I consider my brother a nice guy, and he dated a real psycho. It happened simply enough. She seemed normal when they started dating. Gradually, she became more unpleasant and more problematic. But he’s very nice, and he put up with her problems.
After a while she started using guilt. What would happen to her if she left him? So he stayed with her and tried to take care of her.
Eventually she pushed him too far and he dumped her. You friend is either nicer than my brother, or hasn’t reached his limit.
So, anyway, my theory is, difficult people end up with nice people, because no one else will put up with them.
I’ve known couples towards both ends of that spectrum. It ain’t a pretty sight. The subs litterally do spend all day figuring out what to do. The two doms usually end up in some kind of Thunder Dome dress rehearsal.
When I read the title I immediately thought of someone I know. He would have never gotten together with anyone if she hadn’t made it happen. She’s the only the one in the relationship with enough umph to make things happen. I’d slit my wrists before I’d marry her but that doesn’t make her a bitch.
I’m widely regarded as a “nice guy” myself, and I think that’s generally an accurate assessment.
It doesn’t follow that, if my wife gripes about the way I act at home, she’s completely off base.
Does that mean my “nice guy” demeanor is all an act, and that I have my friends totally fooled? No. But it DOES mean that my wife sees much more of me than my friends do, in a much wider range of situations than they do.
MANY of my friends would swear that I’m a very even-keeled guy who never gets angry. They’re not lying. But my wife knows that I DO have a temper, and she’s SEEN me blow my stack many times. If she told one of our mutual friends that I’ve yelled at her or at my son, she wouldn’t be lying or “projecting.” She’d be telling the truth about the person she sees every day. I believe I’m generally a “nice guy,” but make no mistake, I CAN be a jerk, as most people can. If my wife told my friends or family about the jerkish things Ive done, they’d be wrong to assume “The Astorian I know is so nice, she must be making this up.”
Obviously, I don’t know any of the people the OP is talking about. I’d just caution him against assuming that the nice guy he thinks he knows is the person his wife deals with at home.
Nice guy may equal “non-confrontational” and thus less likely to call the bitch on her behavior. He’d rather tolerate the bad stuff in order to avoid a fight. Or maybe he thinks the nonsense is the price to pay for whatever he sees in her that he likes.
However, does your wife berate and belittle you in front of your friends? Does she act jerkish towards guests? If you did notice a couple where the guy appeared like a good guy, and the woman was publicly a bitch, what is the most likely explanation: (a) that all is as it seems or (b) she is actually a great person and he is a monster in private?
Maybe (b) has a tiny probability of being true but the most likely scenario is (a).
Why are people in this thread focusing on the fact that, yes, it is possible that the guy is a monster in private, when the most likely explanation is that a good guy ended up with a bitch?
If there was a thread about guys who beat their wives and these wives seem like such nice people, would people constantly bringing up that, “Hey, maybe these women are horrible bitches at home”, when yes, there is a chance that they could be bitches at home, but the data we *do *have is that he is a bullish jerk who beats her and hits her in front of us and she, in her interactions with us, seems like the nicest person you could meet.
Why can’t both things be true: she’s a bitch AND he’s a nice guy in public but a jerk to her in private? The fact that she’s repellent doesn’t necessarily mean she’s lying, and even if he is a jerk to her in private, that doesn’t somehow make her a nice person or excuse her behavior.
ETA - And why do you think it’s more likely that a good guy ended up with a bitch, than that a secretly jerky guy ended up with a bitch?
You see a person behaving a certain way in public. Is it equally likely that he is similar in private vs being the exact opposite of his pubic persona? I think there is a chance someone in private is the exact opposite of their public persona, but it is not 50/50 with being similar to his public persona.
I don’t think there is a 50/50 chance that people who behave like good people in public are in fact raging jerks in private.
Given the above, it’s bizarre that people are focusing on this possibility:
It’s my theory that people end up with their partners for a reason. The reasons don’t have to be logical, or result in happiness, but they’re there.
So if a person seems genuinely nice and sweet, yet constantly ends up with raging psychos, there’s a reason. Maybe they’ve got a savior complex. Maybe they aren’t so nice. Maybe they’re such a wimp that the ragaholic can dominate them completely. Maybe they’re a martyr who thinks they deserve it.
Me, I think the most common explanation is the “wimp” one. Anybody with some backbone would kick the psycho bitch to the curb. So the psycho bitch is bounced from relationship to relationship until she finds someone spineless enough to meekly put up with her shit. And since he’s a wimp, she has contempt for him and denigrates him constantly. But the standard cure for being in a relationship with someone you have contempt for is to dump the motherfucker already. Except neither of them can do that, because then they’d be alone. So she’s stuck with a wimp she looks down on, and he’s stuck with a raging bitch he’s afraid of.
It’s a classic dysfunctional dynamic which also occurs when the male is a raging douche and the female is a codependent wimp.
Yabbut, he’s not just some random guy who behaves well in public. You have an eyewitness account that he acts differently in private. To me, that means there’s a greater than 50/50 chance that this is true, because unless there’s an apparent reason why they might be lying, I generally assume people are telling the truth. But you seem to be dismissing it just because you don’t like her.
No, no, no - there’s no “So?”. It’s more like:
“Look, that guy is hitting his girlfriend!”
“Wow, what an asshole!”
“AND, he says she’s a bitch to him in private.”
“That’s entirely possible, but it certainly doesn’t excuse him hitting her.”
“But! He’s hitting her! And she’s so nice! Obviously, he’s lying about how she is in private!”
“???”
Equally, your friend may be a jerk to his wife in private, but that doesn’t excuse her being a jerk to him in public. But… that’s still no reason to think she’s lying.
Now, if she were to say, “I’m a bitch because he’s a jerk to me in private,” then you would indeed have reason to doubt her, because it’s a story that makes her look better (or so she thinks). In truth, it just makes her look petty and vindictive as well as bitchy. Is that what she’s saying? Is she trying to justify her behavior by accusing him of the same?
All that aside, I’ve certainly seen my share of nice guys/girls paired with assholes, and it almost always seems to be this:
And that in no way precludes the possibility that the nice one lamely tries to defend themselves by getting their digs in when they can, in private. Seems likely, actually.
Fear. If she stands up to him, if she asserts herself and fights back, even if she doesn’t say anything at all and just leaves him… he’s spent how long hitting her even when she’s compliant. What will he do if she defies him? Will it be worse than what he’s already doing? So maybe she should just put up with it because, right now at least, it’s “not that bad.” There’s more though.
When a woman is in this type of situation, it isn’t just about the hitting. There is a huge psychological component to these abusive situations that is extremely powerful. The kind of men who physically abuse their partners are experts in emotional abuse and manipulation and, from what I’ve seen (both personally and in my experience dealing with abused women), that’s where it starts. It’s a very subtle process though so that by the time the hitting starts it’s too late. Already the woman feels as though she can’t possibly be without the man because she is too stupid or otherwise incapable of taking care of herself; he has convinced her that she “needs” him. He has also convinced her that it’s her fault he is this way and that he is the real victim and it isn’t uncommon for the woman to feel bad for him when it’s all said and done and to wonder what she could have done differently to make it better. It’s a very complex and effective process of grooming and, as horrible as it sounds to say it, it’s actually quite fascinating from a psychological point of view. I almost wish I could be inside the minds of men (and female abusers, who are an entirely different animal) who do this just to see what it’s like in there.
Oh and the idea that an abuser is a perfectly charming, funny, nice, life-of-the-party kind of person until you get them behind closed doors? Pretty much spot on. I’m not saying your friend is an abuser or that his girlfriend isn’t lying about his private behavior, just that what you said (“master at deceiving everyone in the world into thinking that he is super nice, when in fact he is mean and only exhibits that trait when only she is around”) is SOP for abusers and isn’t at all difficult for them to pull off.
Except, an abusive guy who uses fear to control his woman isn’t going to put up with her denigrating him in public. He’s gonna stomp on her and put her in her place.
What we have here is the exact opposite situation.
To add to what Silver Fire said, domestic violence is about more than just violence. The violence is just a small part in an overall campaign to control and dominate the victim.
Sometimes abusers are described as master manipulators, which I think is misleading. All they are capable of doing is choosing the right victims. This is what naturally happens when you have someone who feels entitled to controlling behavior - he or she will look for someone who allows that behavior to continue.
I think it’s just more noticeable when he’s mild mannored and she’s a “big rough”
I worked for a controller and she was horrible. At the Christmas party I was talking to a nice man and he says he’s the controller’s husband, I swear I almost said, “You’re married to THAT???”
I wasn’t addressing the situation described in the OP, just the question of why women stay with men who abuse them.
Of course, maybe an abuser would put up with that as part of a whole “woe is me, I’m so nice, look at this crazy bitch…” victim act and then kick her ass for it later. I’ve never heard anything about that and I don’t necessarily believe that’s true (of anybody, not just the situation in the OP; I would think an abused woman would be way too submissive for that). A bit of devil’s advocate, I suppose.
