2202Passive Agressive

[evile]

 

 

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evilE

May 20, 2004

 

 

http://www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl?PassiveAggressive

PassiveAggressive

In pop psychology, a pattern where a person exercises power through a
nonconfrontational refusal to act, most often through a reduction of
Communication Channels. It is often seen as a response to overbearing
behavior by another.

An example: Laura and Charles are discussing dinner plans over the
phone. Laura wants to meet friends at a restaurant later in the
evening. Charles wants to stay home, but does not say anything
knowing that Laura will not listen but will instead respond with
anger and intimidation, instead mumbling an "ok." Then, when Laura is
off the phone, Charles decides to stay home but does not tell Laura.
She arrives at the restaurant with her friends but Charles is not
there.

In some instances there may be some sort of covering behavior; in our
example that would consist of Charles concocting some sort of excuse
for staying home (I felt sick) and not communicating the change in
plans (I called but your cell phone wouldn't work). In other
instances, passive aggressiveness is more overt, such as locking
yourself in the bathroom in the middle of a fight.

Passive-aggressive behavior usually has roots in communication
difficulties, or in relationships that lack effective power sharing.

Passive aggressive behavior gains its power from reduction of
expected behaviour rather than the addition of assertive behaviour.
Consequently, often it comes in the form of ultimata ("I won't come
out of the bathroom until..."), and therefore it often fails if the
intended victim does not require the missing expected behaviour as
they will simply call you on the ultimata ("Ok, stay in the bathroom.
I'm going out for drinks."). However, this will make the aggressor
even more infuriated, possibly enough to overreact actively
aggressively.

See GoodBye as an example of a popular passive aggressive strategy in
OnlineCommunity.