Getting therapy to help me understand why my dad is like he is has been incredibly helpful. Like when an ag man says something horrible I call them out on it and they gaslight the hell outta me, I know it’s their issue not mine. But they are repeating the cycle of abuse. It’s sad

There are behaviors men do to deflect their responsibility for their actions, Jon brought up his fertility issues - I had no idea he stuggles, yet tried to make the convo about that instead of acknowledging his behavior was problematic. It’s an effective way to derail a convo.

Also the fact he tried to get me to shift how I saw his actions, the I needed the attitude adjustment not him, even though his behavior (bragging about triggering feminists) was deeply problematic. He believes what he did was ok, I bet he doesn’t brag about triggering vets.

I’ve attempted to have conversations like this with many ag men over the past few years. Often though, they just call me crazy (more gaslighting). Here is the thing, I’m the one doing the work with professionals, I see the abuse, I see how they perpetuate it.

And that’s scary. When I have this conversation irl and I invoke ‘my therapist says’ they run from me because they know I’m right. They know it’s their behavior and taking responsibility for it was not something they learned to do.

Men like Jon will have children and they will teach the girls to take this abuse and they will teach the boys to perpetuate it. Keeping this toxic generational abuse going. I’m so pleased this abuse stops with me, in my family. It’s fucking ridiculously hard to confront & stop it

And it’s not to say these men don’t love their children- they do, very very much. But they never were taught how to love in a way that works. My dad thought he was doing me a huge favor when he killed my horse, his dad would have done that for him.

But to me it was devastating in a way, I’ll never forgive or forget and yelling at me to change my attitude, I’m overreacting and to get over it, made it worse. Just like Jon telling me the same didn’t fix his behavior.