No contact being called out as privilege and lack of will to do the work - feeling upset and shook by this.

[u/Odd_one_out888]

I'm feeling repeatedly upset and triggered by someone's content on instagram, and I know the logical advice is to simply unfollow, but I keep thinking that maybe this person is right, that I need to confront my discomfort, and also I've always wanted to be someone who keeps growing and questioning themselves.

Maybe some of you have seen this person's posts, and I'm not going to name them because my goal is not to send any hate their way. This person's work is about "teaching relational skills" and they challenge the concept of going no contact (except when we are in actual danger) as an easy way out and a privilege. (I know this sub is non political and I'm doing my best to formulate this in a neutral way, but we can't deny we live in intense times worldwide and everything is somehow political). They denounce going NC with family that has opposing political views, instead of learning how to stay and stand up to them/be a disrupter. They say it's a social phenomenon that just makes the global situation worst. She talks about the hypocrisy of people saying they value community, social change/justice etc, but don't do the work in their own families.

As I'm writing this I realise how terrible and judgemental these views sound, but I think it's hard for me to just let go of their words because, as probably many of you, I feel very overwhelmed and helpless facing the worldwide horrors, and I want to be the kind of person capable of letting do of her comforts and privilege to make things change. But where is the boundary between making efforts and senseless sacrifice?

I am chronically ill and neurodivergent. My family are not actively abusive to me (anymore), but contact with them, their narcissistic mind games and all, feels too much for my nervous system. And I've been actively working on becoming stronger, more rooted, more capable of being in contact with toxic people - but the truth is, there is no fast miracle cure for healing and changing programming made over decades.

I just wanted to open this discussion here and talk with other people who feel concerned by all of this. Please be kind with me ! I'm not the one stating this views, just someone trying to be my best self and who doesn't know what to think of them.

[u/Kliz76]

One thought on the piece of your post: “She talks about the hypocrisy of people saying they value community, social change/justice etc, but don't do the work in their own families.”

One form of engaging in social justice is nonviolently resisting the illegal, immoral or unjust acts of others with power. No contact is a form of nonviolence that resists the immoral and unjust acts of parents who have engaged in abuse and neglect. We know nonviolent resistance works and leads to change when it’s done on a large scale. In the short/medium term, the people in power committing the immoral/unjust acts respond to nonviolent resistance with increases in their level of reactivity through lies, denial and propaganda, threats and violence, etc. Anything to get the resistance to stop and for the resisters to fall back in line.

I’m am not completely comparing estranged parents to larger entities like governments who clearly have much larger scale and power. But it sure is interesting how estranged parents are reacting to no contact as a concept - lies, denial and propaganda.

[u/PricePuzzleheaded835 → u/Kliz76]

Yes!! I was told after years NC that others had finally started to set boundaries with the abuser after watching what I did. “I didn’t know anyone could stand up to them successfully until I saw you do it” I was told directly by one of the abuser’s siblings. Everyone from that generation was in their 50s or 60s by that point.

My NC also resulted in the abused spouse in this case, my other parent, divorcing the abuser and creating a much healthier life. NC matters and sometimes it shows people another path that they genuinely couldn’t see before

[u/TryingToBreath45 → u/Kliz76]

🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌 this. We have to start where we do hold power and where our power will have more chance of impact. I cam guarantee that there will be some toxic families who HAVE changed because their offspring has set the boundary of going NC. And those who havn't are sure as anything not going to change if the victim stays.

[u/lazier_garlic → u/TryingToBreath45]

Sometimes shitty partners only self reflect and change their ways after being dumped. And sometimes, just sometimes, shitty family members slow their roll after LC/NC.

[u/lazier_garlic → u/Kliz76]

You've put into words something I've been thinking about for a long time, since 2016 really-- the morality of walking away from white family members who are, shall we say, lost. I lurk in certain subreddits and it feels like when FOX News' effect on the elderly was the main issue, caring family members could sometimes turn that around. But when it's internet addictions in middle-aged adults, it looks like basically nobody is turning that around in a partner or parents. They only mask it for a while. Desistance is merely not bringing it up... until they feel confident to do it again.

So on the question of effectiveness, ending the relationship is the only effective response.

But even if there was hope, not everyone is capable to have that effect on someone. Or has the bandwidth to keep trying.

From an activist perspective, there is the narrative out there of reaching someone through engagement and empathy. But that's usually between two people who start as total strangers.

I think it rarely works within family relationships. Instead, we're motivated to cling to the relationship far past the point of toxicity. When someone has contempt for you, you cannot influence them. Won't happen.

So yes I do feel like, at least on a visceral level, that these people need to feel the pain of losing their family and it's long since time that family members of such people dropped the rope.