Quote from B on October 23, 2023, 1:05 am

Thank you Matthew. Some months ago I’d have done as you say.

But I ejected from too many situations already in my life so far.

This time, and from now on, I’m in the fight to win.

Quote from B on October 23, 2023, 2:03 am

I suppose at the end, when he said:

That’s why she with you.

He was implying Bella is with me because I pay for her things or am permissive with her.

What an asshole. He took advantage of the moments when I was busy responding to others, first to Bella and then to the waitress, to social climb.

Now that reflect upon it, I realize this has always been his pattern, and this was why - among other things - so far it was difficult for me to realize what he was doing.

Quote from Kavalier on October 23, 2023, 2:22 am

Hello, Bel, Matthew!

Bel, I think you and I have different perspectives regarding leadership in relationships. I favour a more egalitarian "men and woman decide together" approach, you, if I interpreted correctly, favour a more traditional "man decides" approach. But even for a more traditional approach, I believe the situation called for more power protection towards Bella:

Bel: Let's get this. (My approach goes more as "hmmm this looks delicious. What do you think of we having this one, babe?". But let's keep your approach)

Bella: But I want this.

Bel: It's with lactose, babe/Bella (whatever you call her. A vocative softens the message). Let's share this other one (suggesting).

Here you are still leading, but it's ambiguous to the audience. From the viewers' point of view, she might even be the one who is intolerant to lactose. Perhaps you're just caring for her.

Now, if even after this she insists on "I want this"... You'd better give up. There's no way you can win this in public, Bel. If you'd like a more tradidional relationship with her, you'll have more chances if you and her discuss privately the expected behaviour so that she doesn't challenge your decisions in front of others. In public she has societal expectations in her favour (it's important to notice that, in traditional societies,  women don't lose power by obeying their husbands. Nowadays, they lose just by complying to your demands. So it's disempowering to Bella to obey you, and even more damaging if she's a professional who must be respected. So the arrangement I think might work would be: you avoid too overtly dominant requests, she avoids challenging you), and this is what Mr. Asshole the Landlord exploited against you. So to retain power in a lost battle:

Bel: It's with lactose, babe/Bella (whatever you call her. A vocative softens the message). Let's share this other one (suggesting, not demanding).

Bella: I want this.

Bel: no problem, we can have both (frame: why are we even discussing this, of course you can get what you want).

Now, the first part of the interaction (where you still could have won):

Me: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Man, what an asshole. Clearly asshole, but still covert. I suggest surfacing, to know exactly what issue he saw with this.

Bel: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Bel: (to Jim) I don't get it. What do you mean by that?

Jim: (to Bella) rambles about that being offensive.

Bel: (to Jim) not at all. Bella loves pumpkin. (to Bella): Don't you, Bella?

Bella: confirms

This way you recruit Bella back to your side. It was still too early in the interaction to take drastic mesures. If he insisted, on the second or third power move, I think Matthew's suggestion also resonates with me. You went out to have a pleasant night with friends (or at least "friendly" people), not to trade farps with a passive-aggressive jerk. I'd just rephrase it as

Bella, we are leaving (Now, ok, this seems to be in contradiction with the egalitarian view I started my post with, but it's not. We still have to support one another, and if she decides to stay, the relationship is over.)

 

Hello, Bel, Matthew!

Bel, I think you and I have different perspectives regarding leadership in relationships. I favour a more egalitarian "men and woman decide together" approach, you, if I interpreted correctly, favour a more traditional "man decides" approach. But even for a more traditional approach, I believe the situation called for more power protection towards Bella:

Bel: Let's get this. (My approach goes more as "hmmm this looks delicious. What do you think of we having this one, babe?". But let's keep your approach)

Bella: But I want this.

Bel: It's with lactose, babe/Bella (whatever you call her. A vocative softens the message). Let's share this other one (suggesting).

Here you are still leading, but it's ambiguous to the audience. From the viewers' point of view, she might even be the one who is intolerant to lactose. Perhaps you're just caring for her.

Now, if even after this she insists on "I want this"... You'd better give up. There's no way you can win this in public, Bel. If you'd like a more tradidional relationship with her, you'll have more chances if you and her discuss privately the expected behaviour so that she doesn't challenge your decisions in front of others. In public she has societal expectations in her favour (it's important to notice that, in traditional societies,  women don't lose power by obeying their husbands. Nowadays, they lose just by complying to your demands. So it's disempowering to Bella to obey you, and even more damaging if she's a professional who must be respected. So the arrangement I think might work would be: you avoid too overtly dominant requests, she avoids challenging you), and this is what Mr. Asshole the Landlord exploited against you. So to retain power in a lost battle:

Bel: It's with lactose, babe/Bella (whatever you call her. A vocative softens the message). Let's share this other one (suggesting, not demanding).

Bella: I want this.

Bel: no problem, we can have both (frame: why are we even discussing this, of course you can get what you want).

Now, the first part of the interaction (where you still could have won):

Me: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Man, what an asshole. Clearly asshole, but still covert. I suggest surfacing, to know exactly what issue he saw with this.

Bel: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Bel: (to Jim) I don't get it. What do you mean by that?

Jim: (to Bella) rambles about that being offensive.

Bel: (to Jim) not at all. Bella loves pumpkin. (to Bella): Don't you, Bella?

Bella: confirms

This way you recruit Bella back to your side. It was still too early in the interaction to take drastic mesures. If he insisted, on the second or third power move, I think Matthew's suggestion also resonates with me. You went out to have a pleasant night with friends (or at least "friendly" people), not to trade farps with a passive-aggressive jerk. I'd just rephrase it as

Bella, we are leaving (Now, ok, this seems to be in contradiction with the egalitarian view I started my post with, but it's not. We still have to support one another, and if she decides to stay, the relationship is over.)

Quote from B on October 23, 2023, 7:40 am

Hi Kavalier,

thank you.

It's an interesting analysis about my interaction with Bella. I agree with your solution and about my mistake. And about the fact that I could have been smoother at the start.

I don't (think I) have a particular model of "decisive relationship" with her: I just suppose my mistake was related to me being in "fight mode" because this guy was power moving.  And when I'm in "fight mode" with someone, it's still difficult for me to switch to "loving mode" with others.

(Although, it may be possible I have unconscious patterns of which I'm unaware of. Which I'll reflect about and change, if it is so.)

As to the option of leaving the dinner abruptly, I feel I don't have the relative power to do that right now. I would seem crazy.

This guy unfortunately established a dynamic in the past where he power moved heavily, before TPM. So now I'm basically on a recovery path.

He also did many things that were worse, but no point in writing about them now.

On this note:

So far I've been storing the will/testament of this guy in my office, as a favor to him.

I'm going to write to him I can't keep his will anymore due to professional insurance cover reasons, and give it back.

At least I'll not make any more favors to him, and I'll start making him pay.

Quote from Lucio Buffalmano on October 23, 2023, 8:18 am

Very interesting situation.

I agree with the "stand and fight" approach :).

I focused on a specific portion of that evening and opened a new thread because it deserves one in my opinion:

• Cooperative relationship against external power moves

Quote from B on October 23, 2023, 12:52 pm

I spoke with Bella about the dinner.

She noticed several dynamics I didn't remember or couldn't notice:

1. The asshole guy poured water to Bella and to himself, and then ignored my glass.

I actually noticed this, and responded by taking the bottle and pouring water to his wife and myself.

2. The guy stared in a slimy way at Bella all dinner.

Which is really nothing new.

In the past this guy once gave a car lift to Bella with his wife present (!), and he "made the wrong turn" three or four times to prolong the time in the car... (facepalm).

He also, in the distant past, had offered to gift his used bike to Bella, but had told her she would have to go to "his garage with him" to get it. Bella of course never went.

I only later consciously realized why he had proposed this, and told Bella. Ick.

3. The guy tended to use push-pull dominance behavior in a peculiar way:

he pushed (ie power moved on me) mostly when the waitress approached the table, and then he reverted back to a more "baseline" normal behavior when the waitress was out of sight and we were by ourselves.

His being "friendly" when the waitress was not near made it more difficult for me to switch back and forth from "normal mode" to "check mode" when he restared.

If I think back to all our dinners (more than 10 in almost 10 years), he always did this. Every. Single. Time.

This makes me think I should probably have nipped the behavior in the bud by using the line:

Me: (to the waitress) Please excuse him. He always makes these competitive jokes.

as soon as he first interacted with the waitress.

From now on I'll go this route in case this happens again, at the first "joke" with the waiter of the particular "dinner asshole" I may be having dinner with.

Had I done so, every further joke on his part would have come across as nasty.

But just being able to see the dynamics now, I feel, is starting to make a difference for future interactions. With him or others.

Higher level concept: Power moves may be timed to produce the biggest effect on people who only occasionally get near, and thus they should be checked more strongly in this case.

I suppose that, because the waiter is present at the table for only a small fraction of the time,

if he/she always sees one guy one-upping another guy,

this is bound to make the waiter fill-in the gaps by reconstructing the dinner as being one big one-up on the mark (in this case, me).

I suppose this principle is important to learn why and how to check moves that only happen when someone gets near:

while the status loss of unchecked moves of this kind may be small within the group of people that stay near;

the people who only get near when one is power moved, probably tend to disproportionately lose more respect for the power moved.

4. Bella was also busy power-defending herself from his wife all dinner.

She told me the wife of this guy also power moved on her several times, by subtly demeaning Bella's work ("What do you do now? Oh, if you have nothing to do you can come see me at my theathre play") and positioning herself as a "busy retired woman".

At one point she even showed us her calendar to make us see how "busy" she was...

In the past she often used to send Bella work offers for menial jobs.

5. Bella says she agrees with the fact she should have handled the final "waitress sisterhood piece" by defending me.

She couldn't see it as she was busy defending herself from the guy and his wife.

I suppose she went through a similar dynamic as the one that led me to be "blunt" because I was focused on checking the asshole.

6. We both agree we'll probably never go to dinner with these assholes again.

We made this experiment now, but these guys are just bad people.

7. Bella also says I made a slight mistake in checking the first "pizza power move":

Me: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Me: You're not very nice to say that Jim.

Jim: You neither.

Me: I wasn't intending it as you did. You twisted my meaning.

Bella says my last sentence in bold here "brought me back at his level", and that I should have just laughed at that point and he would have just seemed an idiot:

Me: (to Bella) Look, this pizza is named Bella. It's with pumpkin!

Jim: (to Bella) Please excuse him for saying that. (manipulative thread expanding)

Me: You're not very nice to say that Jim.

Jim: You neither.

Me: (smirk and small laugh!)

I instantly see she is right here.

I believe it is due to a "too high investment" issue on my side, as if I didn't believe people would notice how much of an ass he was being unless I "explained it".

This reinforces the idea that manipulative thread expanding must not be checked by over-explaining, but by trusting that the group just needs a slight "push" to see the dynamic.

Quote from Power Duck on October 23, 2023, 2:05 pm

Cheers Bel.

This reinforces the idea that manipulative thread expanding must not be checked by over-explaining, but by trusting that the group just needs a slight "push" to see the dynamic

Yeah  agree, sometimes I've seen that some cases like this are easily handled with a smirk and laugh or a remark about the other person, usually positive to thread expand on the nastiness. (I think I've understood correctly what you meant, I'm not sure)

I also believe that in other instances surfacing or going meta brings the mood down and the power mover can solve that issue by saying: "I'm joking🙂", most people in the group will probably side with him since we have a tendency to shy away from conflict.

Those are some thoughts on the matter, feel free to disagree of course.

Quote from Kavalier on October 23, 2023, 4:03 pm

Hello, Bel

Ah, I understand now. Thinking about it, lately I've been answering more than a few threads proposing drastic measures like leaving, escalating, ending things. Things I myself would never do so easily in my own life, and not without lots of conversation before.

I think I'm interpreting the whole interactions as if they were only power move after power move, and it's not the case. There are lot's of normal conversations between them, and there are years long relationships at stake, as you say, that I'm not considering in the analysis.

You are totally right. Better to endure the dinner, then go home, and reconsider having going out with people like these again. It's smoother than getting up and leaving.

Also, I have to comment: I admire the dynamics between you and Bella! You both analysing interactions, point out each other's mistakes and strong points, supporting each other. Seems like she was also invested in the fight!

Quote from B on October 23, 2023, 5:09 pm

Thank you Kavalier.

I believe your points were totally spot on and also the "We are leaving" part is possible in theory as a way to rebalance a strong insult or disrespect.

I also have now - after getting this "final proof" and having become able to see the dynamics - no more respect whatsoever for these two people (the landlords), and I'm ready to lose any semblance of a relationship with them (although more in a "quiet fading way", which I believe is better for me).

And you actually made me reflect on how I botched the dynamics of the dessert choice, which gave way to the power mover to use it against me.

So the single power-move level of analysis is very helpful. As Lucio says, it's probably more helpful than the "global assessment" level.

Especially because, I believe, the higher level "frame" of the relationship between a man and a woman, while initially resistant to repeated mistakes, can still be destroyed by "indefinitely repeated" small mistakes, including constantly falling for other's "dividing" power moves or getting angry.

Small mistakes irritate and distance people, and need to be effectively addressed to prevent breakups and before that unconscious conflict.

The higher level "relationship" can hold people together for a while, but only if the small mistakes are reflected upon, addressed and eventually not repeated.

The phenomenon works similarly in parent-child relationships, friendships, acquaintances, etc.

Each of these may have a different "breaking point", but the breaking point always comes if one doesn't mend his mistakes and eventually stops repeating them.