DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m seeking some advise regarding a good friend of mine who I’m worried about. Some background detail: I’m a woman in my mid 20’s, married. My friend, “Tom”, is a man in his mid 20’s who has serious issues with women.

Tom and I grew up together. Now, Tom has never been the best at empathy. I remember when we were kids, he bullied other kids sometimes (never me). As a teen, Tom began to tease people and make sexist or politically charged jokes–and then struggle to understand when feelings got hurt (he still does this–he says he likes to “stir the pot”). Tom’s not a bad guy–he is genuine, honest, and trustworthy. But his weakness with empathy seems to stem from a lack of emotional intelligence.

Tom has wanted a wife for years. See, Tom and I come from a culture where it’s expected that you date to marry, abstain from sex until marriage, and marry young. Contrary to mainstream culture in the USA, in our culture, it is very common for people to date for 1-6 months and then rush to the altar. Tom is very immersed in this cultural narrative–he is desperate to find a woman to be his future wife, date her briefly, and marry her.

Tom has been in a frenzy of dating, desperate to find his future wife. Being able to find a wife is a big part of masculinity in our culture. Tom, who is fairly rigid in holding himself to masculine ideals, is definitely affected by this. However, as you know, desperation SHOWS, even when people try to hide it.

Tom goes on a date or two with a woman, becomes instantly and deeply emotionally invested in her, texts her constantly, feels that he may have finally found the One, the great and future Wife…. and then is really, really hurt when she either ghosts him, or tells him she sees him as a friend. I’ve tried to tell him he’s scaring them off, his male friends have tried to tell him the same… to no avail. And Tom has started to hate women.

Tom 100% blames the women who ghost him or don’t want to continue dating him. He believes they led him on; or they were too immature; or they were vicious jerks. Remember when I said Tom was bad at empathy? Yeah. He seems completely incapable of empathizing with the women he dates when they reject him. And this lack of empathy is spreading to Women In General. He makes comments about women being emotionally manipulative, and just out to hurt men. He sneers at the Me Too movement and insinuates that those women actually wanted the sex, and then lied about it to tear the men down. The sexist jokes he made as a teenager, just to get under people’s skin? As an adult, he seems to actually believe them. When I or his male friends call him out on it, he backtracks and says he was just joking. (Ironically, he does not include ME in this assessment of women, since I have “Just One Of The Guys” status).

Since Tom has been so unsuccessful in finding The Wife among women of our culture in the States (he does not date outside the culture), he has begun an online relationship with a woman from another country. This woman shares our cultural background, but she doesn’t speak English well. Tom, being raised in the States, doesn’t speak her language well. They make it work, but communication over text PLUS a language barrier? Poor woman doesn’t have a clue what she’s getting into. Tom’s planning on flying her to the States to live with his parents and marry him (his parents are OK with this, since their background is from her country).

I, my husband, and Tom’s other friends, see a disaster in the making. I think this woman is going to run home screaming when she meets Tom in person and feels The Cringe. I think Tom is going to blame her for it, and view her as another Manipulative Woman leading him on. Only this will be worse, because Tom’s more invested this time. And, honestly? I’m not sure where Tom got the ideas he has about women in the first place. Although our culture is in some ways very conservative, women are viewed highly as spiritual leaders and sexism is discouraged by male and female cultural leaders alike. So… I don’t know. Got any insights?

Sincerely,

Worried Friend

DEAR WORRIED FRIEND: I’m not gonna mince words here WF: I’m not entirely sure that your friend is as good of a guy as you say he is. The fact that he’s consistently been a bully and s

tty edgelord — even if it wasn’t to you — doesn’t exactly incline me to think of him in the most positive light. It’s certainly possible, even likely, that his emotional intelligence isn’t the greatest… but I find it hard to believe he actually doesn’t understand the concept that being an asshole to people is hurtful. And even if it was just him being a s

tty edgelord who says things to get a rise out of people… well, it’s like Vonnegut said in Mother Night: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.” Doing things ironically or because you’re trolling doesn’t make them any less s

tty. Ironic racism and sexism is still racism and sexism. You can roll your eyes while you f

k a goat, but you’re still balls-deep in an ungulate.

Now I don’t think it’s much of a mystery where Tom’s gotten some of these ideas. I can all but guarantee you that if you were to look at his Internet history, you’d be seeing a whole lot of Red Pill, alt-right and alt-lite websites and YouTube channels. It may have started off as “I only like these for the memes”, but as we’ve seen: outrage powers the Internet and the algorithms that power Facebook, YouTube, and other social media sites love to show you how deep the radicalizing rabbit hole goes. Even if these beliefs are looked down on in your culture, the confirmation bias and feeling that “oh THESE people understand” spoke to his inner desire to believe that everyone is as edgy and bitter as he is.

So look, the fact that Tom’s been doing this consistently for what seems to be his whole life  makes his descent into being a hateful s

tbird more or less inevitable. Doubly so because there haven’t been any meaningful consequences for him yet. Especially consequences for his actions that he can see as being the results of his behavior.

I mean, let’s look at the way he’s driving women off. He doesn’t make the connection between his s

tty attitude and the fact that, frankly, women don’t want to have anything to do with him. But I don’t think the problem is a lack of empathy so much as an unwillingness to look at anything other than his own interests. It has less to do with being willing to empathize with others and more than he’s stewing in a vat of his own entitlement and s

tty attitude. Since women are ghosting him — and honestly I can’t blame them — he isn’t getting the news that hey, act like a jerk, get dumped with a quickness. Instead, he gets to make up his own self-serving reasons. Reasons which, let’s be real, just serve to justify is own continuing s

ttiness.

I think you’re right: I think his current attempt at a relationship is going to end badly. And just between you, me and everyone reading this: I’d put some serious thought into warning this poor woman about what she’s about to get into. It may suck for Tom to get ghosted AGAIN, but this way it won’t come at the cost of an international flight and the pressure of going through with a relationship that’s just every different kind of bad news.

The only thing that’s really going to help him is a moment of stunning self-awareness. Possibly aided by the firm application of The Chair Leg of Truth upside his head. And as much as I hate to say this: if you want to see him change, then you’re probably going to have to be the one to wield it. Calling him out on his bulls

t is only the start; you have to keep at it and refuse to let him off the hook. When he starts to make his “well I was just joking” excuses, then you have to lean into it. Ask him to explain it. “OK so what’s the joke? What’s the punchline. How was this funny?”  The same goes for when he goes off about how #MeToo ruined things (it didn’t): how, exactly, did these women tear someone down? Who’s actually faced real consequences from it? How many people have lost their jobs or become destitute because of it?

More importantly though, is that you need to make it clear to him that you find his behavior and his attitude unacceptable. Explain to him, in no uncertain terms, that it’s his behavior that’s driving women away. He’s not like this because he’s lonely, he’s lonely because he’s like this. To quote a very wise woman:

“You’re going to go through life thinking that girls don’t like you because you’re a nerd. And I want you to know, from the bottom of my heart, that that won’t be true. It’ll be because you’re an a

hole.”

Calling him out, telling him that you’re not willing to put up with it or have him express such things in your presence is important — both for your own emotional health and to make him recognize that he doesn’t get a free pass just because “he’s only joking”. And if he keeps up with it? Then I think you’d be better off being one more in a string of people who’ve left him in the dirt.

But, straight talk: fixing him IS NOT YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. It’s not on you to make him a better person, especially when he’s devoted this much of his life to being an asshole. It’s admirable that you care and want to try to fix things but that requires him wanting to be fixed and being willing to put in the work himself. And honestly, not only does he not want to be fixed, he doesn’t think there’s a problem in the first place. And as much as you’ve been exempt from his bulls

t, it’s really only a matter of time before he decides you’re as bad as the rest of those evil wimminzes.

Will any of this change his mind? No, probably not. Folks who feel this way tend to have an extensive series of emotional defense mechanisms that keep them from ever admitting the truth. But it will, at the very least, put him in the uncomfortable position of having to recognize how very shallow his beliefs are and how little people are willing to put up with it.

Maybe the knowledge that being a s

t has cost him relationships, including a friend who’s been with him since childhood, might — might — make him think twice.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I’m a 28 year old straight female who just got out of a 10 year emotional and physically abusive relationship and I realize that a lot of relationship advice hindered my ability to leave.

I woke up to the fact that what I was experiencing wasn’t “normal” and was able to extricate myself from a very harmful situation, but now in the post mortem, I’m questioning what had happened and how I stayed in something that was so obviously bad for me for so long. 

A part of it is simply not knowing what was normal. You don’t see couples fighting or making up so its hard to know what kinds of things happen on the inside. I always felt like it was normal to be yelled at and called names when my husband got his feelings hurt or was feeling stressed out, and I just felt like it was my own self control that made it so I didn’t do those things back to him. I’m actually thankful for the physical abuse in some twisted way because I KNEW that wasn’t normal and after massive bruises, I had the courage to leave. 

I also have a problem because in our cultural narrative of an abuser, they are someone who is cunning and planning. They know what they are doing and are going for a specific reaction, while my husband’s abuse seemed more about his emotions getting out of control and him reacting in a s

tty way. This convinced me that he wasn’t an abuser for a long time. 

But another part of it was reading about relationship advice. It seemed like most of what I was reading was telling people to not be so picky, that nobody is perfect, there is no “one”, that all couples fight, and it felt like maybe the types of things happening in my relationship were just the normal trials of coupledom. Wanting more felt like I was asking for too much. Yes “All couples fight” but do all couples resort to insults, put downs and swearing? 

I guess long story short, I’m starting to venture out into the dating world and I’m wondering how I can reconcile “these are normal couple fights and problems” with getting in over my head with someone who is an abuser and would take advantage of me? There were dozens of red flags and moments where alarm bells should have (and did) go off in my mind telling me to leave, but I always gave the benefit of the doubt, much to my detriment. 

Thanks for your time

Confused about ‘Normal’

DEAR CONFUSED ABOUT ‘NORMAL’: Holy s

t, CaN. I’m proud of you for getting the hell out of that situation. Don’t punish yourself for not knowing that you were in an abusive relationship sooner than you did. You got out  and you’ve been healing. That’s the important part. The fact that you want to make sure it doesn’t happen to you again? Also incredibly important. I’ll say it again: I’m proud of you for getting out of there.

Now, let’s talk a little about how to recognize an abusive relationship.

Yeah, people in relationships fight to one degree or another. It’s pretty much an inevitability in any relationship – platonic or otherwise – that doesn’t involve clones or stuffed animals. You have two (or more) people, which means you’ve got two (or more) opinions. Sometimes those opinions are going to conflict. Sometimes the conflict can be loud and unpleasant. For some couples, their dynamic is a more or less continual chain of explosions – big blow-ups followed by big make-ups. For others, it’s intense discussions. But there’s arguing about, say, who gets to decide what to watch on Netflix and emotional abuse.

I’ve written before about toxic and abusive relationships before, but one of the keys is simply: how do you feel about your partner? Do you feel like you can never do anything right and that they’re always blaming you for things that go wrong? Are they always undermining you, cutting you down, reminding you of how useless you are or how you should be grateful that you’re with them? Do you feel like you have to apologize for them to others because they “don’t understand”? Do they make you constantly question your own judgement and worry that you’re overreacting or making too much out of an issue? Are you afraid of them? These are all signs of abuse. You know this. Your own Spidey-sense was telling you this was a bad scene. But let’s be honest here: it’s understandable that you brushed off your own alarm bells. Women are socialized constantly to question their own judgement, to believe their instincts are wrong and to give people the benefit of the doubt.

Now let’s talk a little about your husband’s behavior and the behavior of abusers. A lot of people, men and women both, will blame their abusive partner’s behavior on their temper and say that it wasn’t directed, just them flipping out. The first thing I’d want to know – and if you want, you can write back in or tell me in the comments – is when he flipped out, did he ever break, damage or threaten his own possessions? Because I’m willing to bet a fair amount of money that no, he did not.1  A lot of abusers will use the appearance of a temper to help obscure the true meaning behind their behavior. It’s not that he’s abusing you, it’s just that he’s got a hair-trigger and you should’ve known better, etc.

Part of what makes this work in their favor is that most of us don’t want to admit that we may be in an abusive relationship. We all want to think that we’d never let that happen to us, that we could recognize it and get the f

k out as soon as we saw the first hints that things may not be kosher. This mentality – which is pretty damn universal – is part of what leads to people saying “he doesn’t mean to hurt me,” in all seriousness. We are very, very good at convincing ourselves to continue believing what we already want to believe… and nobody wants to believe that they’re in love with a monster. We tell ourselves that “this is just what relationships are like”, and that it’s not that unusual or that bad. You get used to it, you learn how to avoid it, life’s OK as long as you’re very, very careful.

Abusers know this. And they will deliberately use this against their victims. The more they can keep things murky enough, the more we will try to assume the best possible motivation behind it. It can be very hard to break out of that mindset and realize that you’re being abused.

However, let us, for the sake of argument assume that it’s true – that he wasn’t deliberately targeting you. That he really was some sort of rage-monster, thrashing about randomly whenever he Hulk’s out. This is still abuse. If he’s in such a state that he can go from zero to s

t-flinging gorilla and just smash anything within arm’s reach, then he is not safe to be around other people.  The fact that he would continue to assume that no, it’s ok as long as other people don’t piss him off – thus putting the burden on you to monitor him instead of getting help to fix himself is still abuse. “I lose control” is not an excuse for hurting people, physically or emotionally.

But let’s be real here: Bruce Banner types like this are so goddamn rare as to be rage-unicorns. Abusers may not be mustache-twirling cartoon villains or supremely calculating Hannibal Lecter types but they don’t just “accidentally” abuse people. They may not have a complete road-map about what they’re doing and why, but they know damn good and well that they’re behaving in a way that pushes their victims to do what the abuser wants. The “I just get so angry I can’t help myself” dance – usually with an encore performance of “Oh god I’m so sorry, I’m scum, I’m awful, you should get away from me” self-flagellating immediately after is a very, very common display. It’s especially insidious because even the breast-beating, cloth-rending apology puts the onus on you; it’s designed to make you comfort them for their bad behavior. They get you coming and going and keep you off balance.

And then they’re on their best behavior, convincing you that maybe this time they’re sincere. For a while. And then it all happens again.

Is this because they’ve got everything planned out to a fare-thee-well? Not always. But they know that it works and they will use it again and again and again.

In case it isn’t clear, I want to make this very, unbelievably obvious and I want you to write this down somewhere prominent so you can see it every goddamn day: it’s not your fault. Your husband was an abusive s

tbag. You didn’t make him abuse you. You aren’t at fault because you didn’t see things or listen to your instincts. You aren’t to blame because you didn’t recognize it earlier or because you didn’t leave before you did. It. Is. Not Your. Fault.  Nothing excuses abuse. “Nobody’s perfect” doesn’t mean you should put up with someone mistreating you. Not wanting a partner who puts you down, intimidates you or hurts you isn’t “being too picky”, it’s the very definition of “comes standard with all models”.  All couples may fight but insults, threats and emotional manipulation are all signs that s

t is wrong and it’s time to go.

You have your instincts, CaN and they’re clearly good ones. You just have to trust yourself and let yourself listen to them.

Good luck. And write back to let us know how you’re doing.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com

DEAR DR. NERDLOVE: I need some advice. My boyfriend and i have been dating for nearly 2 years, and I’m absolutely 100% in love with him, and he is with me. He’s truly an amazing man. The only problem is that he thinks he is polyamorous and I know that I am not.

We tried adding another couple into our sex lives before, and it did make me a little bit uncomfortable, but not much. I’ve been hurt by previous partners, and I have high anxiety and jealousy levels. He and I went through a situation with another woman. Nothing physical could’ve happened because she’s across the country, but I was still very hurt by him falling in love with someone else. We’ve been trying to move on from this situation, and things have been going well. Now he’s saying he wants to just forget about being polyamorous. I keep saying that I’m willing to keep and open mind, and keep trying with him. Maybe we moved too quickly with the couple we invited over, or maybe our relationship was still too new. But he just wants to forget about it.

My fear is that eventually he will come to resent me for not supporting who he is. How can I make this situation benefit the both of us? I know that being poly is a part of who you are and it’s not something you can just forget about. I don’t want him to be miserable. Nor do I want to sacrifice my feelings and be miserable instead.

Monoamorous

DEAR MONOAMOROUS: Someone needs to call Sir Mixx-A-Lott because this is an example of what I call a Big But letter. Everyone’s crazy in love, everybody’s perfect… and then you get to the big BUT that immediately invalidates all of the preceding greatness.  In your case, you love your amazing boyfriend and he’s incredible… except for this one conflict you have. A conflict that’s rooted at the core of who you both are as people.

Those are sometimes the most frustrating problems to have because… well, it’s just who you are and who they are. It feels like things should work because there’s so much else about the two of you that does. But while not everything needs to line up to make a relationship work in the long run, sometimes the one thing that doesn’t is big enough and significant enough to render the rest irrelevant. It feels like something you should be able to get past or work through… but doing so comes at the cost of scouring your soul with sandpaper and rolling yourself in broken glass.

The problem here isn’t that you didn’t put in enough effort, Monoamorous, nor is it a case of you tried things too early. The problem is that his relationship and attachment style is inimical to yours. You and he simply have entirely different needs from one another and they’re bumping up against each other in ways that cause the whole operation to grind to a halt. Being poly isn’t about swinging or having sex with other folks in the room, it’s about having concurrent, emotionally intimate relationships. That’s the sort of thing that requires partners to have an incredible amount of trust and closeness with one another, as well as an ability to advocate for your own emotional needs. You need to be able to navigate jealousy — because that’s still going to be a thing, even in poly relationships — talk through your feelings with one another and navigate the incredibly rocky shores that come with trying to manage more than one relationship.

And it doesn’t sound like that’s something that you can do. Not without making yourself miserable in the process… and that’s not going to be fair to you or your boyfriend. Because if he is polyamorous… well, he’s not going to be “forgetting” about this any time soon. He may choose not to act on it, but he’ll still be falling for other people. That part is always going to be there. If his having feelings for another person — even if nothing could ever happen — was enough to hurt you, then this is going to end up hurting you both. And what’s the most frustrating factor is that it won’t be out of maliciousness or carelessness or a lack of consideration on his part. It’s just the differences in how you two are wired.

If you are bound and determined to give this a chance — even if it’s just being the mono partner to a poly person — then you’ll need to do your research. Check out Opening Up: A Guide to Creating and Sustaining Open Relationships by Tristan Taormino and Building Open Relationships: Your hands-on guide to swinging, polyamory, and beyond! by Dr. Liz Powell. See if there’s a poly group in your town, talk to folks, especially people who got started by dating someone who was poly… and see if this is right for you.

But it very well may not be. And that’s FINE; polyamory and non-monogamous relationships aren’t for everyone. It doesn’t mean that you’re somehow deficient or unworthy, it doesn’t mean that you don’t love your boyfriend enough or that there’s anything wrong with you or him. It just means that there’s a fundamental difference in what you need from your relationships and those differences are one where a compromise really isn’t possible.

But hey, maybe I’m wrong. Hopefully I am and the two of you can make this work. And if you can, then blessings on you both. If not… well, all I can say is that two years with a great guy is no small thing either.

Good luck.

Please send your questions to Dr. NerdLove at his website (www.doctornerdlove.com/contact); or to his email, doc@doctornerdlove.com