I wish I could say what happened was all her fault. And while there is reasonable ground to suspect she exploited her position of power and misrepresented herself, the position, and her business…I didn’t protect myself. I grew up in an extremely abusive home. One of the things I survived was being the family scapegoat. To be honest I have had at least one source of scapegoating my whole life, 34 years. Scapegoating is a social construct of transferring the group’s “sin” onto one person/people. This does a few things; 1) the other members do not have to directly deal with their issues, 2) unites the other members of the group even more, 3) and gives those same members the right to abuse or ostracize the scapegoat. The scapegoat is chosen by the dominant person/group and is usually one of the strongest members and has a resemblance to a trait that the dominant person/group has the biggest problem with in themselves real or imagined. There are distinct characteristics of scapegoating. The person being scapegoated didn’t do anything. The person/people doing the scapegoating exaggerate every mistake the scapegoated makes; while every success is downplayed or ignored. The person being scapegoated is often blamed for the mistakes or failures the dominant person/group makes. Even more than that the person who scapegoats is almost unable to admit any mistakes, weaknesses or oversights. And lastly, the person being scapegoated is constantly being defamed. That can be expressed in many ways, from being called names (i.e. lazy, selfish, drama queen, too sensitive) to being discredited to other people so that no one will listen (i.e. Well, she has Autism so she doesn’t understand the meaning of those words.) It is everywhere. For example, in a massage business that rents out of a church in the Midwest.
I know a little weird, a massage business in a church. But before I get into that, I am changing the names of everyone involved. The story I am about to share is not only deeply personal about me, but the mistakes made by the parties involved could be damaging. I have no intention of making the horrible situation I survived any worse than it already is. I do sincerely fear acts of retribution if they find out that I didn’t stay silent too. Scapegoating is everywhere in various forms. And that is why I am writing this. To share what I learned while going through such a traumatizing experience in the hopes that others who are going through a similar situation will have a better chance of reducing the amount of damage this behavior…
