Advice For Parents and Friends of Someone Who's Started Going Out With a Possible Abuser

Article Summary

This article gives suggestions on persuading someone to stop going out with someone you worry might get violent or controlling or otherwise abusive with them. Parts one and two contain most of the advice.

Part one suggests ways of attracting the person you're concerned about away from the abuser with something better.
Part Two gives suggestions on ways of showing up the abuser for what they really are in front of the one they're going out with.
And part three is a story that illustrates some reasons why warning signs that someone has an abusive nature can be ignored at first by someone an abuser's with, and how charm and the ability to cause amusement can, in some circumstances, be warning signs of an abusive personality.

The article's mainly written as if to parents trying to stop their daughter going out with an abusive boyfriend; but it's just as relevant for friends of someone with a boyfriend they worry is becoming abusive, and also there are suggestions in it that will be just as useful for someone worried that a male friend or son is going out with someone who might abuse them.

Contents

1. Finding Out What Your Daughter or Friend's Gaining From Her Relationship With Her Abusive Boyfriend and Thinking About How Else She Could Get Those Things
2. Trying to Manipulate the Abusive Boyfriend Into Showing Himself Up For What he Really Is
3. A Story Showing it can Be Easy to Grow Fond of an Abuser and Ignore Warning Signs, and How Fun and Charm Can Mask an Abusive Personality

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Part One
Finding Out What Your Daughter or Friend's Gaining From Her Relationship With Her Abusive Boyfriend and Thinking About How Else She Could Get Those Things

If a teenager or woman's getting something out of a relationship with an abuser that she really values, it'll be much harder for her to break away. For instance, if he can make her laugh a lot, and she doesn't have anywhere near so much fun when she isn't with him, the relationship will be harder to give up.

If every time he abuses her he apologises, seems upset and promises never never to be abusive again, as a lot of abusers do, if she's emotionally attached to him, she'll really want to believe him, so she'll quite likely snatch any crumb of hope that he's telling the truth. If someone actually wants to believe something, it's much more difficult to persuade them it isn't true than it would be if it didn't matter to them one way or the other so they can easily accept that something isn't what they thought it was. If a person's really getting something out of a relationship because sometimes, the other person does things they value or that stir up fond emotions in them, they'll find it much more difficult to accept that the person's likely to abuse them long-term if they stay with them than they would if they were a stranger looking in from outside, who had no feelings for the abuser that get in the way of their judgment and no reason to hope the relationship lasts.

But it may sometimes be that a girl who's started going out with an abuser would be more willing to stop going out with him if she thinks there's a good chance of being able to get the benefits she gets from being with him elsewhere.

For instance, if she's lonely when she isn't with him, but another man she really likes says he's attracted to her and wants to be with her more, it'll be easier for her to leave the abuser than it would be if she knew doing so would make her very lonely.

Also, if she thinks through exactly what it is about the relationship she values and what parts aren't so great, it may help her to think about where else she could get those benefits and whether the relationship's over-all a good thing, far more so than she would if she simply thought that the reason she wanted to be with him was because she was in love with him.

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So ask your daughter what she values about her relationship with her boyfriend, what she'd miss if she wasn't with him, and whether she has any ideas on what she could do to substitute for it if she ever stopped going out with him.

For instance, she might really miss his humour if she left him, but there might be other ways she could get a good laugh.

It might also be that if there was a greater variety of things going on in her life that made her feel good, she wouldn't miss certain things so much if she didn't have them. For instance, a girl might think she'd be really lonely if she gave up her relationship with her abusive boyfriend, but perhaps if she did a college course and was learning lots of interesting things, she wouldn't crave the company of other humans the way she was convinced she'd start doing if she gave up her relationship with the abuser. There would be things filling her life that would mean there wasn't a big gap in her life that she assumed needed to be filled with contact with others anymore.

Or if the thing she valued most about being with the abuser was that he gave her nice expensive things and took her to places she wouldn't normally go to, those things wouldn't have to be substituted with other nice expensive things, and it wouldn't necessarily mean someone else would have to be found to take her to the fun places the abuser did. If she's asked why she values those things so much, she might, for instance, say they make her feel as if someone thinks she's classy and is worth spending money on so she feels good about herself, and that the places she goes to are exciting and she feels more grown-up there, and that hanging around with the group of friends who go there gives her a nice sense of belonging, as if she fits in with the group and is like one of the family, and also that it's a nice feeling to feel as if someone thinks enough of her to take her there. If she does say things like that, you can then start thinking about what might give her the nice feelings she craves in more healthy ways.

For instance, thinking of new places she could go and new people she could be introduced to might help. For example, if there was a group of friends who all went skating or were in a drama group where they played to fairly big audiences, and she could be persuaded to join, she might well get praise and approval for achievements that would give her that sense of worth, a sense of belonging when she made new friends and became part of the group, excitement at doing something a bit risky like ice-skating - though in an adult-supervised environment so help would be at hand if she did have an accident, - or excitement at doing something a bit nerve-wracking like acting in front of audiences; and a sense of achievement that would give her a feeling of self-respect and pride in her talents. With all those things, she might not feel she needs expensive things from the abuser to give her a sense of worth anymore.

Or if she values the expensive things in themselves, she could be helped to think up creative and if possible enjoyable ways of earning her own money, so again she'd have a sense of achievement, and she can eventually buy such things herself.

So if your daughter's life improves in several ways, even ways that seem unrelated to what she's getting out of her relationship with the abusive man, then she might be more willing to give him up.

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Things That Can Make Some Abusers Seem Attractive to Their Girlfriends at First

There are several things that can make some abusers seem attractive at first and a loss if they were to be given up:

• They can use a lot of compliments and flattery to make their seduction target feel special and loved.
• They can also make them feel special and cared for by being very courteous at first, opening doors for them, being ultra-polite sometimes, and so on. A person can be fooled into believing that's part of their personality, rather than an act put on to get what they want.
• They can seem caring, willing to listen to problems and giving the appearance of sympathising.
• They can provide excitement and an adrenaline rush which can become addictive especially if life is otherwise boring. They might do that in a variety of ways, such as providing the thrill of the risk of danger by speeding in a car or on a motorbike, being abusive to strangers in an amusing way, being unpredictable, such as suddenly putting on a display of feeling and sexual arousal and insisting they must have sex that minute, and other things. Such things can be signs of a lack of impulse control, dangerous emotional instability and selfish irresponsibility. But in the early days, such behaviour might seem exciting and the downsides might not seem obvious or worth taking notice of. Only when the person being attracted by them begins to feel their effects in a more serious way, such as when their boyfriend turns their abusive tongue on them, as they no doubt will in time, or when they're speeding and nearly hit something but the abuser takes no notice of warnings, can a person come to see their behaviour for what it really is and start seriously objecting to it.
  
  You could talk these issues through with your daughter if she says she finds her boyfriend exciting and explains why; but also, again, it'll be easier for herself to tear herself away from him if she's got another source of excitement and adrenaline rushes in her life. So it'll be worth you thinking about and talking through with her what other things could be done to make her life more exciting, or whether she'd feel the need for such excitement in her life if she was doing more things she enjoyed, such as spending more time with other people she enjoys being with.
• An abuser can spend a lot of money on their new girlfriend, perhaps buying her things she wouldn't normally be able to have and taking her to places she enjoys being in where she wouldn't normally go alone.
• They can sometimes have a good sense of humour so they're enjoyable company.

You could ask your daughter what she values about her relationship with her boyfriend and what she'd miss if she ever gave it up. The conversation could provide you with useful information about what she wants more of in life. For instance, if she says she adores the way he makes her feel special with the compliments he gives her, you could ask her if she feels unappreciated in the family, and if she says she does, discuss with other family members how to remedy it, for instance if you all make efforts to compliment each other more.

For example, if one family member notices another one's done a particularly good job of a bit of housework, they could say so, or if someone's done their hair nicely, other family members could make a point of commenting on it, or if a family member's done something that took a fair bit of skill, or they behaved in an especially caring way towards a child, or anything like that, others can tell them they noticed and thought it was good.

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The Value of Compliments From Family Members

In fact, complimenting each other more can improve family relations anyway. There are at least two reasons for that:

1. If some family members have been getting on other ones' nerves a lot or behaving badly, it might be difficult for the annoyed ones to think of anything good about the ones who've been making them angry, and irritation with them can escalate even when they're not doing anything bad, simply because the ones who've been annoyed are mulling over the bad things they have done. If every family member deliberately looks out for good things the other ones do that they can compliment them for, they can notice things they wouldn't have paid any attention to before, and they can feel a bit easier in themselves, because they can realise things at least aren't all bad.
2. The other reason is that when a person's complimented for doing something, they're often encouraged to do it more, both because they enjoy pleasing someone who's going to compliment them, and because if they realise something they do is well thought of, they'll think it's worth doing more. So a family can all end up being more considerate and co-operative with each other when they get into the habit of complimenting each other a fair bit.

The most important thing is that if it substitutes to some extent for the abuser's compliments, and makes your daughter think too highly of herself to be content with settling for someone who abuses her, it'll help you draw her away from him.

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Thinking Through What Might Substitute For Any Good Things the Abusive Relationship Provides

At first, your daughter might not be able to think of any specific things that attract her to her boyfriend, but she might just tell you the reason she wants to be with him is because she's in love with him, or he's "really cute" or something, which doesn't give you any information as to why. But it won't be as simple as just an emotion of love drawing her to him; there will be reasons why it's happening. So you could ask her questions to find out just what it is that attracts her to him, for example, "Does he make you feel special or loved or cared for?" (if yes) "How does he do that?" and so on.

Then you could discuss with her how she might get more of the things that draw her to him in her life if she wasn't going out with him. If she says her boyfriend makes her laugh a lot, for instance, you could ask her if laughter is one of the things she feels she's been missing in life and talk through with her other ways she could have more fun, perhaps offering to do things with her that'll entertain both of you. You won't have to ask her if she'll be willing to give up her boyfriend if you do that, because she'll likely say no. But the more you help her get what she values about her relationship in other more healthy ways, the easier she might find it to break away from it when she wants to, and the sooner the day might come when she does want to.

Naturally there are things that might attract her to the relationship that you won't be able to substitute for, for instance if she admits she feels compelled to keep spending time with him for the sexual pleasure he provides. Still, you could suggest to her that he isn't the only one who could do that. Also, a significant part of that might well be the physical affection he gives her, such as hugging and petting. You, as a parent, and other family members, could perhaps hug her and lightly caress her more often, such as stroking her hair and rubbing her shoulders, telling her how much she means to you. It may even be that she will find genuinely loving sincere physical affection more of a draw than what the abuser's been offering.

Try and choose a good time for the conversation, rather than trying to have it at the first opportunity. It'll be best not to try it when she's in a stroppy mood or getting ready to go out or busy in some other way, naturally, although there might never be an ideal time.

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The Emotional Needs Everyone Has

Everyone has emotional needs that have to be fulfilled for them to be happy. Psychologists have listed what they all are. People can do without a few of them for a while, but the more a person lacks, and the longer they lack them for, the more likely they are to be unhappy and to resort to unhealthy behaviours to fill the gap in their lives or to stop them being unhappy. Here's the list of things everyone needs to be truly happy:

The need to give and receive attention:

Everyone needs regular good-quality contact with others, or they can begin to crave contact with other humans and might seek it in unhealthy ways because it seems easiest to grab what's on offer.

Taking care of the body's needs can help keep the emotions in a good state:

Doing your best to keep your body healthy can actually help keep your mind healthy as well. A lot of people know that sleep deprivation can lead to irritability, feelings of stress and anxiety, lack of concentration and sluggishness do to tiredness and so on. But it probably isn't so well-known that some vitamin deficiencies can cause chemical changes that make people more prone to depression, for example. So eating a healthy diet can improve the mood and make it less likely that people will want to seek gratification in unhealthy places.

Also eating regularly will help, since not doing so can cause feelings of edginess, irritability, depression or lethargy and so on, and people can crave to relieve them by doing things that might be bad for them, such as spending time with people who are abusive to others as a subconscious way of getting an adrenaline boost and having their feelings of irritation with others relieved with laughter and the satisfaction of seeing someone put down. Unfortunately, someone who's abusive to others is more likely to be abusive to them, so being with them makes it more likely they'll be on the receiving end one day.

Exercising regularly also boosts the mood, making it less likely a person will seek to boost it in unhealthy ways.

The need for purpose and meaning in life and things to do to make life fulfilling:

The satisfaction of feeling there's a reason for living can make people feel more contented so they're less likely to seek contentment in unhealthy ways. Also, people's brains are built for getting down to work to find ways to solve problems and challenges. If a brain hasn't got anything to work on or can't solve them so people don't have the satisfaction of overcoming obstacles, the imagination can start blowing little things out of proportion more, as if it's creating its own problems. When people have worthwhile things outside themselves to focus on, they can often be happier than if they only have themselves to think about so they brood on little things till they seem like real problems because they're blown out of proportion.

Or people can crave more challenge and excitement in life, so they're more likely to find themselves in situations where they have problems, that might not be all that easy to solve.

And if a person feels their life has direction and purpose and that they really have something good to live for that they want to dedicate themselves to, they're again less likely to stray into situations that give them a false temporary sense of fulfilment by filling the void in their lives. They're less likely to want to waste time on such things, for one thing.

A sense of working for common goals with others:

When people feel they're part of a group of like-minded people who want the same thing and are working towards achieving something they'll be pleased with, it can give them a real sense of companionship and direction in life, and prevent the feelings of isolation that can compel people to seek solace in unhealthy places. One of the attractions of some abusers is that they can put on a show of caring and provide what appears to be understanding companionship. A person who enjoys doing activities with a group of like-minded people will be less likely to have the time, as well as being less likely to crave the companionship, that'll make them easier prey for an abuser. Also, if they feel their life is going in a healthy direction and has purpose, they're less likely to want to be distracted from it by someone who seems to hold the promise of excitement and companionship, but who they know in their heart of hearts isn't a good person to be with.

Being in a group of people who all care about something they're working towards will also take a person's focus off themselves so they don't brood on any feelings of loneliness, inadequacy and other unsettling things they have until they're blown out of proportion and the person's easy prey for someone who senses their vulnerability and comes in the guise of a comforter and sympathetic listening ear to get control of them and make them feel more and more dependent on them for sympathy and understanding till they can abuse them and they won't want to leave them.



There are quite a few things that could give people a pleasant sense of companionship and worth or enjoyment in life, including joining some kind of club and being involved in planning and carrying out fun activities, being part of a team working for a charity or doing some other voluntary work, campaigning for a cause with like-minded people, and so on. For one thing, when people think their lives are going somewhere and they're with people who are optimistic they're heading somewhere good, they can have too much pride in themselves or self-respect to tolerate being bullied for long by an abuser who might at first seem charming and caring but soon starts to humiliate and try to control them and isolate them from friends.

The need to be creative and learn new things:

It increases a person's mental well-being when they're learning or improving new skills they want and can enjoy putting them to use. It can make people feel their life has value and give them a satisfying sense of achievement and progress. Without it, their lives can feel dull and meaningless, and they can feel worthless and seek to quell their dissatisfaction with quick fixes that aren't good for them long-term, such as comfort eating or the excitement of a bad relationship.

Learning a new skill doesn't necessarily mean going on a course; even downloading a new game from the Internet and learning how to play it well would help satisfy the need.

The need for a confidante:

People need to have someone they trust in their lives who they can unburden themselves to when they're unhappy, and who they can share their hopes, dreams and ideas with, and who will identify with them or at least be interested in what they're saying. If someone feels no one's interested in them as a person, they can be more easily swept along by someone who seems to care about them, clinging onto the attention even when there are signs the relationship's going wrong, because they value it so much.

The need to feel important or recognised as someone of worth:

People's mental health and motivation and happiness increase if they know they're thought of as people who matter or who are carrying out important tasks. Everyone likes being appreciated for what they do. When people are put in a position where they know they're valued or considered trustworthy, they can take more pride in themselves, and their self-esteem rises so they're less likely to willingly get into situations where they're treated as if they don't have any worth, such as where they're being treated as a doormat by an abuser.

There are two other emotional needs, extremely important ones, which a person spending a lot of time with an abuser will probably find themselves severely lacking:

The need to have control over one's circumstances:

Losing control over a part of life can affect the mental health badly. For instance, if someone feels they have to obey orders without question rather than being able to do their own thing, they're not likely to be as happy as people who have more say in what they do. If someone loses control over their body, because it's under threat from an abuser or they're often being coerced into doing things they'd rather not do, or their health is disintegrating, it's even worse.

The need for safety and security:

Everyone needs to have a fair amount of predictability in their lives so they're not under constant worry that they could be facing a threat or a challenge too difficult to cope with at any minute. It's important that people can feel safe, and that their health and well-being isn't under immediate threat or so bad they find it difficult to cope.

Subtly Criticising the Abusive Boyfriend

Your daughter might not be able to see any warning signs of problems in her relationship at the moment, or maybe doesn't want to think about possible ones because she wouldn't want to give up the benefits of the relationship. But you could still ask her whether she can foresee a point in the future where if certain characteristics he has became worse, they could cause her problems, and suggest ways they might do that, such as if he wants to isolate her from friends by insisting they're no good for her, as many abusers do, or orders her around, and so on.

Even if she doesn't think there's anything in what you're saying at the moment, having the conversation on her mind might make her look out for possible warning signs of trouble more, so she spots what you've been talking about more over time.

If you discuss with your daughter what possible drawbacks she can foresee occurring in her relationship, if she's willing to talk it through with you, don't bad-mouth her boyfriend or it'll likely put her on the defensive and the conversation might turn into an argument where she's defending him and you're disputing what she says, and no one wants to give any ground so she just defends him more and more vehemently. That'll be the opposite of what you want, naturally. That doesn't mean don't criticise him at all, but it's probably best done if you phrase what you're saying in terms of, "It's possible I'm wrong, but in my own personal opinion, it seems to me that he's ..." (whatever), and then, "I mean, remember when he ... and remember when he said ... and remember when he did ..." (whatever) "What do you think?"

If it's phrased in terms of just you expressing your personal opinion, rather than it coming across to her as you pressuring her to change her mind about him, she might be more willing to listen.

You could also ask her questions to encourage her to think things through for herself, such as:

• Is there anything about your boyfriend that makes you think he might ever want to control you in a way that makes you unhappy, such as not wanting you to see your friends and family, ordering you around, not letting you do things he doesn't like the idea of for no particularly good reason, and that kind of thing?
• Do you think you'd feel secure with him long-term, or are there things that might make you worry, such as an unpredictable temper, bad habits with spending too much money, going off and flirting with other women and so on?
• Do you think he'd make a good father to any children you had together?

Even if she insists there's nothing wrong with the relationship when you have the conversation, don't be too discouraged, because you might have given her ideas that prompt her to look out for signs of things about the relationship that would make her unhappy, so she might come to the conclusion on her own after some thought and noticing more things that the relationship isn't good for her and it would be best ended before it goes further.

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Part Two
Trying to Manipulate the Abusive Boyfriend Into Showing Himself Up For What he Really Is

It might be tempting to tell someone involved with an abusive boyfriend in detail about everything you don't like about him, even trying to insist she gives him up, and disputing with her every time she says something nice about him. You might persuade her to leave him, but she might instead become rebellious. The trouble is that if she's in love with him, she won't want to hear anything bad you say about him, so she might well defend him rather than listening to you, arguing with you, and defending him more and more vehemently the more bad things you say about him, digging her heels in. The trouble with arguments is often that instead of one side convincing the other, each side makes a more and more determined attempt to defend themselves or convince the other person of their point of view the more under attack they feel, thinking of more and more reasons why they must be right, so in the end they believe their own side of things more firmly than they did before. So arguing with your daughter about her boyfriend might actually make her more committed to him.

Also, abusers tend to like to try to isolate their victims from their family and friends. One way they do that is by telling them they're no good for them and saying bad things about them. If your daughter tells her boyfriend you've been rowing with her, it'll give him an excuse to tell her you only want to be nasty to her and haven't got her interests at heart, don't understand her and are unreasonably prejudiced against him, or something like that, and he'll do his best to persuade her to spend more time with him instead of you.

There are other ways of trying to put your daughter off her abusive boyfriend though.

One is to invite him to a tea at your house or a picnic, or some kind of family get-together, and try to show him up for what he is by getting him to unwittingly reveal what kind of person he really is out of his own mouth. If you can ask him questions that he's likely to answer in a way that makes him look bad, while you give the impression, at least at first, as far as you can, that they're just innocent questions rather than an attempt to cross-examine him or make him look bad, your daughter might begin to see him for what he really is. It's more likely to put her off him if he's subtly manipulated into condemning himself out of his own mouth.

If you show him hospitality on the occasion and try and keep your cool so she can't go away feeling more angry with you than she does with him, she might start brooding on his bad points till she becomes dissatisfied with him, or she might get downright disillusioned with him that very evening, they might argue and split up.

It'll probably be difficult to keep your cool if he starts saying offensive things. It could test your patience to the limit. The natural instinct will be to want to shout at him or get angry and end up rowing with him. But it's important that you try not to, at least at first, for two reasons:

• If he's prone to violence, a quarrel will increase the chances he'll get nasty.
• It's essential that the impression left in your daughter's mind is that he was the nasty one. It's naturally very important that she can't say anything afterwards like, "You really let me down" or "I'm ashamed of the way you behaved", because if her mind's focused on your behaviour, and especially if she partly blames you for the way he behaved, she won't have her focus of attention on her boyfriend's behaviour and be worrying over that so much. His behaviour will have more impact on her feelings if she ends up thinking you acted reasonably but he got unpleasant for no good reason.

Inviting him out somewhere public might be better than inviting him to your house, because he'll probably be less likely to risk getting violent if he feels really provoked if he's in public, especially if he wants to behave reasonably well to make a good impression on you and your daughter, which he probably will if they haven't been going out long.

He might reveal more about his behaviour and attitudes if you offer him alcohol though, which might well loosen his tongue, making him more likely to admit to things that make him look bad.

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Or rather than just trying to get him to discredit himself on one single day or evening, you could try it bit by bit over a period of time.

You could ask him several questions throughout the time you're together that there's a good chance he'll answer in a way that either incriminates him or makes him look plain stupid.

But try not to make it sound like an interrogation, or he won't want to keep answering. If you can keep it sounding fairly casual, changing the subject if things get quite heated and perhaps coming back to it later, then he's less likely to feel as if you're hostile and putting pressure on him.

Also, you could plan it so if things begin to get worryingly heated, somebody with you can interrupt and offer something nice that's likely to soothe tempers for a while, such as a plate of cakes.

Sometimes, people can reveal a side to their nature under provocation that they simply wouldn't usually reveal in the first stages of a relationship with a new girlfriend or boyfriend. When people get angry, they tend to get rash, and say things before they think about whether it's really a good idea; so making him a little angry might help uncover what kind of person he really is. Perhaps your daughter hasn't seen much of her boyfriend's bad side, or can make excuses for it because, for example, she thinks abusive things he says are only meant humorously, which she might think especially if he says some of them in a quirky way. But if you mildly provoke him, he might get far nastier than she thinks you deserve, so she might have second thoughts about going out with him, and he also might reveal off-putting things about his attitudes to women under provocation that he wouldn't if he wasn't in a bit of a temper.

On the other hand, try not to let it escalate too far. Arguments tend to start over one thing but then take on a life of their own, because each person gets heated by the insult the other one flung at them last so they're likely to respond in an insulting way, which will annoy the other person so they'll respond in an annoyed way which will provoke the other person, and so on. And the more heated a person gets, the more angry they'll become by each individual insult. So you might think the argument's about the thing you said that annoyed him in the first place, when actually it's all about you both feeling provoked by the last thing the other person said all the time. Arguments can escalate like that so much they can turn violent. So try not to get too heated, in case he gets more abusive than you can handle.

Abusers can often be extremely jealous and possessive. That ugly trait might be revealed in him if you invite a long-term male friend of your daughter's along and ask if he'll laugh and joke and talk with her a lot of the time. He could even do the occasional thing like - when your daughter's boyfriend is looking - touching her shoulder or something for the briefest of times, saying he just wants to pick a hair off her clothes or something. If your daughter's boyfriend gets unreasonably angry with him or starts picking on him, it'll help your daughter see him for what he really is. Warn the friend what he might be in for, naturally.

And it'll be important that he does make it clear that he's only a friend of your daughter who isn't interested in taking her away from the boyfriend, and that your daughter says he's just been a friend for years. That way, if the boyfriend gets jealous and angry, your daughter won't think he has good cause to do so. Also, it might prevent him getting so angry things escalate to violence, even if he suspects there's more to it really.

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Here are some examples of questions you might want to ask a man you suspect of being a woman abuser. It'll probably be best if a lot of them come from a young person such as a male friend of your daughter rather than parents, who won't be expected to take such an interest in such things. You could even try to persuade a young male friend of yours to befriend the boyfriend and be with him on his own a few times, where he might well reveal far more about his attitudes to women than he will when women are present, especially one or two women he wants to impress at that stage.

Another possibility is using recording equipment to capture what the boyfriend says when he thinks he's talking man-to-man, and play it back to your daughter later, provided you can be confident that what you're doing will remain undetected, since if he finds out and thinks you're snooping on him or trying to entrap him, it could make it dangerous for you, naturally.

Adapt any ideas in this article to your own situation rather than just using them as they're written. Always keep safety in mind, naturally. Think about what could possibly go wrong and how you could best try to prevent it happening.

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One Kind of Conversation Where an Abusive Boyfriend Might Reveal Off-Putting Things About Himself

Here are some suggested questions you could ask him, with the reasons why asking each one might help put your daughter off him. It might take several questions to do that, since his responses to just one or two could be interpreted by her as just humorous, or not enough evidence to make a compelling case to give him up.

Don't ask the questions soon after he arrives, naturally, because he's most likely to want to be on his best behaviour then, and also it'll sound as if you just invited him there to ask them. It'll probably be best to wait till people feel more relaxed, have maybe loosened their tongues a little by having the odd bit to drink, and the conversation's already flowing nicely. Then the subject can gently be brought around to the topic of his attitudes to women, perhaps with you telling a couple of funny stories related to the subject before you ask any questions, so people will be relaxed and the conversation will sound more natural as it drifts onto the topic of what he's really like.

Then these are the kinds of questions you could try asking him:

If someone said to you, "I bet you found it hard enough to get your current girlfriend; I reckon if you weren't going out with her, you'd have no chance of finding another woman", what would you say?

The question might encourage him to start boasting about techniques he uses to attract women and his attitude to women. If he reveals he deliberately turns on a charming act or witty conversation, and often chats up a woman just in the hope of getting laid, his girlfriend might well be disillusioned with him, partly because she will have assumed the charm and good humour wasn't put on but part of his personality, and partly because she probably won't like the idea that he treats women as cheap and easy lays. So the more he can be encouraged or provoked into revealing about his habits and attitudes, especially those to women, the better.

The best way of getting him to do that might be to say something mildly provocative that'll come across as an affront to his pride, so he wants to prove that the opposite of what you said is true. Saying something too provocative probably won't work, at least at first, because it might end up with you just firing angry words at each other about how unfair you're being to start talking to him like that or something. There has to be just enough of a hint of provocation to make him feel his pride needs protecting so he wants to boast.

There might be a problem if instead of giving you an answer, he angrily says something like, "Is that what you think??" So it'll be best if you're prepared for that and can give a justification for asking the question, and for all the other questions you might ask as well. For instance, if he does ask if you're insulting him by questioning his abilities, you could maybe say something calmly like, "No, I don't really know you well, do I. I'm just interested in finding out more about you."

Do you reckon you could seduce any woman you wanted, or do you think it would be hard to find one who'd go for you?

Again, the question's meant to prompt him to boast in a way that might cause him to reveal that his charm, caring, wit or whatever else he used to attract your daughter, is just a cold premeditated strategy he uses in the cause of getting laid quickly or attracting a girlfriend.

OK, what technique would you use to pick a woman up? Give us like a step-by-step guide on how you'd go about it.

Similarly, the question's meant to encourage him to unwittingly reveal that his charm, good nature or whatever else he uses to attract women, is not a permanent part of his personality but something he puts on for the purposes of attracting a woman. Your daughter might expect him to be like that permanently, so even after he's abused her, she might stay with him in the hope that things will get back to the nice way they were at first. And they might for a while, because he might turn on the charm again so as not to lose her. But the more she comes to think it's just a strategy he uses to get what he wants, the more she'll come to see him for what he really is and want to get out of the relationship.

What would you do if you'd been chatting up a girl for a couple of hours, and you thought you had a good thing going, but then she told you she was celibate and she wasn't interested in sex and didn't think anyone should have sex till well on into a relationship?

His answer might give you a clue as to whether he thinks of women as sex objects and that the purpose of approaching one is just to get laid, and also whether he'd use any coercive techniques to pressure a woman into having sex with him, and look down on a woman who didn't see things the way he did. The more he reveals about any bad attitudes to women he has, the less someone will like the idea of being his girlfriend.

If you're so good with women, have you ever managed to get a girl you'd met earlier that evening in a club or pub or at a party to have sex with you when she didn't want to at first? If you have, how? If you were advising a mate who was having a bit of hard luck with women and asked you how to do that, would you recommend he did, and if so, what would you say was a good way of doing that?

If a question like that is asked, and his guard's down and he thinks you think it's acceptable behaviour so he boasts about having done that, then it might expose him as a callous user who disrespects women and your daughter might be put off him.

On the other hand, a person asking a question like that will have to be careful. If it sounds as if they're approving of that kind of behaviour and think it's fun, your daughter will likely start thinking there must be a nasty side to their own character! Yet sounding too accusing might make the abuser want to save face by denying he'd ever do a thing like that when he would really. It might be best to try not to give too much away in your tone of voice or facial expression.

It might be best if all the questions are asked when your daughter isn't there, by a male friend of hers when just the two of them are having the conversation, and it can be secretly recorded and played back to her later, with it being explained to her that the reason her male friend was taking an interest in such things was just because he wanted to find out more about what kind of person the boyfriend is, out of concern that she might get hurt if he doesn't treat women well.

If one of your mates was having a bit of hard luck with women and you thought they really needed to learn how to turn on the charm, how would you advise them?

Again, if he boasts of his ability to charm the ladies and explains how it's done, he will be unwittingly revealing to your daughter that his charm is an act, not a lovely and permanent part of his personality, as she may be assuming it is.

What would you say are the signs that a woman's letting you know she wants to have sex with you?

He might start off by mentioning things that would genuinely seem to be signs of sexual interest, such as leaning a knee against his and touching him; But you could ask follow-on questions, such as asking his opinion on whether if a girl laughed at his jokes, it was a sure sign he was in with a chance. It's possible he'll reveal distasteful attitudes about how if a woman does things she might do with just anyone who sits by her, such as laughing and chatting with him, he has a licence to turn things sexual because he's sure she must be sexually interested. He might even reveal attitudes about how he doesn't take no for an answer or similar things.

What's the quickest you've ever got a woman you've just met to have sex with you?

If you can get him to start boasting about sexual conquests he's made, especially in a way that makes it sound as if he thinks of women as just sex objects, then your daughter might start to get put right off him.

What do you think a woman goes for in a man? Some say women like a bit of excitement so they're attracted to men who can be a bit aggressive and abusive sometimes, but they think nice guys are boring and they'll ignore a nice guy in favour of someone who treats them and others a bit roughly. What would you say?

His views on what women want could really put your daughter off him, if he's silly enough to reveal them. That's especially true if he reveals more about any violent streak he has, and the women who've supposedly been attracted to it.

Have you noticed that women are more keen to have sex with you when you're aggressive towards them?

That might encourage him to reveal more about how aggressive he gets as well as more about his disrespectful and warped attitude to women.

If a woman insulted you in public and you were embarrassed, what would you do?

If he reveals a controlling abusive attitude to women, it might help put your daughter off him.

If you had a girlfriend that cheated on you, how do you think she'd deserve to be treated?

Again, if he thinks she deserves a punishment that seems too harsh, such as a physical beating, it might show him up for what he is in front of your daughter. If it sparks an argument between them, it could help to end the relationship.

Have you ever been out with a woman who really tested your patience to the limit? What did you have to end up doing to keep her in line?

If you can somehow say that without sounding too accepting in a way that'll worry your daughter, or accusing, unless you're finding that sounding accusing is producing results because he's defending his ugly behaviour more and more the more you protest about it, then you might get better results. Naturally what you're doing shouldn't seem anything like a police interrogation to him, but you can still borrow one or two tactics from police interrogations that can encourage good results. One is to sound understanding, as if the person asking the questions empathises with the accused because they understand how easy it must have been to be tempted to do something bad in the situation they were in, and doesn't think it's fair that they should be held entirely to blame as if there was no good reason for what they did. People can be more likely to plead guilty if they think they'll receive a certain amount of sympathy.

Likewise, if you ask an abuser a question in a way that could give the impression that you fully understand that women might need to be disciplined harshly sometimes, then they might admit to more than if they feel you'd seriously disapprove, especially so if they're trying to impress you so you'll approve of them going out with your daughter.

Naturally you'll have to try and get a balance between sounding disapproving and too approving, since your daughter will be likely to protest if she thinks you approve of that kind of behaviour, and you'll have difficulty defending yourself without giving the game away.

Would you like to settle down and get married soon? Or would you prefer to play the field for some time, just having fun and having lots of different girlfriends till you decide on the right one?

If he says he just goes out with girls for fun, but he's led your daughter to believe she was special and he was serious about her, or if he expresses a desire to marry quickly and keep her to himself when she herself would prefer things not to get that serious for the time being, then it'll give her more reason to think about whether the relationship's really a good idea.

If a woman was married to you, how would you feel about her earning more money than you? Do you think it's right that a woman should earn more money than a man?

Many abusers have very traditional ideas about a woman's role, and are also prone to severe jealousy. So asking a question like that just might cause him to say things that betray those attitudes, which might be attitudes your daughter simply didn't realise he had.

What if your wife had a good job and she often went out with friends from work but you'd lost a job and were stuck at home doing nothing? Do you think you'd be annoyed about her going out while you were stuck at home? Would you tell her to stay at home more often with you?

If he says he'd be very annoyed and would demand she stayed with him, he'll be revealing himself to be jealous and controlling, which might be a side to him your daughter hasn't seen and doesn't like, which will help put her off him.

If some man seemed to be trying to chat up your wife or girlfriend in front of you, or was taking up a lot more of her attention than you, what would you feel like doing to him? Do you think you'd tell him to leave her alone?

Again, if he feels he can answer that truthfully and he reveals he'd be very annoyed or even use physical force to try to stop it, he'll be showing your daughter a jealous and controlling side to himself, as well as a violent one that might put her off him even more.

What's the funniest fight you've ever been in?

If he reveals a cruel bullying streak, by, for instance, laughing at his defeat of a weaker individual, then again it might help open your daughter's mind to what he's really like.

If he can't think of any funny fights at first, it might mean he hasn't been in any, but you could always start by telling him about funny fights you've been in or heard about, if any, to see if it jogs his memory.

Have you ever fought someone bigger than you and won?

If he has a violent streak, the question might encourage him to boast and reveal it.

What about scrawny little men? Has one of them ever been annoying you and you put him in his place quick as anything?

If he thinks he's picking up a sign that you admire him or are amused by his aggression towards other men who annoy him, even much weaker ones, he might boast, talking and laughing about acts of aggression he's committed that your daughter finds distasteful. It might open her eyes to what kind of person he is.

People with psychopathic personalities who don't have any qualms of conscience about any violent acts they commit can think there's glory in them, so if someone can bait them into boasting about them, they can reveal a truly ugly side of themselves they might have kept hidden before. There's the story of the psychopath who was being interrogated by the police who were trying to get him to confess to a murder. They were trying to appeal to any feelings of compassion he might have, trying to make him feel sorry for the victim's family so he'd want to spare them the misery of not knowing who killed their relative by admitting it was him. He wouldn't confess, and the police asked an expert on psychopaths to come and discuss new interrogation tactics with them. The expert recommended they taunt him about not having committed much impressive violence at all. They took his advice and jeered at the psychopath for only being in the minor league, saying that compared to some serial killers, he'd done very little. Soon the suspect was telling them about murders he had actually committed, not just the one he'd been arrested for but others the police hadn't known he'd committed.

Having said that, again, a parent trying to bait an abuser into boasting about abuse will have to be careful they don't give the impression they're a terrible person themselves, particularly in the presence of their daughter, especially if there's a possibility the boyfriend will turn out to be not that bad, and he himself might express horror at what the parent seems to be revealing about themselves!

Please can you get us in touch with a few former girlfriends of yours so we can ask them what kind of person they think you are?

If he's happy to put you in touch, it could be a promising sign, and former girlfriends would be well worth talking to to find out if he was abusive with them. But if he hates the idea and is offended that you should ask, you can suspect he has something to hide.

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Part Three
A Story Showing it can Be Easy to Grow Fond of an Abuser and Ignore Warning Signs, and How Fun and Charm Can Mask an Abusive Personality

You might have been sure right from the beginning there was something wrong with your daughter's boyfriend, or you might have since picked up on what seem very obvious warning signs that something's badly wrong with his personality. You might not understand why she can't see them. You might even get impatient with her and criticise her harshly, perhaps saying things like, "I don't understand how you can be so stupid! I always thought you'd have more sense than to go out with a creep like that!"

The trouble is that if what you say makes her feel unhappy, as well as feeling indignant that you're saying horrible things about her, she might run to him for consolation. You might not think he'd be capable of giving much of it, but people can sometimes show dramatically different sides of their character in different situations, and you might never have seen the bits of his that appeal to her most. He might even just be putting them on to keep her interested, but she might not know that.

If a person's getting enough out of a relationship, before nasty things begin to happen, and sometimes even afterwards, they can treat things that would otherwise put them right off a person as if they have a lot less significance.

---

These things can be illustrated with a story about something that happened on an Internet forum, where someone disregarded what she knew of another member's abusive side and had a fun, playful friendship with him till he turned his verbal abuse on her, and on his real-life girlfriend. There were a few reasons she didn't let the early signs of his abusive personality put her off him. This will go some way to demonstrating why early signs of an abusive nature can be tolerated even though an outsider to the situation observing them might think the one on the receiving end of most of the unpleasantness should cut all contact with the abuser immediately.

Warning: This story contains quotations full of abusive language, to illustrate the way the abuser in it, and probably many other abusers too, can swing from being playful to being nasty.

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Before she'd encountered him, if anyone had asked her if she'd ever want to be friends with someone who often bullied another man on an Internet forum by calling him a child molester for no good reason, who expressed the desire to kill or beat up some other forum members, and who even recommended another forum member kill his baby son, making a tasteless joke about it, she'd have said no way!! She'd have thought she wouldn't dream of associating with such a person. She'd have considered it was completely against her morals, and that she wouldn't want anything whatsoever to do with such a man. Yet that's what she did. She even spent some afternoons enjoying battles of wits with him, and got in contact with him via email after he was banned from the forum. Why? ...

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He posted under a succession of aliases, coming back with a new username every time he got banned. I'll change everyone's names for the purpose of the story. He can be BullyBoy. The woman who remained friends with him for a while despite the early signs of his abusive nature can be called Sharon. The man the bully taunted about being a child molester can be called Thomas Trump. One of the moderators who kept banning him can be called TinyTrousers.

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This story's actually quite long, so if you'd prefer to go straight to the most important things:

• Jump to the conclusion: How Fun and Charm Can Sometimes Mask an Abusive Personality, and How Some Kinds of Fun and Charm Themselves Can Be Warning Signs.
• Or jump to what psychologists say about the symptoms of a couple of personality disorders abusers can have.

Some of the Nasty Things the Abuser Said on the Forum, and Some Reasons Why Sharon Tolerated Them and Even Laughed at Some of Them

Here are a few of the things BullyBoy said that one might imagine would put Sharon off him for life, but didn't:

On one occasion, when BullyBoy worried he was about to get banned, he started expressing the wish to do people harm in revenge for wanting him banned. Another member said he didn't have the right to think he was being treated unfairly if he did get banned, since he'd been calling Thomas a child molester without evidence. He told BullyBoy he was lucky no one knew who he really was, and that if people weren't allowed to be anonymous on forums, he'd hopefully be more considerate to people for fear he'd be in danger.

BullyBoy responded,

Aw, shut up, you pious fuck. How many times do I hav to tell* you that, with me, you simlpy shut your gab up until asked for your opinion, peroid? I wish I could meet this big mouthed, blustering fuckhead in real* life, far, far away from the warm blanket of his anonimity, and see just how much his gab would work when I started saving him a visit to his dentist by knocking out his teeth(free of charge, too!) not to mention twisting his cunt insid out. Lol....You are a fuckin clown, mate. One of em fags that needs a beating, and a coupla broken bones here n there....what say you?

Sharon was sickened by his comments. Yet still, after a few weeks, after he got back on the board with a different username, asked her to email him and gave her his email address, she did email him.

Why? Why didn't that awful thing he said put her off him for life?

The truth is that she'd found the witty exchanges between them fun, and she missed them. She was hoping to be entertained again. His banning had left a gap in her life, a life which was fairly dull, and her work could sometimes be a bit depressing. She really appreciated the lift she got from having fun with him on the forum, and it actually helped her work better, perhaps because it raised the adrenaline levels in her brain so she was more alert, as well as more cheerful. It also gave her more variety in life so she felt refreshed after the break from work rather than finding work as monotonous as she would have done if she was doing that and nothing else. And finding she had the ability to fire off quickfire witty responses to what he said made her feel good because she could have pride in knowing she was talented like that. She didn't get the opportunity for that much fun anywhere else; he was the only one who enabled her to have fun like that and give her mental energy and enjoyment of life a boost by using her creative witty side.

Abuse victims, too, can hold precious memories of good times in their minds and they can have a more powerful sway over them than one recent episode of abuse, especially if it was apologised for. Abusers can often put on really convincing displays of supposedly heart-felt emotion when they apologise, so it's easy to think they're really sorry.

A woman was once interviewed on television who had a good strategy for reminding herself about what the abusive boyfriend she'd left had really been like, every time she missed him and felt like going back to him because the memories of his abuse were fading a bit and a more powerful influence over her mind was her memories of the good times they'd had and the times he could be nice: She wrote down lots of abusive things she could remember him saying, and stuck them on her walls, so she had a constant reminder of what he was really like.

Looking back, it could be thought especially surprising that sharon was willing to maintain a friendship with BullyBoy for as long as she did, given he once registered with a username almost the same as hers so he could pretend to be her, as he did with several others on the forum to make fun of them by pretending to be them and saying obnoxious things; and when most of his accounts were banned after his bullying became quite intense, he used the one with her name to say to the person banning them, who had a little baby boy at the time:

... btw, I would protect that baby if I were you, TinyTrousers my ole' pal. You never know mwhen the Thomas Trumps of this world might be lurking around the corner!

But of course, the correct thing for you to do withy that little monkey would be to hurl him against the parapet, to end any misery he iis undouvbltedy going to suffer at school at the hands of bullies, who would probably hang the buggger from a tree! HA HA HA HA! Are'n I a scream , TinyTrousers?

And to the person he was taunting about being a child molester, he taunted some more under another username:

Come, come, Trump! You surely Don't mean to saythat you haven't been having fun along with the rest of us? I mean, (and I hope you dont mind me saying this in public,) didnt you send me a private message just the other saying 'hey, I simply loved it when those sweet dudes discuss my sexual abnormalities, Cos it sooooo excites me! And then you went on to tell me in a whisper how you despised TinyTrousers for banning your old cronies, and that as a ounishment, you wre going to break intyo his house one day, and rape his poor, deformed son! with the inside asssistance, as it is known to the police, of his buck teethed spouse, who would hold the former down while you ecstasically put himthrough the motions! Oh, come off it thomas! What do you mean 'Hey! you betrayed moi trust, maite! for Gawds saike, wot's wrong with ya?" Ill tell you whats wrong, thomas, you old Child Molesting rapist, you! TinyTrousers is my friend, and I will not have you and his shameless wife plotting to molest his baby, however deformed he may be, without blowing the whistle!!

hey, TinyTrousers! TinyTrousers!! where art thou, my old diligent anti-troller? Dont tell me you have stolen a nap again, when there is serious work to be done? Shocking! Indeed, hearing about Thomas sexualy harras his two year old neice would hardly shock me more!

Why in the world would Sharon have wanted anything to do with him after a campaign of bullying against the man that culminated in taunts like that just before he was banned?

The truth was that for some time he'd been entertaining. Sharon didn't take the nasty things he said seriously, because so many of the abusive things he said were said in a quirky creative way that made it seem as if there was no real serious intent to hurt behind them. The amusing style of them obscured their real abusive nature. That only came out later in its most obvious form. At the time, it was exciting in a morbid kind of way to go to the board every morning to see if there were new horrors waiting there to be found. She would half grin, half cringe as she read the mocking things he said about the man. They gave her an adrenaline boost that gave her days a lift. She valued the entertainment, since her life was rather unexciting and they brightened her day. They did that all the more because the man BullyBoy was taunting was someone she was annoyed with. If he'd mocked someone she really liked the way he did Thomas, she wouldn't have tolerated it.

She would, nevertheless, have protested and stood up to BullyBoy, if it wasn't for the fact that Thomas had said something silly while they'd been arguing about disapproving of people who defend others, saying they're just trying to protect something they themselves believe in from being attacked, wanting to hamper free speech. So apart from the odd mild protest and warning to BullyBoy that he could get banned, Sharon just sat back and enjoyed the fun. It turned out that Thomas Trump wasn't as keen on freedom of speech when he was on the receiving end of its more unpleasant side, and complained to a moderator and got BullyBoy banned a number of times! And once he was fed up of being bullied and left the board for months.

One reason Sharon didn't take BullyBoy's mockery of Thomas that seriously was that she knew that if Thomas had stood up for himself and given as good as he got, there was the potential for the whole thing to stop being nasty and just be a bit of fun.

Having Fun With the Abuser

Sharon herself had teasing matches with BullyBoy that were just good-natured fun, though there was an undercurrent of abusiveness in them on both sides that she didn't see as real abusiveness at the time. For instance, here's the kind of thing they'd say in their teasing matches (BullyBoy happened to come from Sri Lanka, though his English was good because he'd been educated in Britain for years):

Sharon: They tell me you're so keen to make Sri Lanka look like a successful sporting nation that you approached the England cricket team with a special offer; you said that next time England played a series of matches against Sri Lanka, you'd pay them 2 million dollars if they'd purposely lose them all.

And what do ou mean, "thailand hadnt been discovered at the tmie winnie was alive?" like you woul nkow..you were born three whole years after the boer war! you're too young, sharon!

Sharon enjoyed the way he could answer back like that. It kept her coming back for more teasing matches.

One thing that kept Sharon interested was that BullyBoy used a kind of flattery on her as well as having fun battles of wits with her and being able to mock Thomas amusingly.

Once, for instance, someone started a story where they imagined other forum members getting up to some adventures. BullyBoy wrote a follow-on part:

Sharon, Thomas and the rest of them wlaked and walked.

Begone, you worms!!!!! thundered the stranger at the group. They scuttled like rabbits, Thomas wetting himself in the process. Only the queenly Sharon stood tall and fearless, staring straight at the stranger...

The Abuser's Flattery and Displays of Fondness, and What Should Have Been Warning Signs

BullyBoy also wrote Sharon a kind of amusing love poem:

A TRIBUTE TO Sharon, MY BETHROED

I was strolling along the streets of fame,
Basking in the glory emanating from my name,
Caring naught for neither beast nor man,
Revelling in the knowledge that everyone was my fan.

I stood upon my pinnacle of intellectual power,
Little knowing that this was the eleventh hour,
Of my pride, my joy, my might, my mammon,
For I was about to fall for a woman.

(And then, fuck it, it happened...)

The years of success must have rendered me complacent,
For when, turning, I beheld a stranger, it was anything but pleasant.
I marvelled that she was standing on the same lofty level as me,
But seizing my rapier, I thundered ''I'll make short work of thee!"

(This is where it gets exciting!)

We crossed swords, and a battle commenced,
One of vicious attack and superb defence.
A struggle that would go down in the annals of history,
As the only one in which THE GREATEST failed to
blaze a brilliant victory.

(See what happened when the damn thing ended, will you?)

As the echoes died away, and the dust began to settle,
I perceived that here was an antagonist worthy of my mettle.
I had at last met my Moriarty, my Evil Genius,
I was sure of this as I was that my middle name was Phineas.

(Who should have been flying by at that moment, but that fockin' nuisance, Cupid.)

Spotting me, Cupid stopped and reached for his bow.
"A customer," he mused, "A client, what Ho!"
Grinning like a Mormon, he pulled out an arrow,
And shot it straight into my big toe.

I turned, and suddenly, Moriarty had gone,
And so had the rugged crag I'd been standing upon.
I was suddenly in the middle of the Garden of Eden,
Surrounded by an ochestra playing a lilting peice by Hayden.

Floating before me, where Moriarty had been,
Was a virus-shaped vision, of beautifulness
the world has never seen,
(I know, fuck it, dont YOU ever make grammar mistakes when in intense emotional turmoil? Jeeez!)
Clasping her to my bosom, I showered kisses on her upturned face,
I twirled her around and whispered hoarsely,

''Sharon, MY MATE!"

Sharon thought his apparent adoration of her was a bit strange, but one reason she didn't want to discourage it was because she felt flattered by it. So she let it continue, enjoying what seemed to be the admiration.

One day, BullyBoy sent Sharon a message asking for her real name and phone number. He said he'd like to talk to her on Facebook and would love to know her in real life. Sharon was a bit startled that he'd do something like that, since after all, they hardly knew each other. She didn't give him any of her personal details. She made a joke of it and told him someone had hacked into his account and asked for her phone number. He expressed fake outrage and told her it was his worse self, and his better self would have to keep him in order. The incident was just shrugged off as something insignificant and they carried on their friendly relations. In fact, their friendship grew warmer, Sharon oblivious to his real intentions.

They had a bit of a joke about his worse self and his better self on the board after that. For instance, one day, after he said she ought to use a particular kind of joke and she jokingly said she might start and would perhaps use it to make fun of him for practice, he said:

Well, Sharon, it was with great determination and courage that I overcame my Worse Self, who suddenly materialized beside me and growled "Ooh, er, BullyBoy, 'eres the chance for thee to- (Yes, I know, he speaks Old English because he went to Eton) 'eres the chance for thee to force the young lass to pay for being allowed to practice on yer, by revealing 'er name to yer!"

We then went to Mr justice Menmon, [a misspelling of the username of a friend of his] who ruled that a coin toss would settle the matter. The bailiff was a reformed pimp called [the name of another board member] -something, and it was he that would toss the coin. As luck would have it, the blighter's hands were shivering so much with Parkinson's Syndrome that the coin slipped out of his fingers into a gutter. Still looking for that coin. Ill let you know what the Verdict of History will be upon this point, the moment we find it, sharon.

BullyBoy was still amusing, despite the fact he was making fun of other board members for no good reason. And the joke about his better self and his worse self obscured a bit of the real nature of his abuse.

Sharon didn't think there was anything much to worry about, despite the fact that he, some stranger on a forum who seemed to have a thing about her, had asked for her phone number, and still wanted her real name. It turned out it was a sign of bad things to come; but she didn't know that then.

BullyBoy also wrote stories about the two of them. They had cute quirky amusing scenes in them like these:

Women who drew stares were not uncommon in so prestigious a restaurant as Oslo Court. But the lady who entered on the afternoon of July 7th, 2010 broke all previous records by a mile and a half.

The scenery knew that dance by heart. All you had to do, if you were a tree, was to jump up and down, and if you were a hedge, you went round and round. So the trees jumped up and down and the hedges went round and round, and Sharon and BullyBoy stood still in the middle, admiring it all...

There was an undercurrent of abusiveness towards other board members in what BullyBoy wrote that was actually pretty unpleasant including stories about them being killed. Sharon protested mildly, but it didn't put her off him. There were parts of his stories she enjoyed a lot and she'd have lost that source of amusement if he'd stopped writing them.

When he wrote those stories, BullyBoy dedicated them to Sharon and kept asking her if they were making her fall in love with him. He also often linked to love songs on YouTube and said they were dedicated to her. Sharon didn't understand why he was saying he was in love with her when he hardly knew her, or wanted her to fall in love with him. He started two threads on the same day asking her to marry him. She thought it was a bit strange, but decided to just use them as opportunities to be playful and have some fun, thinking that since it was only a forum, nothing more serious could ever happen, so it didn't really matter if she didn't put a damper on things and tell him to stop his behaviour because she wasn't interested.

It turned out she was very wrong about that, when things turned nasty. But at the time, his behaviour seemed like some kind of nutty but cute and amusing affection. Perhaps she should have known better than to think of it as odd but sweet, given that the fact that people were being killed in his stories, and the fact that his taunting of Thomas was pretty vile, suggested he was anything but sweet-natured. But she didn't know what else to make of it, perhaps naďvely.

Later she was to realise it was a sleazy attempt at flirting and winning a conquest. He even carried it on after he got a girlfriend. In fact it got more intense after that for a while. Then he started alternating between being loving, and trying to taunt her into being more playful with him, saying he was going off to see his girlfriend if she didn't, as if he thought it would be fun if they were in competition with each other. He may very well have been doing something similar with his girlfriend.

It's apparently common for abusers to express strong affection for women before they really know them, trying to rush them into a sexual relationship and even into marriage. Their infatuation can die just as quickly and then the nastiness starts, when their chosen woman's become emotionally attached to them so she won't be able to just shrug her shoulders and get away from them without looking back.

It's far healthier if friendship is developed before any romance ever comes into things, so people can find out if they get on well together in a variety of situations so they can be confident a relationship's more likely to last before it ever gets romantic.

But as for BullyBoy and Sharon, at the time, she liked his stories, and she liked the teasing matches they had, and she did develop a certain amount of fondness for him. Certainly not love, but she enjoyed his company and would go to the forum specially hoping he'd have posted something amusing.

When Things Began to Turn Unmistakably Creepy, and Why Warning Signs Were Still Being Ignored

All that changed though when he got a real-life new girlfriend and started talking about her on the board. In fact, he might have had one before then when he was chatting Sharon up as well, and the realisation made her feel bad. BullyBoy one day laughed and joked with a real-life friend of his who was also on the forum, and enthusiastically told him the story of how he'd just started going out with his new crush and was already cajoling her into having sex with him minutes into the relationship. He was talking half in some Sri Lankan language, and told Sharon it was none of her business when she asked what he was saying, which she didn't like.

Sharon was unhappy with the way he still kept telling her he loved her when he was supposed to be going out with someone for real. She didn't think it was fair on his new girlfriend. She gave a lot of hints that she wasn't interested, such as joking that she was a lesbian and would prefer to go out with his girlfriend, and that she'd decided to become a nun. She also wrote him an angry private message accusing him of being a flirt and saying it wasn't nice when he had a new girlfriend, telling him she wasn't a relationship wrecker and she didn't want him to behave like that with her.

He disregarded everything she said, and seemed to be convinced she was actually falling headlong in love with him.

For that and other reasons, relations between them deteriorated.

One day, Sharon thought she'd try to resurrect friendly relations and bring humour back to the forum by re-posting some old funny things he'd put on the board and joking about them. But it just convinced him all the more that she was in love with him.

Soon after she wrote him the message saying she wasn't a relationship wrecker and she didn't want him flirting with her after he'd just started going out with someone for real, he started a thread where he made up the beginnings of a story about her on the beach about to have sex with ... another board member. She didn't really understand why. Months later, it occurred to her that he must have somehow imagined she'd start off assuming the story would be about her and him and be pleased, and then be disappointed when it turned out to be about someone else. At the time though, she was just mystified. She objected to the story because she didn't think of other board members in that way, so she wrote a sequel to it, where the other board member turned out to be a journalist in disguise, pretending to be her lover, and when she realised he was an impostor, he ran off to chase up a story to report on for a paper about how BullyBoy was marrying Thomas Trump.

Later that day she felt a bit sorry for BullyBoy because she'd written that, and wrote another sequel where it turned out they weren't marrying after all. It was meant to be just a bit of fun. She entertained herself writing it. But so soon after she'd told him she wanted him to stop the love talk, his creepy response was:

Oh, please, Sharon. If you really must be this desperate to regain my lost love, you could at least try being a little less obvious than begging kme to let you do me favours, and wearing that ''BullyBoy's Faithful Doormat'' sticker on your bumper! Or did you forget that I detest weedy women? But dont give up, Sharon. Keep trying, and perhaps, just maybe you'll get this guy bback. You could-no, that wouldnt work. Or you might-no, that wouldnt work either....well, im darned if I know how you're gonna get me back, but keep trying, sharon! Remember that Edison failed thousand times before he invented the bulb! ...

That very day, as if he imagined she'd be in love with him no matter what, or that his revelation would upset and disappoint her, he discussed how he didn't want to settle down with a woman but just liked to "hump and dump" them, "just play with them". He described himself as a "player" who just wanted some fun. But he said he might take his relationship with his girlfriend further than he normally would with a woman, because he was quite fond of her.

In fact, in an outburst of rage, he said a friend of his girlfriend's was trying to persuade her to break up with him, and though he wouldn't physically abuse her because he wasn't "sad", if she succeeded, he'd "tear her apart emotionally"; he knew who she was going out with, and he'd beat up her boyfriend so severely he'd be in a coma or in intensive care, while she cried about him in the hospital.

And in yet another thread, he said, after Sharon made a comment about a girl leaving him:

Dumped me?? lol. People dont dump ME, womna. If theres any dumping to do, I do it. I hump em and I dump em.

Some time later, he'd utter the unsettlingly contemptuous words:

Typical female reaction. when they see they cant have you, they get butthurt and start crying.

That sounded like the voice of experience.

Ironically, ... or hypocritically, he told the story a few days after he'd boasted about playing with women for fun of how when he'd been at school with his sister, someone a couple of years above him asked her to go out with him, and dumped her a couple of weeks later, saying she wasn't "sassy" enough. He saw her crying, and when he found out why, he went and threatened the older boy that if he messed with her anymore, he'd chop his "dick" up. Then he punched the boy.

Sharon asked him why his sister's feelings were more important than those of other women. She didn't get an answer though.

Sharon became more and more disgusted with BullyBoy. They argued and stopped speaking for a while.

But several days later, BullyBoy tried to remedy the situation by sending her a private message that said:

Good afternoon, lady. (Pretty *cold* in here, though...positively snowing, in fact, the time of the day notwithstanding!) ... Your (incredible) refusal to give me your name irriates me no end. I do not give a Brit cigarette-butt that I dont know you personally, but when I ask you for your name, and an online date, you let me have them both without a word of protest, Got that? I wish I knew you in real life, Id like to see how much your gab would have worked if I strode up to you and laid before you the ultimatum that you were going to date me tonight... (my usual technique with steely willed type gals...never fails.) For more information as to the steps I propose to take from here, i beg that you ref. my profile signature. Ill give you one more chance, though. PM me your name and/or email within 24 hours. (but not ur phone no. Giving me ur fone number aint gona be enough, if you think im going to give you my personal number by calling you...well, you need IQ lessons from [another board member whom he despised], thas all. Well, I expect to have your name and email in my PM by midnight today. No bullshitting around with me about the time either, sharon. when I give you a deadline, you stick to it, thats all.

If she'd never come across him, and someone had asked her what reaction she'd have to someone who got a girlfriend, expressed the wish to seriously injure the boyfriend of one of his girlfriend's friends because she was trying to persuade his girlfriend to break up with him, and only a week or two later, he insisted she herself go on a cyber-date with him, Sharon would probably have thought she'd run away horrified, not wanting anything to do with him. And she probably would have done something like that if those things were the first things BullyBoy had done on the board. But though she certainly did protest about his threats to seriously hurt the man, she was still willing to get back on fairly friendly terms with him, even after he demanded a cyber-date, because she couldn't have predicted how nasty things would become, and she'd smiled at things he'd said for so long, even abusive things because they were often said in a quirky amusing way, that she assumed his order for a cyber-date and her real name was just a bit of fun, and also she didn't want to lose the entertainment and thought things could get back to the way they were before.

Significantly, if anyone new had come onto the board just then and seen his behaviour, they wouldn't have understood why Sharon had ever wanted anything to do with BullyBoy. They'd have seen several signs that he was likely to get nasty that she was willing to take less seriously than she should have done for the sake of giving him another chance in the hope she'd enjoy herself in his company again.

So when he demanded a cyber-date, she turned the whole thing into a joke. She sent him what she said was her real name, but in reality it was something long and outlandish. The reason she viewed his order for a date and her real name as mostly humorous was partly because he made a new signature about her that made her chuckle. Yes, she should have decided things were getting far too creepy, and that since he appeared to have absolutely no regard for his new girlfriend's feelings, plainly showing he wanted to cheat on her - even if only mentally in cyber-space, she should have decided never to speak to him again. But he started being playful at that time, and she just joked about what he'd said and foolishly assumed it could still just remain playful, since she had enjoyed herself when it was. She didn't pick up on how serious his intentions to turn things sexual were, perhaps because what he said was often phrased in a quirky jokey way. It's possible things could have got seriously menacing if she had known him in real life, with her just joking around and him convincing himself she was leading him on.

She did write a joke story about them going on a date that was designed to make fun of the fact that he seemed to keep misinterpreting what she said as signs of love for him. But it seems he didn't recognise the mocking humour in it and thought it was an even deeper sign of love for him!

Not long after that, Thomas Trump came back to the board after a long absence licking his wounds, and had BullyBoy banned again.

Just before he was banned, he said to Sharon:

id much rather BE on the board than that cranky, crooked-backed, Koran-cribbing cunt [Trump]. After all, I enjoy the luxury of sole and stern dominion over the wips and weeds that use this forum as a restroom...you happen to be one of the few exception, i must grudgingly admit....But what the heck, would this fuckheaded nobber genuinely ban me for having a little fun? "ooooh, this guys a spammer! ahhh, hes calling pore little me a choil' molestarrr oooh!!! Focking aussie runt. Thomas Trumpet-fart's evidently one of those faggy wimps who get beaten up at school and their lunch money ripped off em by dudes like me...how he survives in the Big bad world is a mysstery to me...oh, I forgot, he's a janitor in one of those orphanages.

Sharon shuddered at the thought that he maybe really did beat smaller kids up for their lunch money at school, and that he seemed to imagine she would approve of that, wondering what she'd done to give him that impression; but she still didn't see it as enough of a warning sign not to have anything else to do with him again, although it did make her cautious about it.

BullyBoy had been seeming more and more creepy to Sharon. He'd seemed a bit creepy before sometimes. For instance, in one of the threads where he asked her to marry him, he'd said he was doing his best to find out her real identity. But she had just made a joke of it, convinced nothing bad could come of it. She had been getting thoroughly fed up of him recently though, but since just before he was banned, he became entertaining again, it raised her hopes things could be the way they used to be.

So when he came onto the board under a new name and quickly told her his email address and asked her to email him before being banned again, she considered it.

When he asked her to email him, he said he hoped his girlfriend didn't see it, and that he also hoped Sharon wasn't just a little girl of about 13. She should have seen that as a warning sign that something bad might happen or that his interest was not actually in just having a bit of entertaining banter as hers was, but that he would want something sexual. But Sharon dismissed what he said as a joke, even after all that had happened. After all, she herself certainly wasn't planning to say anything flirty in any email she sent, so she unwisely assumed there couldn't possibly be a problem. She just wanted to joke around with him, talking about silly little quirky things. She should have realised things wouldn't be like that, given the recent past, but she remembered the fun times they used to have when she assumed he'd settle for just being playful, and hoped things could go back to being like that.

It did take her a few weeks wondering whether it was a good idea to email him before she did. And when she did, she created a new account just for communicating with him and didn't use her real name on it, so she could just get rid of it and cut all contact with him without fear of being traced and emailed again by him if he became a pest. And she warned him that if he became abusive, she'd delete the account and never re-activate it. She also stopped emailing him, not wanting to have anything else to do with him, after he said something about fights he'd been in and how he used to be promiscuous but had supposedly changed. But she started emailing him again when he asked her to.

Things Begin to Become Downright Nasty

Soon, it seemed to her that his behaviour flipped and he became abusive.

His behaviour did suddenly get a lot more unpleasant, but much of it was really only a worsening of behaviour towards her that had already begun to get nasty. When Thomas Trump had returned to the board one day, BullyBoy had happily told his Sri Lankan friend on the forum that he was "rubbing his hands in glee" because now he had someone who was easy to bully, since it wasn't easy to bully Sharon. Despite him making it clear he was trying to bully her, Sharon still contacted him after he was banned, hoping for some entertainment. Perhaps it was the hope of that and the memory of the fun times they had had that made her just dismiss what he'd said about wanting to bully her as if she didn't think it mattered.

His behaviour did get a lot more abusive though. He seemed to interpret her emailing him as some kind of victory, as if he had her under his thumb and could treat her the way he wanted. He asked her to phone him up, and became more and more insistent and abusive as she kept refusing but just joking about the idea and asking why he wanted her to.

Then one day he got back on the board under a new name and put a story on it that was insulting to her and obviously part wishful thinking:

... Sharon started falling in love with me. My glib tongue that could go in an instant from poisonous as cobra venom to as smooth and carressing as butter; the irresistible charm that I could oozed from every pore when I so wished-well, what girl could have been blamed for finding me hopelessly irresistible? And, like twenty seven of her online predecessors, Sharon was no exception. It was a love that went in the blink of an eye, from a mere flicker to a flame, to a raging wildfire that threatened to send her into permanent Shrink therapy if she didn’t grab my offer to let her email me.

But then, things started changing. Sharon decided to take a risk and start playing hard to get with me. It didn’t work. Before she knew what was happening to her life, I was holding open the door in our online relationship for her. “Out”, I ordered. But as she stumbled out into the snow, I felt a bit sorry for her and gave her a small spark of hope. I’ll let you back in when I think Ive punished you long enough and you've learnt the rules about dating me online, I said, before I shut the door. That’s currently how the situation is, by the way. I might email her again if I think she's learnt her lesson and is sorry.

Sharon said what he said wasn't true. He responded:

OK, cut the crap. You arent kidding anyone but yourself, sharon. You want to pretend you aren't infatuated with me, at least do it convincingly. Your reactions to stuff I say here only reveal how much you are 'into' me. Trust me, Ive seen it happening enough times to know the symptoms. You're probably a hard to getter in real life, but you want me, you have to live upto my standards that I lay down for women who want to be fucked by me(real life, like Cheryl [his girlfriend], or online, like you and tonnes of others.) And i aint gonna lower my standards one iota for you. So you either be funny like you used to be, or continue to live a dream that will never be realized, and you'll have to go on hugging your pillow and crying, or whatever you women do when the guy you like isnt getting attracted to you. (Thats wat Ive seen my sis do, so I guess you cry about me evry night too. Sorry, but I aint too moved by that.) I aint got time to waste on you love lorn bitches.Jeeeez!.

She told him she didn't feel that way about him at all.

He started regularly getting back on the board and being banned around that time. One day he said nasty insulting things that irritated Sharon and made her think he'd better behave or he'd be banned quickly. She didn't want him to be banned, because still, even after he'd become abusive, she was hoping they could have friendly fun on the board together. She told him he'd be banned again if he didn't watch it, jokingly but irritatedly asking if He actually wanted to be banned. He said:

What the fuck did you just call me, bitch? Loser? me? you call me a loser? Fuck you, how dare you come fannying around with me with your fucking shit, you little Brit lezzie? You want me to ignore you for the next two weeks while you scream and beg me to come back to you? Dont mess with me, bitch! And THAT FUCKING SHITFUCKING BOOBNECKER-Thomas FUCKIN Trump! IM GONNA FUCKING TRACE HIM INTO THE HEART OF HELL IF I HAVE TO, AND TEAR HIS BALLS OFF WITH MY BARE HANDS, THEN DEEP FRY EM AN FORCE HIM TO EAT EM!

LOl...do you genuinely think I could be arsed to sit and play your dumbass games with you? I really have better things to do...but once again, you may do whatever the fuck you want, but as long as I'm here, I do EXACTLY AS I PLEASE, and make NO EXCUSES TO NOBODY! ... Just cz I call you a couple of swear words in fun doesnt mean im trying you to kick up shit ... you dumb bitch! Thats how I speak to every woman I meet online who I happen to find worthy of my attention-or didnt you know yet? Any more whining and moaning from you-"aw...he's caling me this, oooh, he's calling me that," and you can forget about banning me altogether-I wont be even bothering to come online to chat with you anymore. Up to you, bitch.

Sharon told him she liked him far better when he first came to the board, since in those days he'd been whimsical and humorous, making bold egomaniacal claims about how he could crush the theories of scientists beneath his feet that she'd found amusing. Now he just boasted about being great. He responded:

Who the fuck was asking you for advice? I flaunt my ego the way i want to. You like the way I do it, stay, if you dont, get the hell out! Dont you ever, ever try to tell me how to do things, do you understand me? I do whatever I want, whenever I want, and I make no excuses to anyone!

Shut up yourself, bitch. Always remember that every time you do some dumbass thing like that, you are running the terrible risk of me not answering the phone when you ring me up, desperate, on pins and needles, to be engulfed by the masculine majesty just of my deep, sexy Voice, just like one of the million other bits that I convert into my lifelong slaves on a daily basis with a single, almost lazy glance of my irresistibly seductive eyes...You are walking a tightrope, tryna bullshit me like that, woman. Not only have you got me mailing you, you even persuaded me to start phoning you...you got me, you got a fuckin good thing, girl. You lose me, you lose me for good.

She hadn't actually agreed to speak to him on the phone; he seemed to be imagining things.

After she criticised the way he'd behaved on the board, he said:

I wasnt going to bother replying to you anymore, but you have an uncanny suddenly coming up with shit that makes my blood boil so much I can roast barbecure on it. What have you done this time? Here it s-Telling me that Im not 'cute, sexy, hot, and whimsical' and more- Bull fuckin shite. Im all that and more, you're just not clever enough to realize it, thats all.

... Anyway, Ive got busy with six other women on the net. I met em on forums and chat sites. We chat up on a daily basis. Im alternatively charming and aggressive to them now, and Ive got them living for that moment when they can come online and chat with me. LOL..they dont even know me, and they are already in love with me. Well, like I said, Ive got a way with women -online or face to face doesnt matter.

After all that, he came onto the board one day and mocked Sharon for not wanting to flirt with him. He wrote a pretend little conversation between him and her:

BullyBoy:I think you're exciting, Sharon.

Sharon took what he said to mean that the purpose of him talking to her had all along been to flirt. She wrote him a private message about how she didn't want to flirt with him especially because it might upset his girlfriend. He replied saying that though he'd only been messing around - (it was a habit with him to pass off all his abuse as humour) - he was touched, and respected her for not wanting to hurt his girlfriend's feelings, and wouldn't try to flirt with her again. He also said he was amazed at what she'd said because most women he'd encountered on chat sites didn't have such principles. And he said he'd shared her message with his girlfriend and she was touched too, but said she didn't mind them flirting since she knew it was only chat. It turned out he was lying about that, - either that or the girlfriend didn't realise how much there was to it at the time but discovered there was more soon afterwards.

Despite what he'd said, within a couple of days he was back to his old self, taunting Sharon about supposedly longing to phone him up to hear his sexy voice and saying she'd better have a nice voice when she did.

Then he came onto the board and said:

Just remember this-I dont like shy girls. Nor boring ones. As long as you act all flushy and blushy about your feelings towards me, Im sorry to say that getting me to hold you in my arms and gently kiss you, wil be but a dream for you. Go on and proclaim your true feelings for me out there, you dumb idiot! What th fucks wrong with you all of a sudden?

The Abuser Upsets His Girlfriend

The very next day, it became obvious he hadn't been treating his real-life girlfriend much better. He emailed Sharon a few times. One message said:

LOL...I just forwaded that mail I just sent u to Cherry, and I'd hardly take my finger off the mouse after pressing 'send', than she was phoning me up, and started to yell at me. And when i say yell in terms of Chery, I mean speaking in the softest possible way and yet in a voice that spits venom. ..."Kevin, love, you're spending too much time on this woman. If this goes on, I'm going to give you a choice-Me, or Her". fancy the cheek! She also said she didnt like the fact that 'her Kevin' had stooped to the level of trying to irk out personal details of a woman he barely knew online.

Haiaiai...you women.

Just a minute or so later than the last one, before Sharon had said a thing, BullyBoy sent her another email that said:

Fuck off, you little bitch. Im beginning to wish you'd never met me. Cheryl's threatening to break up with me cz of you- even though I insist that I have nothing for you at all..fuck. I got two more similar calls from her, and I blasted her both times, and now she's crying. She's like the only woman who loved me who I actually loved back...not for her pussy, but as a person, as a woman...and its a sorta nice feeling to love someone like that. And now she's pissed at me. Im dashed if Im going to let her see it, but I do feel a bit sorry fr her...maybe Ill buy her a fucking great box of chocolates and a bunch of roses the size of a small oak tree, and take her out to a five star dinne atHilton tonight...plus I'll send her a poem saying im sorry, a poem torn up into bits of paper so she as to scrabble them together to find out what it says...Aw I know she wont leave me, cz that would be like throwin away a milion dollars, but what worries me s that she's hurt.

Sharon simply commented that he clearly didn't have good social skills. Later that day he emailed her again, boasting:

Well, you could shake your lovely silky aurburn head at my social skills, Sharon darling, but you must admit that what I lack in the aforementioned respect, I more than compensate for in another, far more important one-that of chick-magnetizing, now dont I?

Oh, well, time for my date at the Hilton...Cheryl's OK with me btw. I went over to her place and allowed her to vent for an hour or so. She ended by saying "I never want to see you again!" I rose, and went upto her. Then I took her into my arms and said softy, "I love you, Chery.."...(fuck, that was so weird, id never genuinely meant that sentence in my life before, but I did then...)and she started crying again. I just ruffled her hair etc..to cut a long story short-REALLY short, I mean-almost as short as Trump's cock-Cheryl and I are goin out to Hilton tonight for a wine and a spa. A Happy Ending, what?

hey, you wanna join us, btw? Im sure Cheryl would love to meet you!

Sharon doubted his girlfriend would want to do that, since what had upset her in the first place was BullyBoy giving so much attention to her as if she was a rival girlfriend! A mere minute or two later, BullyBoy was making crude jokes inviting her to fly halfway around the world to Sri Lanka to visit him and go to bed with him. So much for caring about his girlfriend's feelings!

It seems his attempts to pacify his girlfriend, and what he said earlier about maybe doing other things to console her and attract her back, such as buying her a huge box of chocolates and writing her a love poem, had a whole lot more to do with manipulating her into wanting to be with him again or giving himself the ego boost he'd get if he succeeded in convincing her to stay with him, than they did with genuinely expressing care for her.

Typical of an abuser; apparently they often put on earnest-seming lavish displays of affection when they've done something abusive, to pacify and keep their partners.

Apparently he and his girlfriend split up soon afterwards though, over something else.

The day after he upset his girlfriend and then invited Sharon to visit him and go to bed with him, she cut all contact with him, deleting her email account and telling him she wanted nothing more to do with him.

He did get on the board after that a few times during the following year or so and asked her to email him again, but she refused.

Insights Into the Abuser's Personality he Said Were Accurate

The day BullyBoy made his girlfriend cry, Sharon went to the forum and talked about him. She had been asking people for their opinions on his personality, which could seem a lot of fun sometimes but could so easily turn nasty. Thomas Trump thought she needed to be warned about him and gave his opinion. A couple of days later, BullyBoy praised Thomas for his insight into personality, saying most of what he'd said was accurate, and that he must be the kind of person people describe as a "people person". How well he actually read what Thomas Trump said is open to question, but he said it was all correct except something he'd said about how he must have got that way in the first place. Thomas had said:

Originally I had assumed that he was just a young, fresh out of high-school, intellectual bully who craved attention but didn't have the where-with-all to fight with reason. I assumed that he had no substantial life experience so, when challenged, he would resort to foul tactics like abusive language and despicable innuendo. He wasn't worth fighting with - he didn't deserve a serious intellectual challenge and to fall for his goads was beneath me.

He pathologically seeks attention in the form of praise and approval but pathologically rejects it because it was born of a fake reality which he projected. He loves to be loved but reviles those who love him. Woo, abuse, woo, abuse, woo, abuse - he doesn't understand this pattern either. ...

More Fun on the Forum, and the Abuser's Fake or Short-Lived Apology

Soon after that, the owner of the board found a more effective way of keeping BullyBoy out, and he probably stopped wanting to be there anyway. But soon afterwards, someone else started posting regularly. Sharon thought he was obnoxious and told him so, especially in a thread where he listed a number of categories of people he declared he enjoyed making fun of. He started trying to hound her off the board. His attempts mainly consisted of responding to her posts with comments like,

You seriously need to get off my penis baby. It just aint gonna work.

I won't be bullied into sex with a fat bitch who never leaves her computer.

Sharon wasn't going to be bullied off the board by comments like that. As she had done before at first when BullyBoy had become provocative, she responded with jokes, turning the exchanges into opportunities for her own entertainment. This time, she copied some jokes, funny stories and other things from the Internet and pasted one or two on the board in response to each of his ugly comments, changing one or two details in them so they sounded as if they were about him personally. She thought she was just having harmless fun, brightening up her own day, but he didn't like it at all. It didn't stay harmless; he became nastier, and the whole thing became much more bad-tempered and abusive after a while.

When it was just beginning to turn nastier, he got the idea to claim he was deliberately goading her and that the fact that she responded meant she was like his puppet dancing for him. Perhaps he imagined she was responding because she was being made so angry by his lazy little taunts she couldn't help herself. Never mind that most of what she said was humorous! What he said didn't put her off replying to him. Here's an example of what she put on the board. (The man's name has been changed to Uncouthman.)

Oh no, Uncouthman's goaded me again! I'm so annoyed I can't control myself, so I have no choice but to fall for the bait! (Well OK he didn't [goad me] this time; he didn't even address that [message] to me; but where's the fun in that? So I'm going to pretend he said something nasty as usual.)

BullyBoy must have been looking on in the background, and it seems it made him wish he was back on the board having fun with Sharon, because he came back using the account of a friend of his.

At first, he was obnoxious, probably thinking that provoking her was a good way to get her attention. Sharon ignored him. But he became more of a pest, and after he ordered her to speak to him, she quoted several of the nasty things he'd said before and emphatically said she didn't want anything to do with someone who'd say things like that.

Then he tried to turn on the charm and apologise. He wrote quite a long message that said:

Remember the good old days when you and I would engage in skillful thrust and parry at each other over those little theories, Sharon? You know how entertaining and fun you found it was, to debate with me and strive to out-tease me! (though you never could accomplish that)

Let's give this another shot, Sharon. Would you agree with me to purge our memories of the dark past, and to start afresh? Let us see if it is yet too late for us to resurrect those days of fun filled glory that you and I shared on this site, all those eons ago!

Sharon refused to accept his apology, insisting she wanted nothing more to do with him. After all, she didn't think mere 'pride' was a good explanation of the way he'd behaved, and she was concerned he'd do something that would upset a girlfriend of his again, perhaps taunting the girlfriend about the amount of time he was spending on the forum with Sharon, without Sharon even knowing it was going on! Besides, she remembered that day when he said he knew she was desperate to be "fucked" by him, feeling sure she must be infatuated with him, but that she'd have to be playful again if she wanted that to happen. She wasn't going to be playful with him again, knowing he might interpret it to mean she was obeying his orders because she really did want to have sex with him! If he'd interpreted her mere wish for entertainment as infatuation before, he might very well do so again.

She told him to go away, and he wrote her a message that seemed truly over-the-top to her, expressing soul-crushing guilt. It didn't seem authentic. She still refused to be playful with him again and criticised him.

It's apparently typical of abusers to try to get what they want by playing on the emotions of the one they're trying to change the mind of. BullyBoy said the reason he'd changed was because he'd had a relative with TB he hadn't paid much attention to but who'd died recently, and it had made him realise he should value people more, or something. He actually said he was thankful it had happened because he was glad of the change in him. Sharon doubted he really would be glad a close relative of his had recently died of a horrible illness, and told him she doubted any of his story was true, since after all, he had once put a message on the board claiming he was going to commit suicide because his wife and children had been killed in a car crash the day before, and that couldn't have been true.

He soon became mocking, criticising her for bringing up his past behaviour towards her since he'd just apologised for it, and taunting her for supposedly imagining she was pure so she was in a position not to forgive him, when actually her own behaviour had left a bit to be desired. He completely missed the point of what she was saying, that she was concerned that if she had anything to do with him again, some other girlfriend of his might end up getting hurt. It seemed he imagined an apology is like a magic wand; wave it and the past is all gone, and after that, anyone who brings it up is at fault. He criticised her for mentioning it again. But Sharon wasn't willing to drop it, since she'd want to talk it through quite a bit before being reassured that he really understood her concerns and that nothing like what happened before would happen again.

But it seemed BullyBoy had just been after a quick fix. When he discovered it wasn't going to happen, he left the board, mocking her for being "priggish and boring", after she mentioned that it hadn't been nice of him to keep calling Thomas Trump a child molester. So much for having changed!

The Abuser Shows He's Still as Obnoxious as Ever

In fact, he made it clear he hadn't really changed by the way he behaved. For instance, despite the fact he was supposed to have a new girlfriend, he started a thread with the same "hump 'em and dump 'em" attitude he'd had before, saying:

SEDUCTION-MY SECRETS OF SEDUCING CHICKS.

write me an email thankning me for turning your love life from the wretched nice-guy mess it was, to that of a casanova.

Sharon thought that was a callous way to treat people. She was unsettled by the way he was talking as if he had contempt for the girls he was approaching, for instance calling them "bitches", and talking about them as if the only value they had was as sex objects that would be bound to bend to his will if his usual mechanical operation/seduction strategy went to plan; and yet these girls he evidently had contempt for were the same girls he was trying to get to do something as serious as have sex with him, something that might stir up real emotions in some of them, who might not realise it was meant to be just a quick one-night stand! He would surely be effectively deceiving them into thinking they were getting something they weren't, that is, a genuinely fun guy who was genuinely interested in them.

It occurred to her that when the two of them had been playful, whereas she'd been mistakenly assuming he'd just wanted a bit of entertainment as she had herself, what must really have been going on was that he was playing a game of strategy, teasing her so as to get her interested so he could work up to some kind of cyber-seduction, or even a real-life one, given he'd kept asking for her real name and phone number. She realised that when he had written stories about being in love with her and linked to love songs on YouTube that he dedicated to her, and asked her to marry him, it wasn't some kind of nutty sentimentality as she'd thought it might be before; it wasn't even affection; it was just a cold, crude, self-serving attempt to bring sexual tension into things so he could get closer to making another conquest.

Sharon thought she never wanted to be playful with him again, feeling sure he'd just think of his teasing as a strategy game to work up to getting that cyber-sex he seemed to crave so much. So even if she'd accepted his apology, she still wouldn't have wanted to be playful with him again.

The Abuser is Given Another Chance, But Quickly Fouls it Up

BullyBoy didn't show his face on the board for some time after he left after Sharon rejected him.

Then, months later, he came back. At first, Sharon was actually quite friendly towards him, because he was friendly himself to begin with, and came back saying he appreciated some things she and Thomas Trump had said. They could have got back into a playful routine; but they very quickly started arguing and Sharon got fed up of him. One thing she thought was a warning sign that he was still the same and it was best not to be friends with him after all was that she told someone else that she wasn't interested in forming romantic attachments to people, and BullyBoy told her that that had lowered her a lot in his opinion. She wondered why. She thought it must mean he was just out to flirt with her again, and she lost her temper with him. The argument got nasty for a little while.

After one round of the argument, he apologised for his part in it and then said,

... So to wrap it all up, theres no point in us terminating our three year friendly rivalry over something so silly.
So lets hug and make up!!
*Gives Sharon a hug*

Sharon refused to be pacified, especially since she was annoyed because she'd said things it seemed he'd completely ignored, and he was putting an unrealistic sentimental gloss on things. It turned out she was right not to grab the opportunity to make friends with him, since that very morning, he revealed he'd been joking and laughing about her with his latest girlfriend! They'd somehow interpreted what she'd said about not being interested in forming romantic attachments to mean she felt awkward around people in real life so had to come online to make friends. Not long after he'd given her a cyber-hug and said he wanted to be friends, he said,

my girlfriend and i laugh at your pathetic, lonely existence.

Sharon got so irritated with him she stopped speaking to him for several weeks. Then he tried to make friends with her again, private messaging her a picture of roses, just after Valentine's day! She refused to be friends with him though, and was suspicious that he'd send her an image of something romantic rather than a sign of ordinary friendship.

At first, he tried to convince her he genuinely wanted to be friends. One thing she said was that she didn't like the way he called women bitches, and he said, charmingly,

I didnt call you a bitch. I called you...my Friend. And that is the greatest compliment one human being can pay another.

A touching sentiment, ... at least it would have been, if it wasn't false - he had called her a bitch several times in the past, - and also he likely used the word 'friend' because he calculated that that would influence her most, being convinced friendship was what she wanted, after having laughed with his girlfriend about her because they'd read so much into one sentence of hers that they decided she must be a socially awkward person incapable of making friends in real life who was therefore desperate to make them online to compensate.

The Abuser Reveals His Attitudes to Women

Very soon afterwards, BullyBoy showed he was still his old self. Another man came to the board, who I'll call Educated Neanderthal, and at first Sharon thought he might make a good playmate and said so. As if in a jealous rage determined to scare intruders off his property, BullyBoy raved around the board starting thread after thread designed to destroy the dignity of the new man on the board, foolishly heedless of the fact that if he was too obnoxious, his "property" wasn't likely to want anything more to do with him.

Again and again and again he tried to discredit Educated Neanderthal by mockingly calling him a virgin and insisting he was hopelessly incompetent and inexperienced when it came to women and needed to be instructed. In reality, there was no way he could have known such a thing, and the evidence pointed to its not being true. He didn't realise how unpleasant he was making himself look. He was revealing things about his attitude to women that made the displays of affection towards Sharon he'd put on the board some time earlier look very deceptive indeed. He said things to Educated Neanderthal that made Sharon more sure than ever that she'd made the right decision in refusing to be friends with him, and which made it obvious his apology and claim to have changed was completely fake.

For instance, after Educated Neanderthal got fed up and started a thread with a poll about what people thought of BullyBoy and asked Sharon if She'd voted, BullyBoy said to him:

... And umm...naturally you dont realise this, but its as easy as hell to tell a virgin from a guy whos good with wmoen. want me to give you a few examples?

Second thing you need to change about you. You need to learn that women like a man who can lead them, and be dominant without having to act domineering. What you are doing is submissive and wishy washy, and until you change that, you are going to go on being a virgin. ...

All that because Educated Neanderthal had merely asked Sharon whether she'd voted on his poll, and laughed a lot at a joke she'd made!

Educated Neanderthal had made it clear he wasn't trying to score with Sharon so sex was irrelevant. But BullyBoy didn't care, and carried on as if he imagined he was going all out to attract Sharon and making mistake after mistake. In reality, Educated Neanderthal wanted to use the forum for what it was supposedly for - conversations about philosophy and science and religion, and also light entertainment. And he was well aware that Sharon had been makeing it very clear too that she wasn't on the forum to find someone to get sexual with. He said,

I have made my position abundantly clear to Sharon, and the rest of [the forum]. Oddly enough, since having met you, Sharon has learnt her lesson about lecherous little morons like yourself, and to ensure no such further mistakes, has made her position abundantly clear to me and everyone else too. Both of us write here, to all and sundry, with the concept of mutual, light-hearted and written entertainment, irrespective of gender. Yet as much as you yearn to believe you can introduce sexual tension at the drop of a hat, with either sex, the only tension you continuously apply is to people's patience.

BullyBoy disregarded everything anyone said in criticism of him. And his ego seemed to grow bigger and bigger with every passing day, if that was possible; he insisted over and over again that he was "awesome"; and when Educated Neanderthal challenged him to produce a photo of himself to demonstrate his awesomeness, BullyBoy taunted him all the more, in ways that were yet more revealing about his real attitudes to women. He said things like,

If you'd ever fucked a woman, you'd know that personality towers over looks in dating. I have a fair share of looks, but the reason I have bitches falling over themselves to get at me is not my looks, but my confidence and my sense of humor. two things again that you'd know nothing about, hence your virginity. ...

... you know fuck all about how the female mind works. Im handsome, but ive seen men who look like roadkill getting women. why? because they have personality. its personality more than looks that pulls pussy. looks is maybe 20% of the game. george carlin and robbie williams look like shit, but they are dating legends. see how foolish you are beginning to feel trying to talk about shit you know nothing about, you virgin faggot?

He started a thread instructing Educated Neanderthal on dating. He said:

... note: you NEVER buy a bitch a drink. that just tells her you are a doormat, and ecnourages her to BS you. when a woman BSes you, you throw it back in her face and she'll start behaving herself. problem solved.

start off with a bit of foreplay to get the bitch in the mood. gently pat her sexual parts, start off with a bit of light dirty talk. to give you an example, i once started off the fuck process with a woman i'd brought home with 'now remember, if you want to have anal sex with me, i have some rules.
she goes: what makes you think i dont have a few rules too?
me: "what makes you think women make the rules?
that sorta thing

Chillingly, BullyBoy said, after Educated Neanderthal had said he felt sure there was no woman on earth who'd have sex with BullyBoy voluntarily:

I never said there was no woman on earth who wouldnt fuck me. Nor do I give a fuck if any particular woman wants me or not. She is for me to take or leave.

Educated Neanderthal and Sharon started speculating over whether he could be a rapist after that. That just enraged BullyBoy more, and he got even more abusive to Educated Neanderthal, mocking him even more for his supposed lack of experience with women.

He insisted to Sharon that in real life, he wasn't anything like a rapist or a creep. He said,

i treat women with charm. depending on the woman. the scared, shy types i treat with courtsey and be a gentleman, make them feel they are the cente of the universe, bang, they wanna fuck me.
the hotter, confident types i am more challenging to. I tease em, bust on em, even get a bit rude, make them laugh at themselves, etc etc. cz they have the confidencve not to take offence

Sharon quoted the first part of what he'd said and responded:

So what you basically seem to be doing is deceiving them into believing you genuinely care about them, all in the cause of a quick "fuck". If you manage to convince some to "fuck" you and then discard them and move on, which appears to be your modus operandi - presuming you really do do this stuff and you're not just fantasising that you do with your hand, your genitalia and a tissue, they are likely to feel conned, cheapened, betrayed and let down. But you can't even begin to comprehend what it must be like to feel like that, can you, and even less do you care.

I don't expect you to take this in any more than you've taken anything else in that anyone's said to you on the subject. Still, I feel like saying it anyway.

BullyBoy didn't seem to be able to comprehend her concerns. He started taunting her, saying she was obviously an old, conservative loner who hated sex and hated men who had sex with women.

For instance, in a thread where Educated Neanderthal was expressing disgust after Sharon had quoted some of the abusive things BullyBoy had said when he'd first become abusive to her some time before, BullyBoy expressed no regret for them, as he'd claimed to do when he'd apologised to her, but instead he said things to Educated Neanderthal like,

I'd give you an F- at success with women. Id love to see a pic of your fiance btw. She probably never got laid either. rotfl. ...

Educated Neanderthal said there was no way BullyBoy was going to be allowed to look at a picture of his fiance so he could treat it as porn. BullyBoy responded,

your fiance=porn material?? hahahahahahahahahhaha! i wouldnt fuck trash like your fiance if she was the last bitch on earth, so stop trying to tempt me with her pinhole vagina. I like my chicks to have experience at sex, which clearly a type like your fiance would not have. besides, she would probably chase me about and act all needy with me if she even saw me, i dont give chicks like that a second glance.

He said to someone who made a stupid joke about Sharon and Educated Neanderthal getting on well enough that perhaps they wanted to be married:

he scores with sharon because they are both old, conservative, and never had sex, hence their mutual repulsion towards it. You hate what you cant have.

Some time before when Sharon and BullyBoy had been on friendly terms, he had claimed to be the cousin of a certain top Sri Lankan female swimmer, telling Sharon to find out about her; and he'd also claimed to be a radio show host on one of the most popular radio stations in south Asia, earning a five-figure salary, as well as a news reader. He would boast about it a lot. Sharon now suspected he'd just told her those things to impress her in the hope it would get him closer to being able to turn the relationship sexual. She told him so, also criticising him for interpreting mere interest or enjoyment, or even possibly a willingness to listen out of politeness, as a signal that a woman wanted sex with him. He didn't quite understand what she'd said, and responded:

when i ask women out, i dont have to cajole em, ever. me asking you out=your dream come true.
especially women who make the connection when I tell them my name. they go crazy and go omg, are you _____
im like, umm yes. they go 'eeeeeee!!! oooooh!'
yes, that's 100% true. so yeah, they wanna fuck me just to be 'polite'.
lol. ever heard of a woman fucking a guy to be 'polite'? idiot.
but even if they dont, make the connection, i dont have much trouble, my looks and personality does the trick.
im not into the one night stand thing much right now cz im in a serious relationship, but when i go back into that shit, ^^thats how it'll work out.
sometimes, ill admit there are women who KNOW who i am and what i do, and still dont want to get sexual with me. im like, so wat? I just move on to somebody else.
seriously, you hate on me because I like sex and having a good time with women=you have issues.

He'd once told Sharon he didn't do one night stands anymore because he had better values now. So much for that! Lying was a habit with him. And she was unsettled by the fact that in saying that if a woman doesn't want sex with him because of who he says he is he moves on to another one, since while at least that was something, he was suggesting once more that he approaches women not because he wants to get to know them as people, but just because he's hoping to get sex, so his interest in them ceases immediately he finds out he isn't going to get it.

So it seemed to her that he'd been deceptive earlier on when he'd written the love poem and stories about her that suggested he'd actually had real affectionate feeling towards her rather than seeing her as a mere potential "cyber-fuck". She had thought it odd at the time that he would have such affectionate feelings towards her when he hardly knew her. He would link to love songs on YouTube and dedicate them to her, and she had thought it was especially odd when one day he'd linked to one called Nothing's Going to Change My Love For You. Since he hardly knew her, she thought he should have known there were any number of things he might find out about her that would change his feelings towards her!

The day he started talking about having got a new girlfriend and chatted to his Sri Lankan friend on the board about how he'd been flirting with her and cajoling her to have sex with him within minutes of her agreeing to go out with him, he said he played her a song to help the process along, Nothing's Going to Change My Love For You. So Sharon realised it must just be a standard song he uses to woo women he wants to get sexual with, because he thinks it attracts them to him or something.

In the middle of another argument, BullyBoy said to Educated Neanderthal:

Now, Im not debating the outcome of a face to face meeting with a guy who's thousands of miles away, but lets just say that if you tried to say any of this shit to me in person, I'd rip your pants off and anal fuck you before you could say 'virgins rule'.

It wasn't the first time he'd expressed violent sentiments like that about someone. After he was banned once, he'd written an email to Sharon in a rage with the subject heading:

Thats it. Im going to trace [the board owner] down and have his wife and kids raped before his eyes...Then ill impale him.

Sharon Wonders if the Abuser Was All Along Doing Something Similar to Online Grooming

A few months before Educated Neanderthal made his appearance on the board, Sharon had been upset by a documentary on television about some Pakistani men in Britain befriending young girls and at first deliberately doing things they knew would make the girls feel emotionally attached to them or glad to be with them, like flattering them, giving them gifts and taking them to nice places; and then they would rape or sexually exploit them, knowing the girls would be less likely to run off to the police or tell their parents than they would if total strangers did that. Sharon started a thread on the board about it.

Later, it occurred to her that there were similarities with the tactics of BullyBoy, who'd used flattery, and the online equivalent of gifts - entertaining stories declaring love for her. He'd also told her he was a celebrity, which is similar to one tactic abusers trying to groom young people for sex sometimes use - claiming to be able to introduce them to celebrities and so on. Then he'd got abusive when he thought she was emotionally attached to him.

But she thought there was another possibility: She heard about men from developing countries, particularly Nigeria but not necessarily always, getting to know women on dating sites, and charming them into falling in love with them, ... which might not be too difficult because the women are actually on sites where they're looking for love! And then they scam them. They often tell them a moving story, such as that one of their family members has suffered a tragedy and is receiving medical attention but it costs a lot and they can't afford it. Women have paid such scammers tens of thousands of pounds or dollars, while the scammers laugh.

Sharon said she wondered if the reason BullyBoy had asked her for her contact details so often was because he was planning to try and scam her like that. He protested, saying she should know he wasn't just a low money-grubber. But a while later, he one day decided the board needed to be told for some reason that a "chat bitch" had sent him a pair of knickers and 50 dollars. He said he'd just thrown the panties away, but the money was very enjoyable to have! If he'd really been earning a five-figure salary, as he often claimed, one would think it wouldn't matter to him one way or the other. Sharon wondered what he'd told the woman he needed the money for, or why else she sent it.

Sharon Wonders if the Abuser Could Be a Date Rapist

BullyBoy was proud of his supposed power to attract the opposite sex. He insisted he didn't need to use violence to get a woman because he knew how to win a woman's affections. Some time before, he had also insisted women love "jerks" - that women go for abusive men because they find them exciting, whereas they think nice guys are boring. He taunted Educated Neanderthal by saying he was probably the kind of "nice guy" women went for when they eventually wanted a break from real men. He said:

Engaged?? rotfl... ... The dude's 34, and he's engaged. I doubt you are engaged, but in the unlikely event that you are, its not going to last long. You're the quintissential nice guy that woman settle for after their thirties, because they want a break from the roller coaster rides that real men take them on when they are younger. Save yourself the pain of having a divorce and dont marry at all. Your type are unable to sustain women for long, or give them what they need, son. Ill gurantee you she'll get fed up of you and start dating a more manly dude a few years down the marriage.

This came from someone who was himself clearly unable to hold down relationships with women!

He didn't explain what he meant by "rollercoaster ride", but it may have had something to do with what he said about himself being alternately charming and aggressive to women and having them supposedly longing to spend time with him because of that.

He was offended by the fact that Sharon seemed to think he was a woman abuser, and became abusive to her in response. That didn't help her see things another way!

Sharon thought it was certainly possible that BullyBoy could fool himself into believing women are turhned on by aggression because of his experiences. She speculated that what might well happen in reality is that if he finds his "seduction" technique isn't working with a girl, he puts on a show of anger, and the woman he's with, fearing it'll escalate into violence, complies with what he wants, in other words has sex with him to keep the peace. He thinks the reason she responded to his advances at last when he became aggressive must mean women are turned on by aggression in a man, and must like a man who's "alternately charming and aggressive".

That's apparently the kind of twisted thinking abusers can have and one way they can justify what they do to themselves and to others, insisting they don't abuse women, sounding sincere.

So an abuser can't be taken at their word; apart from their obvious inclination to lie, they can deceive themselves.

The Abuser Tries to Turn Things Light-Hearted

After all the horrible things BullyBoy had said about his attitudes to women, it seems he wanted to get back on good terms with Sharon again. Sometimes she said unpleasant critical things to him and he didn't respond, as if he was trying to avoid an argument or didn't want to be unpleasant to her. Then he started a thread which made fun of her, but in an amusing way. It made her out to have a terror of even the word 'sex'. He tried to be friendly towards her all the way through it even though she insulted him. It seemed he wanted them to forget the past and start their friendship again. But Sharon didn't want to consider doing that for a moment. BullyBoy said:

I'd love to see you meet me face to face Sharon, just to see you go from 'bullyboy, i hate you cz you are sucha sex addict bla bla' to 'omg...swoooooooon'
beleive me. I dont care that you hate me. Ill gurantee you that if you met me face to face, felt the magical touch of the force of my awesome personality, and to cap it all, if i looked deep in your eyes and gave you that half cocky, half sweet smile that have sent women preening like the devil and blushing., you wouldnt last a moment. I gurantee you you'd be BEGGING to be mine. thats me for you.

Sharon didn't doubt for a moment that he could melt the hearts of women with a sweet expression, judging by the sweetness of parts of the stories he'd made up about her at first. But she felt sure they'd be in for an unpleasant surprise. She was annoyed with him, and wouldn't be drawn into much fun. She said:

I wouldn't do [what you just said I'd do], partly because I'd be starting out with an advantage no other woman who's ever met you has ever been able to start out with. That's the advantage of starting out with the knowledge that your charm and "sweetness" is just a cold calculated rousse to get a "fuck", not genuine cuteness and affection, and that you boast with contempt about how women have fallen for it. It's just a cynical means to an end. After all, you very clearly admitted as much, didn't you, when you boasted about your ability to "seduce chicks".

So tell me: Just how long after a woman sleeps with you do you generally start the abuse?

BullyBoy didn't lose his temper, but responded with what was perhaps an attempt to appease her, saying he knew he'd been 'vile' in the past, but he knew she could change him; there was 'at least some good' in him, and he was sure she could bring it out. So he asked if they could start their friendship again. It was obvious to her that he didn't mean the thing about changing sincerely; she could tell he was playing, particularly because he said he was using a special deep voice to say the words about how she could change him. Still, he was at least trying to keep things light-hearted. She had no appetite to be playful with him anymore though.

If she'd actually become very emotionally attached to him before he'd become abusive, sharon's attitude might have softened towards him then; she might have allowed herself to believe what he'd said and started wanting to have fun with him again, despite all the nasty things he'd recently said. But because she hadn't become all that attached to him, it had been easy for her to detach from him, so his attempts to be nice and good-humoured didn't sway her like they might have done.

The Abuser Reminds the Board of How he Used to be Fun

BullyBoy was genuinely convinced he was a master of creativity! Educated Neanderthal started taunting him by saying the things he put on the board were so unintelligent he was obviously stupid. BullyBoy insisted that if he wanted to, he could say much more intelligent things to Educated Neanderthal than he was doing, outwitting him at every turn! Educated Neanderthal challenged him to do so. At first he refused. Then he tried. Mostly, he just linked to things he'd said when he hadn't been on the board that long, declaring them to be "awesome!"

They'd certainly been much more fun. He used to claim he could disprove the theories of great scientists and that he would crush them to powder. Sharon had enjoyed reading that kind of humour. In fact, she'd been glad he'd come to the board, because she'd assumed that that kind of humour was what he was all about, intellectual humour that played with theories of scientists and things like that. She considered that to be a few leagues above the kind of humour that gets all its laughs from jokes about sex or mean-spirited jibes about others. How wrong she'd been about what he was like!

But as an example of the kind of humour she'd thought he was all about at first, he'd once written a variation on his attempts to crush the theories of scientists:

I MAY WIN A CHAIR AT HARVARD FOR THIS…MY BRILLIANT THEORY ‘B’ !!!!!!!!!!!!

I would have smashed to atoms yet more 'wise' sayings, only they all scatterd, screaming in fear, like flour in a typhoon when i put out my hand to put them in my bag... In a flash of pity, I decided to leave them alone for now, and, hoisting my sack over my left shoulder, I strode off into the distance, laughing, and kept going till I disappeared over the darkening horizon in the falling dusk, and walked out of this page... I AM THE GREATEST!!!

Sharon had assumed he was just having a bit of fun. But it turned out he really did believe he was someone great. Long, long after he'd first come to the board, she started to recognise his humour and boasting as the self-aggrandising ego-massaging it probably was.

BullyBoy mustered up a bit of his old kind of humour in a thread he started mocking Educated Neanderthal's creativity in comparison to his own. It said:

Members of the jury, the person you see before you, standing in the dock, yes, the fidgety little man with the oversized penis, (dont let the size mislead you, it's 10% penis, 90% internet rubber,) is [Educated Neanderthal's] Creativity.

The judge delivers a long preliminary speech before passing sentence. But the only words of that speech that Educated Neanderthal's creativity will remember, are these. ....Sentenced to die a virgin.

The humour was the kind of quirky humour Sharon had found amusing at first, and once again some of it had a compelling appeal, even though it was making fun of a board member she liked better. But BullyBoy had said too many nasty things for her to want to have fun with him again or to laugh at it. She finally knew better than to be sucked into communicating with him in a friendly way again.

She used to laugh at the way he boasted about being so great in an obviously exaggerated way. When he'd first come to the board, she'd laughed at the way he said he could crush the theories of scientists to powder or make the theories run away screaming as they fell to pieces. She'd thought it was amusing that some mere bod on a forum would claim to be greater than them all. But while the fact was obscured for a long time because he deliberately did use a bit of humour, he actually believed a lot more of what he was saying about being great and a genius than Sharon had assumed at first. An angry quote from him can illustrate the fact:

After he started boasting and boasting about how "awesome" he was and how "awesome as fuck" his old stories had been, which he did at around the time he started that thread about everyone on earth adoring him, she told him that actually, while they'd merited a smile or a grin and had been fun, they weren't "awesome". He took offence and replied,

bullshit. they were awesome as fuck, so stop whining like your opinions to the contrary matter to me. self deception? u only say that cz u cant imagine any normal person being as awesome as i claim to be. if u knew me in real life, lol. u'd possibly think slightly difrent. not that u matter of course, ya pikey twat.

It seems, as Thomas Trump had said, BullyBoy truly was a narcissist. From PubMed Someone with narcissistic personality disorder is likely to:

In Conclusion: How Fun and Charm Can Sometimes Mask an Abusive Personality, and How Some Kinds of Fun and Charm Themselves Can Be Warning Signs

It's been said that abusers as a group are far more charming and fun to be around than the average. Naturally there will be a lot of abusers around who don't have an ounce of charm in them. But if a group of abusers was compared to a group of other men, it might well be found that there were a lot more charming personalities in the abuser group. That's probably partly because their charm consists to a large extent of exaggerated compliments, which come easy to them because they have no qualms about lying. They can say things like, "You look just like a film star" or "I mistook you for a famous actress", or, "You've got the most beautiful blue eyes I've ever seen", and all kinds of things like that, not meaning a word, but knowing the flattery will likely get the person they're flattering interested in them. BullyBoy said things a bit like that to Sharon at first.

The impression of charm can also be given because they have no qualms about putting on a courteous polite considerate act that a woman might assume to be a lovely part of their personality when in fact it's false, just put on as a strategy to win a conquest. Most men, on the other hand, though they might be on their best behaviour at first, are probably much more like their real selves from the start, so they don't seem as attractive.

When BullyBoy was being abusive to Sharon, he told her he was completely the opposite of abusive in real life. He obviously wasn't, because he bawled at his girlfriend and made her cry, for instance, and then said she spent "an hour" venting about the things he did that she was unhappy with, before saying she never wanted to see him again, so there must have been a lot of them! Also he said he behaved abusively in real life when he apologised to Sharon.

But he claimed that in real life, he was ultra-courteous to women, pulling chairs out for them, being polite, and several other things. Since he made it clear he uses a strategy to attract women, the courtesy was probably part of the act. But the women he introduces himself to won't realise that. They'll probably assume the charm is a real part of his personality. If they grow fond of him because of that, especially if they've become sexually involved with him and that's made them more emotionally attached to him, it might take a fair bit of abuse before they give up hope that he'll turn charming again and leave him.

It's apparently common for abusers to cycle between being charming and sentimental and nasty.

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As for abusers often being more fun to be around, that might well be at least partly because they see no problem with making fun of other people. So they have a lot more to joke about than men who wouldn't think that was very nice. It can seem entertaining to be around someone who's making fun of others in a quirky amusing way; but we ought to think more about what it's like to be on the receiving end of it. People who did that more might find they're not so quick to be drawn into relationships that become abusive when the abuser turns their "humour" on them, as they probably will.

When BullyBoy apologised to Sharon for the nasty things he'd said, as well as expressing what must have been fake overwhelming guilt, he said he hadn't meant any of the abusive things he'd said seriously. He would often pass his abuse off as humour, and a fair bit was said in a humorous way. But there was obviously malicious intent behind it. Spotting the malicious overtones of any jokes people tell, and thinking critically about any malicious opinions of others they hold, can give a big clue to what their personalities are like.

Some abusers can also seem fun to be around because recklessness, irresponsibility, disrespect and lack of impulse control can sometimes be entertaining, and at first not recognised for what they are. When it's new and unexpected, the kind of behaviour someone with those characteristics exhibits can seem attractively daring and amusing.

For instance, if someone shouts abuse at random strangers for no good reason, stands up and bawls at his boss in front of everyone to shove his job up his arse before walking out the door every time he doesn't like a job so he never stays in one for long, and responds to a challenge to drink as much as someone else who taunts them that he probably can't by instantly bellowing an order for a dozen whiskeys and gulping them down in quick succession, it can seem exciting, and make on-lookers laugh at first, just as if a toddler stands up in a church meeting and unexpectedly shouts, "Fuck!" it would likely make the parents laugh at first because it was so unexpected, even though they don't want to encourage the behaviour and will likely get angry with the toddler if he or she likes the effect it had and does it again, expecting to get more laughs.

In a similar way, if an abuser repeats a behaviour that seemed fun at first over time so the on-lookers get used to it, and its negative consequences become more obvious, the same behaviour that was laughed at at first will likely come to be seen as mean-spirited, stupid, overly-extravagant, irresponsible and so on. And the person who has to deal with the negative consequences the most will often be the person closest to the abuser, like a girlfriend. So she might be the first to stop finding his behaviour amusing. But that might not happen till she's quite involved with him so it's not easy to break away.

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If someone points out and discusses the downsides of the boyfriend's behaviour with the girlfriend when it hasn't been happening long so she isn't as emotionally attached to him as she's likely to become, - both the current downsides and the possibilities for bad things to happen in the future, - not in a way that sounds as if they're condemning him, but just in a concerned way, she might possibly think about the consequences more, and become disillusioned sooner.

Likewise, if you notice her boyfriend's compliments seem exaggerated and he's displaying an unwise amount of affection towards her, given he doesn't know her well, it might help to discuss with her the possible dangers of getting emotionally involved with someone without knowing them well, even though they seem lovely sometimes, such as finding that there are unexpected and worrying sides to their personality that didn't show themselves at first but only do so later, under provocation or stress or boredom and discontentment and so on.

A girlfriend who tolerates some verbal and other mild abuse because her abuser insists it's just meant humorously could find herself tolerating abuse that gets gradually worse and worse; and it could be quite nasty before she decides enough is enough.

Spotting warning signs of abuse early and getting out of relationships that could be risky, even though there's something to gain from being in them, could prevent calamity later.

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