Hello I m Darren Magee and today s question asks if I d discuss what I think is a very insidious
form of abuse and that is to be excluded, to be ostracised by others.
In this video, I'm going to look at what that is. I'm going to look at the effects of it
and I'm going to be referring to research carried out by Professor Kipling D Williams
at Perdue University. I will put a link to that research into the description of this video.
But if you like this video or find it helpful or find it interesting, please consider subscribing
to my channel. Just to remind you though this video is for information purposes only and is
not a substitute for support from a mental health professional. Now to be ostracised is not just
someone withdrawing or giving the silent treatment temporarily due to them being upset or angry.
Nor is it going Grey Rock or no contact with an abusive person for the sake of your own sanity,
your own safety. To be ostracised is to be excluded deliberately from groups,
conversations, families, privileges, with the intent to hurt. It is to be ignored,
it is to be treated as if you don't matter, as if you don't exist. Now human beings, we are social
creatures. We on some level we all like to fit in, to belong, to be accepted. We have relationships,
different kinds of relationships with different people. We live in communities, join groups. To
be deliberately excluded from these things, as I said, it can be a very insidious form of abuse.
Insidious in the sense that it's more like a sin of omission rather than commission. For example,
you imagine somebody at work they re being ignored they re not being included. If they were to put in
a complaint, the abuser or abusers well, they may say things like, Well we didn't threaten
them. We haven't used bad language. We're not intimidating them. In fact, we are here just
to do a job. We're not here to make friends. And in his research, professor Williams stated that,
Being excluded or ostracised is an invisible form of bullying that doesn't leave bruises,
and therefore we often underestimate its impact . And I would agree it can have a huge impact on
someone's mental health and their well being, which I ll outline later on in this video.
Now being ostracised can take many forms. As I said, there could be being ignored at work.
Could be talking to someone and they don't acknowledge it, there s social events being
planned and everybody but one person is being invited. There could be saying hello to someone,
people on the street and you know that they saw you, but they walk right past as if you
weren't there. There could be groups of people openly talking about someone either directly or
indirectly right in front of them, but pretending that they're not there or behaving like they don't
care if that person hears it or not. There can be many different reasons why some people or groups
of people ostracise others. It could be because maybe someone belongs to a different ethnic group,
a different faith, culture, sex, social class. It could be maybe they were fine with that person
until they find out they voted for a different political party or hold a different ideology,
and then all of a sudden it seems that they have just stopped existing.
Sometimes there could be envy involved. You could have someone who's maybe better qualified, more
skilled, more ambitious than someone. What we see there is, as I say, an envy, but also a jealousy,
because the abusive person might be jealous that they could lose their position, their status.
Or maybe following the ending of an unhealthy relationship one of the parties is being avoided
by their mutual friends, while the other one, the aggressor, a lot of the times it is, is still in
regular contact, getting all of the sympathy. So the research that I mentioned earlier found
three stages of ostracism. Firstly, there are the initial acts of being ignored or excluded, and at
first someone might think Oh they just didn't hear me, or maybe they forgot about me or whatever.
It still has an effect even if it's in the short term. But as that continues, the person being
ignored may start to question themselves. What's wrong with me? What have I done or what am I doing
wrong? They begin to doubt themselves. The second stage is coping. This might involve trying to fit
in, complying with, agreeing with, being extra nice to, doing anything that might foster some
kind of acceptance. If nothing works to gain any kind of acknowledgement, the person being excluded
often stops trying to be liked and will just settle for being noticed. This may be, you know,
they become aggressive, they start to provoke, they become sarcastic, passive aggressive. Then
those who are doing the ostracising behave as though they are justified. We don't want
anything to do with someone like that. Look at how they behave. We are the offended party here.
Now that's what would be known as reactive abuse, and I have made a video on that previously if you
want to check that out. It refers to focusing on someone's reaction to being abused,
to being mistreated, focusing on the reaction, not what causes the reaction. And lastly there's
resignation. If someone has been ostracised for a long time, the pain, it can become too great
and they just give up. They can feel helpless, hopeless, depressed, unworthy. They may become
alienated, withdrawn, feeling intense anger and sadness, which can at times spill over into other
relationships. Now to be fair, sometimes ostracism can have happen unintentionally. There may be no
real reason for it. And if that's the case, and if you feel confident enough, it is important to
stand up for yourself, to remind the other person, the other people that you are here as well and
that you have a voice. There are times when these things can be resolved. However,
to be treated with constant disapproval, treated like you don't matter over a long period of time
that can have a huge impact on someone's mental health. Their self esteem, self confidence, their
self worth is all affected. What I mean by that, well we ll stick with self esteem for a moment.
When we put the word self in front of something like self esteem. That's not really so much what I
think of myself, a lot of the time it's more what I think others think of me. What I mean is you're
talking to someone they re making eye contact, answering your questions, laughing at your jokes,
you generally feel okay. If you're talking to someone and they just look right through you
or roll their eyes and walk off, you generally don't feel so good. And that is often the intent.
To devalue and dehumanise. Now if you are, or if you have experienced this kind of thing,
please consider talking to a counsellor or therapist. They can help you to traverse the pain
that this causes. To draw on and develop healthy supportive relationships with people who care.
So that is a brief outline of ostracising. As always, please feel free to use the comment
box below if you ve any thoughts or experiences you want to share. There are some interesting
conversations start around these videos. But if you found this video helpful or interesting,
please consider subscribing to my channel and until next time, thanks for watching.
No one likes to be rejected. We all have a need to be accepted on some level. Not necessarily
loved, admired, dated by, or whatever, just accepted. And that's not really a lot to ask.
Sometimes, though, maybe you need to look at the calibre of some of the people who are doing the
ostracising. Don't look at what they are, don't look at where they are, look at who they are,
look at their character. Are they really the type of people you want to be friends with?