Diversion
A Tactic to Avoid Change. The Neglectful and Abusive woman is a master of diversion. A favorite form is to bring up irrelevant material and interest others enjoy rather than discuss her her unhealthy acts. This is particularly useful in settings where discussion about almost anything is seen as a sign of cooperation. If pressured to stick to the point, they use more subtle forms of diversion. These include spending too much time on a point and spend too much time on it, labeling something as a problem so they can describe it at length, distracting others from more important issues, or bringing up previously settled arguements or debates. Another diversion is to recount their qualities and good deeds. In some programs the facilitator tries to increase one’s self-esteem by emphasizing the good in them. This allows the Abusive and Neglectful Woman to divert from discussing unhealthy patterns that are so destructive.
Bringing up racism or sexism as an excuse is another way of diverting. Clearly, there has been bigotry and discrimination by various races and sexism, but racism and sexism are irrelevant to the issue at hand. They know this is a sensitive issue and that is why they raise it. They may take the offensive with charges of racism or sexism when they have failed to gain agreement on some point.
