See if you can catch yourself complaining, in either speech or thought, about a situation you find yourself in, what other people do or say, your surroundings, your life situation, even the weather. To complain is always nonacceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself into a victim. When you speak out, you are in your power. So change the situation by taking action or by speaking out if necessary or possible; leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness.

~ Eckhart Tolle

Eckhart Tolle Action Change Complaining Negativity Power Victimization

The most powerful anti-Christian movement is the one that takes over and radicalizes the concern for victims in order to paganize it. The powers and principalities want to be “revolutionary” now, and they reproach Christianity for not defending victims with enough ardor. In Christian history they see nothing but persecutions, acts of oppression, inquisitions.This other totalitarianism presents itself as the liberator of humanity. In trying to usurp the place of Christ, the powers imitate him in the way a mimetic rival imitates his model in order to defeat him. They denounce the Christian concern for victims as hypocritical and a pale imitation of the authentic crusade against oppression and persecution for which they would carry the banner themselves. In the symbolic language of the New Testament, we would say that in our world Satan, trying to make a new start and gain new triumphs, borrows the language of victims....The Antichrist boasts of bringing to human beings the peace and tolerance that Christianity promised but has failed to deliver. Actually, what the radicalization of contemporary victimology produces is a return to all sorts of pagan practices: abortion, euthanasia, sexual undifferentiation, Roman circus games galore but without real victims, etc.Neo-paganism would like to turn the Ten Commandments and all of Judeo-Christian morality into some alleged intolerable violence, and indeed its primary objective is their complete abolition. Faithful observance of the moral law is perceived as complicity with the forces of persecution that are essentially religious...Neo-paganism locates happiness in the unlimited satisfaction of desires, which means the suppression of all prohibitions. This idea acquires a semblance of credibility in the limited domain of consumer goods, whose prodigious multiplication, thanks to technological progress, weakens certain mimetic rivalries. The weakening of mimetic rivalries confers an appearance of plausibility, but only that, on the stance that turns the moral law into an instrument of repression and persecution.

~ René Girard

René Girard Anti Christian Christianity Victimization

If you cannot read Shakespeare, or Melville, or Toni Morrison because it will trigger something traumatic in you, and you'll be harmed by the read of the text because you are still defining yourself through your self-victimization, then you need to see a doctor.

~ Bret Easton Ellis

Bret Easton Ellis Antipc Antipoliticalcorrectness Literature Reading Trauma Trigger Victimhoodculture Victimisation Victimization

Father-daughter incest is not only the type of incest most frequently reported but also represents a paradigm of female sexual victimization. The relationship between father and daughter, adult male and female child, is one of the most unequal relationships imaginable. It is no accident that incest occurs most often precisely in the relationship where the female is most powerless. The actual sexual encounter may be brutal or tender, painful or pleasurable; but it is always, inevitably, destructive to the child. The father, in effect, forces the daughter to pay with her body for affection and care which should be freely given. p4

~ Judith Lewis Herman

Judith Lewis Herman Abuse Abuse Of Power Betrayal Betrayed Child Abuse Dysfunctional Relationship Father Incest Patriarch Patriarchal Power Powerless Sexual Abuse Trauma Victimization

A thief is one who insists on sharing his victimhood.

~ Criss Jami

Criss Jami Crime Criminal Force Frustration Funny Funny But True Giving Humor Insist Materialism Pain Poverty Robbery Sharing Sin Society Stealing Suffering Taking Thief Victim Victimhood Victimization

I tend to walk around convinced that any amount of forgiveness that I could extend could never possibly compensate for the offenses that I’ve had to endure. Yet, maybe the greater offense is that I’ve got that backwards.

~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Craig D. Lounsbrough Abandoned Abuse Abused Backwards Betrayed Compassion Compensate Compensation Forget Forgive Forgiveness Forgiving Hurt Offended Offense Release Ridiculed Used Victim Victimization Victimized

We have probably all seen teachers who would pick a student up by the scruff of the neck for saying ‘Shit,’ but who would walk by without a word when overhearing that same student taunting a classmate, calling him a ‘fag.’ It is often easier not to intervene — even when there is a clear-cut victim. It’s out in the hall. It isn’t our business. It isn’t our problem.But our inactions, like our actions, define who we are and what are true values are.

~ Richard H. Eyster

Richard H. Eyster Actions Bullying Cruelty Discipline Gay Gay Baiting Intervention Kindness Not Our Problem Teacher Values Victimization

Real humility is graceful power, not a mandate to be victimized and abused.

~ Bryant Mcgill

Bryant Mcgill Abuse Grace Growth Humility Victimization

I believed I was too sensitive and weak. To “prove” I wasn’t a victim anymore, I moved closer to painful experiences rather than away from them. Remaining in harm’s way and exposing myself to more pain kept me in the victim role rather than moving me out of it.

~ Christina Enevoldsen

Christina Enevoldsen Belief System Harm Healing Pain Sensitive Suffering Victim Victim Role Victimization Weak

We each have our own ways of sabotaging & keeping ourselves down…Do we need to remain the victim so strongly that we pull the ceiling down upon our own heads? There is a comfort in the familiar. Also, it is important to us to be in control because as children being abused we were not at all in control. In self-sabotage we can be both the victim & the victimizer.

~ Maureen Brady

Maureen Brady Abuse Survivors Comfort Zone Comfortable Control Healing Healing From Abuse Healing Insights Recovery From Abuse Self Sabotage Survivors Victim Victim Role Victimization

Underlying the attack on psychotherapy, I believe, is a recognition of the potential power of any relationship of witnessing. The consulting room is a privileged space dedicated to memory. Within that space, survivors gain the freedom to know and tell their stories. Even the most private and confidential disclosure of past abuses increases the likelihood of eventual public disclosure. And public disclosure is something that perpetrators are determined to prevent. As in the case of more overtly political crimes, perpetrators will fight tenaciously to ensure that their abuses remain unseen, unacknowledged, and consigned to oblivion.The dialectic of trauma is playing itself out once again. It is worth remembering that this is not the first time in history that those who have listened closely to trauma survivors have been subject to challenge. Nor will it be the last. In the past few years, many clinicians have had to learn to deal with the same tactics of harassment and intimidation that grassroots advocates for women, children and other oppressed groups have long endured. We, the bystanders, have had to look within ourselves to find some small portion of the courage that victims of violence must muster every day.Some attacks have been downright silly; many have been quite ugly. Though frightening, these attacks are an implicit tribute to the power of the healing relationship. They remind us that creating a protected space where survivors can speak their truth is an act of liberation. They remind us that bearing witness, even within the confines of that sanctuary, is an act of solidarity. They remind us also that moral neutrality in the conflict between victim and perpetrator is not an option. Like all other bystanders, therapists are sometimes forced to take sides. Those who stand with the victim will inevitably have to face the perpetrator's unmasked fury. For many of us, there can be no greater honor. p.246 - 247Judith Lewis Herman, M.D. February, 1997

~ Judith Lewis Herman

Judith Lewis Herman Abuse Abuse Of Power Abused Women Attacks Bravery Courage False Memory Fear Healing Honor Oppressed Power Psychotherapy Recovery Survivor Survivors Survivorship Therapy Trauma Survivors Victim Victim Blaming Victimization Victims

When basic human needs are ignored, rejected, or invalidated by those in roles and positions to appropriately meet them; when the means by which these needs have been previously met are no longer available: and when prior abuse has already left one vulnerable for being exploited further, the stage is set for the possibility these needs will be prostituted. This situation places a survivor who has unmet needs in an incredible dilemma. She can either do without or seek the satisfaction of mobilized needs through some illegitimate source that leaves her increasingly divided from herself and ostracized from others.While meeting needs in this way resolves the immediate existential experience of deprivation and abandonment. it produces numerous other difficulties. These include experiencing oneself as “bad” or weak for having such strong needs; experiencing shame and guilt for relying on “illegitimate” sources of satisfaction: experiencing a loss of self-respect for indulging in activities contrary to personal moral standards of conduct; risking the displeasure and misunderstanding of others important to her; and opening oneself to the continued abuse and victimization of perpetrators who are all too willing to selfishly use others for their own pleasure and purposes under the guise of being 'helpful.

~ J. Jeffrey Means

J. Jeffrey Means Abandoned Abandonment Abuse Abuse Of Authority Abuse Of Power Basic Needs Child Abuse Deprivation Deprived Emotional Abuse Emotional Neglect Evil Exploit Exploitation Guilt Guilty Conscience Humanity Invalidation Manipulation Needs Neglect Ostracism Prostitution Shame Survivor Victim Victimization Vulnerability Weakness

Blame is a Defense Against PowerlessnessBetrayal trauma changes you. You have endured a life-altering shock, and are likely living with PTSD symptoms— hypervigilance, flashbacks and bewilderment—with broken trust, with the inability to cope with many situations, and with the complete shut down of parts of your mind, including your ability to focus and regulate your emotions.Nevertheless, if you are unable to recognize the higher purpose in your pain, to forgive and forget and move on, you clearly have chosen to be addicted to your pain and must enjoy playing the victim.And the worst is, we are only too ready to agree with this assessment! Trauma victims commonly blame themselves. Blaming oneself for the shame of being a victim is recognized by trauma specialists as a defense against the extreme powerlessness we feel in the wake of a traumatic event. Self-blame continues the illusion of control shock destroys, but prevents us from the necessary working through of the traumatic feelings and memories to heal and recover.

~ Sandra Lee Dennis

Sandra Lee Dennis Affect Affect Regulation Betrayal Betrayal Bond Betrayal Trauma Betrayal Trauma Theory Blame Control Emotional Health Emotions Higher Purpose Hypervigilance Illusion Memories Mental Health Mental Illness Out Of Control Posttraumatic Stress Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Powerlessness Ptsd Regulate Emotions Self Blame Shock Trauma Trauma Victims Traumatic Traumatic Experiences Traumatic Memories Traumatized Victim Blaming Victimhood Victimization Victims

Maybe it’s a whole lot less about focusing on the fact that we’re all victims and a whole lot more about the changing the fact that we’re all careless, as that is what victimized all of us in the first place.

~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Craig D. Lounsbrough Abandon Abandoned Abused Betray Betrayed Callous Callousness Careless Carelessness Cold Cruel Cruelty Focus Focusing Hurt Ignorance Ignorant Insensitive Neglect Neglected Perpetrator Thoughtless Victim Victimization Victimized Victims

Certainly we struggle as victims of other people’s unkindness. We have been sinned against. But we cannot excuse our sinful responses to others on the grounds of their mistreatment of us. We are responsible for what we do. We are both strugglers and sinners, victims and agents, people who hurt and people who harm.

~ Larry Crabb

Larry Crabb Hurt Response Sin Unkindness Victim Victimization

The guarantee of safety in a battering relationship can never be based upon a promise from the perpetrator, no matter how heartfelt. Rather, it must be based upon the self-protective capability of the victim. Until the victim has developed a detailed and realistic contingency plan and has demonstrated her ability to carry it out, she remains in danger of repeated abuse.

~ Judith Lewis Herman

Judith Lewis Herman Abuse Abused Women Battered Women Batterers Battering Domestic Violence Perpetrator Promises Protection Refuge Safety Self Protection Survivor Victim Victimization Violence

Some victims do need to blame themselves and take responsibility.

~ Bryant Mcgill

Bryant Mcgill Blame Responsibility Victimization

I stayed in therapy long enough to know that nothing that happened to me was my fault. I didn't do anything to invite it or deserve it. But that just makes it worse. Maybe I don't blame myself for what happened, but when they tell you that something was completely and utterly random, they're also telling you something else. That nothing you do matters. It doesn't matter if you do everything right, if you dress the right way and act the right way and follow all the rules, because evil will find you anyway. Evil's resourceful that way. ... They tell you it was random to make you feel blameless. But all I hear them telling me is that I have no control, and if I have no control, then I'm powerless. I would have preferred being blamed.

~ Katja Millay

Katja Millay Control Victimization

[Pope] Clement waved his hands in irritation as if to dismiss the very idea. The world is crumbling into ruin. Armies are marching. Men and women are dying everywhere, in huge numbers. Fields are abandoned and towns deserted. The wrath of the Lord is upon us and He may be intending to destroy the whole of creation. People are without leaders and direction. They want to be given a reason for this, so they can be reassured, so they will return to their prayers and their obiediences. All this is going on, and you are concerned about the safety of two Jews?

~ Iain Pears

Iain Pears Chaos Civilization Decay End Of The World Genocide God S Wrath Jews Mankind Panic Papal Authority Plague Pope Punishment Ruin Scapegoats Turmoil Victimization Victims

I don't wanna be a lover,I just wanna be your victim.

~ Elvis Costello

Elvis Costello Love Lust Lyric Lyrics Relationships Victim Victimization

I believe that all people allow the act of victimization to take lead in their lives without realizing or trying to stop it. You hear of another person's problems, automatically feel the need to salve their pain, so you make it your own. After a while, it no longer matters if the problem was yours to begin with. You absorb their pain into your body, your blood stream, your soul. It becomes yours.

~ Leigh Hershkovich

Leigh Hershkovich Blood Brain Pain Soul Victimization

There is, therefore, a temptation to return to an explanation which automatically discharges the victim of responsibility: it seems quite adequate to a reality in which nothing strikes us more forcefully than the utter innocence of the individual caught in the horror machine and his utter inability to change his fate. Terror, however, is only in the last instance of its development a mere form of government. In order to establish a totalitarian regime, terror must be presented as an instrument for carrying out a specific ideology; and that ideology must have won the adherence of many, and even a majority, before terror can be stabilized. The point for the historian is that the Jews, before becoming the main victims of modern terror, were the center of Nazi ideology. And an ideology which has to persuade and mobilize people cannot choose its victim arbitrarily.

~ Hannah Arendt

Hannah Arendt 1968 Antisemitism Authoritarian Ideology Nazism Terrorism Totalitarianism Victimization

I decry the injustice of my wounds, only to look down and see that I am holding a smoking gun in one hand and a fistful of ammunition in the other.

~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Craig D. Lounsbrough Ammunition Gun Injury Injustice Sabotage Self Inflicted Self Inflicted Pain Self Injury Self Sabotage Unfair Unfairness Unjust Victim Victimization Wound Wounded Wounds