Rejecting is a push-pull Narcissistic Abuse tactic commonly used to upset already in love or brainwashed people suffering from Stockholm Syndrome.
People who have narcissistic temperaments tend to display rejecting behaviors towards their children or love interests most commonly.
When a child is rejected, they are oftentimes abandoned or erased from the family heritage — denied the warmth and comfort the security of being raised by or related to a loving family normally provides. They might also be intermittently rejected with a parent or caregiver electing to socially and emotionally ridicule them for not measuring up to family standards, their net worth as human beings fundamentally invalidated and denied.
An abusive love interest might alternate between love-bombing or hoovering an abuse target, telling them things like no one could possibly ever love them the way the abuser does then stonewalling, disappearing, or withdrawing affection to create a fear-based, hyperstimulated panic reaction in the body of the person who has been targeted.
By devaluing a child or mate and withdrawing or withholding social support and affection from a target, the abuser can sit back in delight in watching their intended victim emotionally and psychologically being subjected to torture.
Other common ways an abusive person lets a target or scapegoat know that they are “worthless” or unimportant to the Cluster B person is by engaging in one or more of the following acts that specifically communicate the Abuser is adept at the art of rejecting as a mind-control tactic used to brainwash victims into believing they are lucky the abusive person or toxic peer group associates with them at all in private, socially, personally, or professionally:
- harsh criticism,
- belittling,
- labeling,
- name-calling,
- yelling (to intimidate rather than raising their voice in a heated debate due to frustration or while expressing a desire to be heard), screaming or swearing at children or a mate, public humiliation of a target, or demeaning jokes made both to or about a target in public or in private, teasing about mental capabilities or physical appearance, refusing love (in the form of kind words, positive attention, and touch),
- physical or emotional abandonment,
- shunning a child or love interest who is bound to an Abuser’s family by blood as the parent of the Abuser’s child or grandchild from the Abuser’s family support network altogether,
- kicking teens or people with disabilities that limit their earning potential out of the family home,
- locking kids out of the home to discipline or punish,
- reporting a teen or older child to the police for unruly behavior when and if they seek professional help or therapy for abuse,
- telling friends and family members that a child or romantic partner is mentally unstable in order to undermine their social credibility reporting abuse then bragging to the victim openly they will never be believed by anyone if and when they decide to come forward about abuse,
- and/or simply walking away from a family, spouse, love interest, or child without giving the abandoned person the benefit of an explanation or closure opportunity with regard to whether or not they want to effectively end the relationship.
All Narcissistic Abuse tactics that employ a rejection or rejecting strategy tend to elicit an extreme Stockholm Syndrome response from the preferred scapegoat target, noting that individuals who are the kindest and most loving personality types are the most inclined to fall under the spell of social predators who employ this sort of push-pull measure.
Abusive personality types tend to use it as the darker half of their “intermittent reinforcement” technique designed to keep an abuse victim walking on eggshells while striving to avoid displeasing a cantankerous and emotionally flighty aggressor.
By constantly putting the metaphoric brass ring of pleasing them slightly out of reach of an abuse victim who is constantly striving to maintain and foster a healthy relationship with them, the Cluster B personality type is able to continuously taunt their preferred targets and scapegoats with claims they could have been pleased if only their targeted victim was better.
