would email him a list of therapists, of course if he requested therapy, and I would NOT tell him "this is thanks to the free market. I love you." I wouldn't do that because that is a passive aggressive sick thing to do to someone one supposedly loves and cares about!

*sigh* any thoughts?

 

[J. D. Stembal]

What your father is saying is that he is unwilling to offer you the therapy that you have requested. "The government is making this available," is a way to not take ownership of the situation for which he is responsible. What are the chances that government-funded counseling will offer you the assistance you need? If your therapist attempts to hold your parents accountable for their actions, would they complain to his superiors?

 

Perhaps this is projection, but I have the desire to ask your father why he decided to have children. From the way you explain your interactions with them, it sounds as if they oppose your wishes for everything. Is this accurate?

[TheSchoolofAthens]

What your father is saying is that he is unwilling to offer you the therapy that you have requested. "The government is making this available," is a way to not take ownership of the situation for which he is responsible. What are the chances that government-funded counseling will offer you the assistance you need? If your therapist attempts to hold your parents accountable for their actions, would they complain to his superiors?

 

Perhaps this is projection, but I have the desire to ask your father why he decided to have children. From the way you explain your interactions with them, it sounds as if they oppose your wishes for everything. Is this accurate?

Actually, yes that is quite accurate! Spot on. Earlier today - but after I posted this - I went downstairs. My mom and dad were eating in the kitchen. My dad casually asks "did you get my emails?" I told him "yes, I didn't appreciate the passive aggressive part" He knew exactly what I was talking about and he thought it was funny. He looked at my mom and briefly explained it to her and he said it is true. I told him it's not funny, especially when the topic is about therapy, and when he said "well its true" I told him "no, dont try to bring government up because you never want to talk about it." He tried to say it was just a joke until I told him "accept responsibility, it was such an asshole thing to do" and then he said he was sorry. I know his apology was far from genuine.

 

I was taking my food upstairs and he asked "you're not going to eat with us?" I said "No, why would I eat with you? When you say things like you've said It makes me not want to eat with you." And he said "oh so now you're not going to eat with me ever?" And I said "Just because you said sorry doesn't mean anything. You have to promise to change and actually change. If you keep making statements like you did then I never want to spend time with you."

 

As a kid, my parents - especially my dad - would tease me about how I preferred staying up in my room to read or be on the computer. They wanted me to want to spend time with them and their family friends and do things with them. Of course a good family wants to do things together, but this wasn't like that. They didn't really care about what I wanted to do, they just wanted me to go with them because it was what they wanted. That went on for about 4 years, probably from 13 to 17 until they realized I was becoming my own man. And that is just one example.

I think that is how he survives - by controlling others through manipulation, and playing the victim. I don't think he ever learned how to control himself. My god, now I think he had me and my siblings just to feel at bay and as if his life is under control.

 

PS: By the way, I really appreciate your response. It has helped me think through some deeper things such as why he chose to have me. It's not that I never thought about it before, but I think I am far closer to a realistic answer.

[Matt D]

Hey Nic,

 

I'm so sorry to hear about your situation with your parents. No child would choose to be born to a family that disowns responsibility in the way you described. I know the ball-shaking terror that comes with peering objectively into the cesspool of foo corruption. I commend your courage to talk about it over the internet.

 

I'll be blunt, I really don't think talking with your parents about statism is going to be a productive for you as a way of pointing out why your relationship is broken. I say this having fallen into the same trap with my father around religion when I was trying to bring my full honest self to my family. The trap is to intellectualize as a way to avoid your experience in the moment. Did you talk about anything specific to them or to your childhood? Furthermore, did you at anytime tell them how you felt by something they said during the conversation? I can imagine you must have felt really cold and empty, if not angry, when your dad said he thought you'd end up alone. That jibe is not passive aggressive; that's just immature and sadistic.

 

Doesn't matter if your therapy is paid for by the state. They'd just spend it on war or locking people up if not on you. Is it true that if you wanted to be independent you could do it. I know you said you weren't passionate about college, so potentially you could find a job and move out if necessary? Obviously I hope it won't be necessary but since you're of appropriate age it's something to think on.

[TheSchoolofAthens]

Hey Nic,

 

I'm so sorry to hear about your situation with your parents. No child would choose to be born to a family that disowns responsibility in the way you described. I know the ball-shaking terror that comes with peering objectively into the cesspool of foo corruption. I commend your courage to talk about it over the internet.

 

I'll be blunt, I really don't think talking with your parents about statism is going to be a productive for you as a way of pointing out why your relationship is broken. I say this having fallen into the same trap with my father around religion when I was trying to bring my full honest self to my family. The trap is to intellectualize as a way to avoid your experience in the moment. Did you talk about anything specific to them or to your childhood? Furthermore, did you at anytime tell them how you felt by something they said during the conversation? I can imagine you must have felt really cold and empty, if not angry, when your dad said he thought you'd end up alone. That jibe is not passive aggressive; that's just immature and sadistic.

 

Doesn't matter if your therapy is paid for by the state. They'd just spend it on war or locking people up if not on you. Is it true that if you wanted to be independent you could do it. I know you said you weren't passionate about college, so potentially you could find a job and move out if necessary? Obviously I hope it won't be necessary but since you're of appropriate age it's something to think on.

Thank you for the response! Right now my goal is to become financially independent. I am hopefully going to go into a 10 month program called Praxis! Some here may have heard of it as it is very pro free market and entrepreneurship. I think I will be happy with that. You are right. I talked about anarcho capitalism with them, in which they did their very best to try to counter. I talked to them about it because I thought it was a conflict of values that was causing problems, but honestly that is not the real or most problematic aspect.

 

I talked to them about my childhood and all I wanted was to be listened to without being made to look as if I am just blaming them and being hurtful. I told them that I wish I hadn't been in public school, and that I was in a Montessori type school. That is when my dad said "we couldn't afford to put you in a private school, we could hardly pay the electricity bills!" Again that made me annoyed because the man did not give his career his all, he gave up on it and gave up on us. I wanted him to say "we couldn't put you in private school because I made mistake after mistake, wrong decision after wrong decision and I avoided responsibility and growth." Obviously not word for word but I wanted him to take responsibility for my poor education that I was unhappy with!

 

When I told them that I was very sad in public school, they told me "we didn't know! We would ask you how your day was and you would say it was fine or okay, if I [my mom] asked questions you wouldn't want to tell me anything!" I told them that I was a kid, a teenager who didn't know how to communicate my problems, and that in retrospect there were so many signs! I had really bad posture, in a way that signified sadness, on top of that I would often sit with my hoodie on because I didn't want to be seen or see others too much in my house. I was sad. They knew this! My dad would even tease me about how mopy I was, my mom was not as bad but she made comments every now and then as well.

 

I wrote a poem about it a few days ago:

 

"Laying, crying,

To the light I was turned.

Just one days worth of knowledge,

For that I yearned.

"What is it today you learned?"

The silence spoke,

Claim no ignorance.

The nature inside of me,

Was replaced with gears and cogs,

Rusted and torn,

Desperately trying to move forward,

If even only an inch.

But why so desperate for happiness if I was in school and for knowledge I yearned?

"What today is it you learned?"

Claim no ignorance,

The silence spoke."

 

That poem really expresses my feelings best. How dare they claim that they had no idea - my mom said she had no idea until I started failing in in junior year of high school, which she got a therapist. She told me how she cried many nights and couldn't sleep at all because she was worried about me. I don't doubt that she did. I know she did. But she refused to see this bubble that was getting bigger and bigger, and she only acted once it popped. Again, I just wanted to hear "We are sorry, we should have put you in a better school, you deserved it."

 

But my mom told me that "it was just the teenager phase." She said "all the books said to just give space and leave you alone unless you wanted to talk." I began crying at one point and she tried to come to me and hug me and I told her I didn't want to hug right now and she said "See, see I am trying to come to you but you are pushing me away! I wanted them to take responsibility but they wouldn't. They told me the bullshit about teenager phases and how most teenagers go through those phases - that is true but it does not make it right by any means! I told them that it is a fallacy that just because it happens to a lot of people doesn't mean it has to happen or should happen.

 

My dad told me that I was responsible, as a kid, to tell them that I was unhappy in school. I couldn't believe it. As if my body language and other non verbal cues weren't enough, I remember saying - countless times - that I hated doing my homework and that school was incredibly boring. Hell I blatantly said I didn't like school, as if any kid goes through public school without talking about how bad it is! It just sickens me because he

wouldn't accept the responsibility that he had to really talk to me about my life and really care about what I want and how I feel, he should have started that bond the day I was born but it wasn't there.

 

It would be one thing if he accepted responsibility and if he actually given his career his all - whether that meant going back to school, or learning a new trade or skill like programming, or working for a bigger business (he just wanted to be a self employed graphic designer), but he did none of those things. He avoids responsibility for his actions, himself, and how it hurt me and continues to hurt me.

 

[MMX2010]

What does your father look like, physically?  Is he muscular or the opposite?  Can he grow a beard, and what does it look like?  And do you think he could win a fight against the average man? 

[Carl Green]

When I saw that email I was so frustrated, but I think his goal was to frustrate me. Why on earth would he tell me something like "the government is making this possible" if he knows we are completely at odds with so called government.

 

 

A part of the reason could be that even though he knows you two are at odds, he doesn't fully understand what you're telling him about government. He doesn't see the funding for that therapy as being acquired through theft, or if he does he just somehow doesn't see it as theft and justifies it with bullshit like the rest of 'em.

 

Also, your poem is a wonderful piece of art.

[MMX2010]

For the two of you who downvoted my question, it's important both because I study body language and because I'm a fan of VoxDay's socio-sexual classification system.  And I can't determine whether the OP's father is using Gamma/Omega destructive snark, or Alpha/Sigma dismissive/challenging snark. 

[Tony Crowe]

TheSchoolofAthens, I know I'm late to the thread but I wanted to express my gratitude for what you have shared. What an amazing(and painful) struggle you are in to define what you are looking to get out of life versus what was handed you.

 

Thank you,

-TC