I want to name an elephant in the room. I want to put my finger on something that needs to be discussed. I have no idea the appetite for this topic but it’s one that begs to be explored in our age of outrage.
It is the concept of one’s anger as it is directed without poise and without justification at whatever target we wish to target it at. What I guess I’m discussing is the narrative of abuse that is taken too far on occasion.
First, what about the role and dynamics of anger as a response to abuse.
DARVO (where abusers DENY, ATTACK, then REVERSE VICTIM & OFFENDER)
Anger certainly has a role in responses to abuse, there’s no question about it. And whether we like it or not, righteous anger or indignation is part of the process of grief we go through in regaling in pain from the harm caused.
One of the threats of our anger, however, is DARVO. In perhaps reacting in rage at the injustices we endure and therefore face, especially in being triggered, we open ourselves up to further abuse.
We might know something of a concept called DARVO, whereby those who do the harm of abuse are accused of doing harm yet end up switching back that harm onto the victim and suggesting that they themselves are the abuser.
DARVO stands for Deny Attack Reverse Victim and Offender, and it’s a tactic abusers use to switch the focus onto a victim and their anger. Survivors of abuse need to modulate anger to effectively ward against being DARVOed. There’s no wisdom in reacting to abuse in unmerited rage. Whilst anger is understood as a response to injustice, there needs to be a better overall response.
ACKNOWLEDGING IMPERFECT HUMANITY
Sometimes narratives of abuse are taken too far, particularly when they do not cater for the imperfections in the common woman and man.
I mean, if we are to relate with one another romantically, with a definite level of intimacy, we will need to agree that from time to time we won’t be the best versions of ourselves. We share the best and worst of ourselves in our intimate relationships.
Sometimes our emotions will spill over into anger. Sometimes we will not be able to contain ourselves. Sometimes we will find ourselves in a place where we are ashamed in reflection of how we behaved.
In all good relationships there is a measure of forgiveness given the occasional excursion from virtuous behaviour.
All good relationships and all good marriages have that feature about them that there is a grace measured out for each of the parties, and always space for forgiveness, whereby a person isn’t called an abuser for the occasional time their behaviour dips below what’s reasonable. When stress takes hold and has them behaving in ways they would otherwise be ashamed about.
What I’m saying is there is a sharp difference between an abuser and someone who is just an imperfect human being. And that difference is in the ability and capacity and willingness to apologise for one’s lamentable behaviours—which includes the ability and capacity and willingness to change one’s behaviour.
There must be a limit to one’s righteous anger against or opposed to the anger that is uncontrolled and that is called abusive. There must be a reasonability that returns to us on the other side of anger—a reasonability that seeks to redeem what is broken and restore the relationship, through repentance and restitution.
‘BLUE ANGER’ & ROOM FOR FORGIVENESS
When abuse narratives are taken too far and there is no room for forgiveness there is the complete absence of love. At times we all get angry. Perhaps what we must have space for is blue anger.
Blue anger is about feeling sorry for our anger, because it always has room for the sadness that is true to all anger, sadness that is best described as a lament for a love that is lacking, and a sadness for the injustices that should never occur but do.
Blue anger gives space to sorrow and saves the rage, so love is protected, so forgiveness remains a possibility.
When there is room for a form of anger that is just so sad for what the situation holds, the humanity remains, and there is room for grace and forgiveness, which at the very least is self-preservative, not to mention exhibiting the grace for which every other human being deserves when we consider the universal givenness to mercy we all have in Christ.
GUARDING OUR HEARTS TO REMAIN MERCIFUL
If anger is to exist, let it coexist with mercy or some form of clemency, which has space for reconciliation, for transformation, for change. And whilst we may not see change in the other person’s life, what it actually helps US with is the space WE need to hold in our hearts for those possibilities for our own good, for our own healing, for the sustenance of our own soul and spirit.
The biblical truth applies here: “Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy,” said Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:7). Where this is grounded is in the playing out of our own lives. OUR own hearts grow darker when we’re not merciful.
One of the most poisonous things we can do is stay in a world where there is only anger and advocacy and injustice, because the heart grows sick without hope, and we all need the positivity of hope, of grace, mercy, and kindness, and of clemency, with which to see; there is goodness in humankind, comingled with the sin.
One of the most powerful lessons in my own life has been that when I have been held in that place of negativity, of utter injustice, of justified anger, the presence of hope has disappeared. I then tended to only see with the eyes of cynicism, like those in law-enforcement and other professions like prison guards will battle against, because they may only see what is bad and evil about humanity.
What we must endeavour to do is hold the balance and create opposite tensions where the opposing truths of good and evil are able to coexist in the milieu of life’s reality.
We need to advocate against evil, but we must also prop ourselves up in the good.
We need to sustain ourselves spiritually in this life, which is simply bridging the gap between cynicism on the one hand and naivete on the other.
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Justice is and will always be when it’s justice for all. Justice is divine. Who measures up to divine justice when anger is the only parameter?
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