There are all manner of red flags to look out for in our relationships, be they romantic, familial, or platonic. Love-bombing, jealousy, controlling behaviours, and being a dick to the waiters in a restaurant are all sound ground for calling time on a burgeoning romance or friendship as far as I’m concerned. But one red flag that is much harder to spot early doors is the perpetual victim. The friend who has a master’s in “shifting blame” and a PhD in making everything about themselves.
You know at least one of these people, dear reader. This is the friend who is always the victim in their own stories, is always at the centre of some terrible drama, and who resists actual solutions to remedy whatever god-awful situation they have gotten themselves into because, as you eventually realise, being the victim is more important to them than healing and moving on.
Why? There’s a lot of power in unjustly occupying the victim role. You get attention, people feel sorry for you and do things for you, and you aren’t required to examine your own actions. There is a good chance you are actually still friends with this person, because by the time you realised what was going on, it was too late, and now all your time together is monopolised by talking about their problems.
This is what is known as “toxic victimhood,” “victim syndrome ,” and having a “victim mindset”. None of which are official medical or psychological disorders, nor are they recognised in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5). But, understanding how victimhood can be weaponised and used to manipulate is very important, nonetheless.
To be clear, I am not talking about someone who has had a really shitty time of it and is struggling to get their head above the water and may be stuck in a “victim mindset”. A mate struggling to get over a divorce, for example. They deserve compassion and support. Please don’t ditch that person, unless it’s been 15 years and they are still slagging off their ex to all and sundry.
I am not propounding the infamous “stiff upper lip” mentality the Brits are famous for. Nor am I talking about someone who has sadly been a victim of some awful experience. We are all victims of something at one point or another, and when that happens, you’re absolutely allowed to feel the full force of it and to take your time processing it. No, I am talking about the people who set up permanent residence on Victim Boulevard, evoke squatter’s rights, and refuse to be moved. The people who use the label of victim to close down valid criticism and avoid accountability.
Toxic victimhood is an entirely different beast to being a victim. This is pathological. According to the website Healthline, the three defining beliefs of a victim complex are: bad things happen and will keep happening; other people are to blame; and any effort to create change is pointless.
I once (briefly) dated a guy who would react angrily at the slightest criticism and start shouting about how “f**ked up” he was because his mum sent him to boarding school when he was seven. While I have no doubt that was very upsetting for a small child, it’s hard to understand how that traumatic event excused him shagging a load of other people and lying about it.
I had a temporary job during my twenties where I befriended a woman who had apparently been treated horribly by everyone in the office. Nobody wanted to be work buddies with this lady. To begin with, I felt very sorry for her. She seemed so sad and forlorn, but pretty soon it became clear that she was the common denominator in every encounter, and it was easy to see why. She was manipulative, snidey, and bad-mouthed everyone. In short, she was an energy vampire.
She loved to tell you how awful various employees were and specialised in making you paranoid that they hated you as well. She would inevitably have a disagreement with whoever she was currently draining and would then go to HR to report them for bullying. Thankfully, I was only there for six months and avoided the worst of it. I clocked what was going on when she started talking about all the complaints she had lodged and distanced myself. But I’m sure she’s still there, slagging me and hundreds of others off for not being her verbal punching bag.
Perpetual victims are not only exhausting for everyone involved – their behaviour is highly manipulative as well. I like to think most of us are decent people who will help someone who is in distress, but this is a dynamic that can be easily exploited by the perpetual victim.
The Karpman Drama Triangle is a model of interaction developed by psychiatrist Stephen B Karpman in 1968 to explain how conflict arises. The three points of this triangle stand for the “persecutor”, the “rescuer”, and the “victim”, and they all interact with and trigger one another. The persecutor creates a victim, who will in turn trigger someone’s rescue reflex. In any conflict, we move through these stages, often creating more drama, but never taking responsibility for our own part in it. This model is widely used in psychotherapy to help people understand their role in conflict and to move outside of it.
Someone who is perpetually stuck in the victim role will deliberately provoke the rescue response in others who initially want to help – just as I did with the lady in the office. They give the victim attention and try to take on some of their burden because it makes them feel good to do it. However, someone with toxic victimhood has no real desire to change, because they enjoy the attention and don’t want to take any responsibility for their actions, so the rescuer will often become the persecutor, and the whole cycle starts again.
The only way to move outside of it is to communicate as adults, accept accountability, and work to change – which is very difficult with someone who is committed to being the victim.
At the end of the day, friendships thrive on reciprocity and joy. While it’s noble to lend an ear or a shoulder to cry on, a relationship shouldn’t feel like a never-ending therapy session for one. I am afraid my advice for anyone dealing with this is to extricate yourself from the situation. Retreat slowly without making eye contact. If you are brave enough to call it out directly, be prepared for an angry reaction (persecutor), and then to be become yet another villain in their stories.
But that is still better than being caught in a perpetual victim triangle with someone who has no intention of breaking the habit.
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