You are psychologically primed to believe it when someone tells you a woman is “crazy.” We all are. We are inundated from the womb with stereotypes about how emotional and irrational women are. I mean, for a week out of each month, all women are raving lunatics, am I right? (Sarcasm there: that’s a gross distortion of the symptoms of even severe PMS, which only affects a small percentage of women.) When someone tells you some “crazy lady” hassled them about an issue in which they were totally innocent, you most likely believe them unless you have reason to doubt that individual’s credibility.
This post is for everybody who tends to believe it when people tell you they’ve had an encounter with a “crazy lady” or “woman” or “bitch” or whatever. I’m automatically suspicious of claims about “crazy ex-wives” and “this crazy lady at work” and even the “crazy lady” who’s a complete stranger, because I observed from childhood how manipulative liars – male and female – use the presumed “craziness” of women to help themselves.
The other day, I was sitting in my car in a parking lot, getting ready to pull out and leave. My car was running, which should’ve provided a clue that someone was in it. A guy came to his car, which was next to mine, and banged his driver’s door loudly into my passenger door while I was sitting there watching him. I got out and saw that indeed it had left a big smear of paint on my car. I made him roll down his window. I pointed out what he’d done.
He hadn’t done it, he lied.
I told him I’d watched him do it.
Somebody else must’ve done it, he lied. He must’ve denied it ten times, because I kept just repeating: I watched you do it. I heard the bang.
“How hard,” he asked, “would I have had to hit it to leave a mark?”
“Pretty fucking hard!” I confirmed. Seriously, what?
Even more desperate, he said, “Do you think I’d do a thing like that?”
Now, this was just funny, because I couldn’t imagine which stereotype of Perfect Gentleman he thought he was passing for. In fact, he appeared to be of hispanic/Latino descent, and I’m white, so if I subscribed to the sort of stereotypes to which he was appealing, then hell, yes, I’d think some damn “Mexican” wouldn’t have any respect for my belongings or his own. Whatever! I looked at him like he’d meowed instead of speaking English and said, “I don’t even know what you think that means, but yes, absolutely, I sat right there and watched you do it!”
Nope. He wouldn’t say I was “crazy” or confused or making shit up, like a truly innocent person accused of something at total random would do. Nope, he just kept insisting he didn’t do it. But he also wouldn’t look at it, and I think if I were accused of damaging someone’s car, I’d look at it to see if, you know, the paint was a totally different color from my car, or something that would convince this misinformed person I really didn’t do it.
The good news is: my dent resistant panels really do work as advertised. Once I wiped the paint off, there was no mark at all. There was no actual damage in a legal sense; I just wanted him to own up to being a complete shit and apologize like an adult. Unfortunately, I was dealing with the mentality of a four-year-old.
But you know how he’ll be telling this story, right? Some “crazy lady” in a parking lot came up and harangued him about something he would never do, and if he had done it, he’d have admitted it and offered to pay her and bought her roses and stuff because he’s such a gentleman.
Women: if you date men who relay a lot of stories about “crazy” women doing them wrong, do not later whine about how they treat you. “But I’ve told you my being naked and panting in bed with with some other woman wasn’t what it looked like when you walked in on us at your apartment! So you automatically have to stop complaining about it!”
The next time someone relays a story about a “crazy lady”, be very, very suspicious. Not just for the honor of whatever poor woman’s being unfairly painted as “crazy”, but to protect yourself from getting close to the sort of person who thinks it’s rational to deny having done something that everyone involved knows he did.
Men are entitled to get angry and confront people. But women aren’t, so when we behave like human beings, we’re “crazy.” Men have to do far more bizarre things than confronting assholes with their assholery to get labeled “crazy.” And that’s as it should be for everyone. But only men enjoy that privilege.
By the way, I actually don’t think this guy was “crazy” either. I think he’s just an asshole. I think he got away with this “I didn’t do it!” shit a lot in childhood and grew up thinking it would serve him through all his adult assholery, too. These people are common, and they come in every gender/sexuality/race/whatever flavor, but imagine these two cases coming before a judge:
- A woman rightly accuses some guy of damaging her car through ridiculous negligence or deliberate intent. The guy says she’s “crazy.”
- A woman rightly accuses some woman of damaging her car through ridiculous negligence or deliberate intent. The accused says she’s “crazy.”
Will the judge be influenced by the stereotype of the “crazy lady?” Will s/he find it easier to believe a “crazy lady” claim coming from a man? Will s/he find it easier to doubt a “crazy lady” claim coming from a woman?
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That’s what I thought, but I didn’t want to put words in your mouth about your writing process.
Maria(Quote) (Reply)
It’s all good!
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
“Women: if you date men who relay a lot of stories about “crazy” women doing them wrong, do not later whine about how they treat you.”
Nope. Poor judgment does not mean women no longer have the right to whine and yell and get pissed of when men mistreat them. Making bad decisions about who they date in no way makes them more to blame when they are abused or mistreated.
Tom(Quote) (Reply)
Yeah, I was kind of feeling icky about this part.
Attackfish(Quote) (Reply)
I’m not talking to the world and saying, “Ignore women who complain about being mistreated by guys after they’ve exercised poor judgment.” I am addressing those women who believe their dates’ stories of crazy exes, usually because they buy into the idea that Other Women Are All Crazy Bitches But I’m So Cool, and then act surprised when they get treated in a way that would make any rational person angry and confrontational – which is what these guys really mean by “crazy.”
It’s just like the admonition, “If he’ll cheat with you, he’ll cheat on you.” Sisterly admonitions like this are typically paired with a threat of tough love (“don’t come whining to me”) to get the point across.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I consider crusading against Special Snowflake Syndrome to be one of my Feminist Duties.
Simply because I myself am a recovering Snowflake.
JT(Quote) (Reply)
As someone who actually *is* crazy (or at least, someone who identifies as mentally ill – I have chronic endogenous depression), can I just point out that as a “crazy lady” I find I have to watch my behaviour very carefully at all times in order to be able to blend in. At least part of this is due to the social stigma of mental illness, and with its interaction with my little collection of neuroses to create a self-expectation on my part that I must be a “good loony” – I can’t display non-normal behaviours either in public or in private. It becomes very exhausting, to be honest. The more folks who aren’t “crazy” (or mentally unwell) can do to combat the stigma of mental illness and the notion of the “crazy lady”, the better, in my opinion.
Meg Thornton(Quote) (Reply)
I really shouldn’t have E!News playing in the background as white noise…apparently, Cameron DIaz, in ALL HER INFINITE WISDOM just said something about relationships that I think really speaks to this thread, kinda.
“….Men need to be with women who challenge them and call them out on their shit, conversely, women shouldn’t be crazy bitches…”
….I know that’s just a Franken-quote, but REALLY? Does she not realize that more often than not in society, “Woman who calls out men on their shit” = “CRAZY BITCH”~!?!?!
Ugh.
Casey(Quote) (Reply)
The more i think about it, the more I wonder if this trope isn’t used in multiple ways to silence abuse victims. Aside from the obvious technique of calling female abuse victims “crazy ladies”, there’s also the more general effect of guys who think that dealing with a “crazy ex” was as bad as it got.
Woman: Yeah, my ex is a real psycho.
Man: Hey I have one of those too! She threw all of my stuff out the window onto the street. It was-
Woman: No, I mean he’s stalking me and has threatened to rape and kill me.
Aside from the ablism of using “psycho” in place of “dangerous, misogynistic, and belongs in prison”, well, you can see how easy it would be for men to equate their not-fun experiences with abuse My dad certainly has this problem with other men who assume when he says his ex was abusive (which he almost never discloses, partly for this, and partly because it’s hard for him to talk about) that he means she was a “crazy lady”, and therefor, it wasn’t that bad.
Attackfish(Quote) (Reply)
*lol* I guess not.
You know, as long as we’re analyzing the Frankenquote here…
It’s heteronormative, which I guess is a gimme but still bugs me. There’s an assumption that not only should every man be with a woman (no LGBT, no asexuals, no taking time off to find yourself or whatever else), but every man should be with a specific type of woman. As if relationships were one-size-fits-all for men and if women aren’t that size then they’re SOL.
When a man does something stupid, his girlfriend is obliged to tell him it was stupid. But when the woman does something stupid, well, she just shouldn’t. In both cases the burden is on the woman to recognize shitty behavior and put an end to it.
A man’s path to a good relationship is to pick the right partner. A woman’s path to a good relationship is to modify her behavior. I guess if she changes herself enough, Prince Charming will pop out of thin air?
Sylvia Sybil(Quote) (Reply)
Sylvia Sybil,
Well, I guess so, I mean…isn’t that also what The Secret is based on?
Casey(Quote) (Reply)
Eek, I had to learn the hard way to run away from this. I’m such a slow learner, I actually had to learn it three times before it sunk in. It’s a vicious cycle because I felt wronged by the first guy, which made me bond better with guys who felt wronged by their exes.
Then I realized that halfway decent people do not say these things. So I’ve come up with a list of ways that guys will act when they actually have been truly wronged by a cruel ex-girlfriend who was behaving irrationally.
* He doesn’t go around telling everbody. He doesn’t post it on Facebook, or on his public blog, or on Twitter.
* His facial expression and tone shows frustration and bewilderment, not a sense of superiority. He does not make fun of her.
* When quoting what she said, he does not replace any of her words with “blah blah blah” or “wah wah wah.” If he is writing this story, he does not write her dialogue in all caps.
* When quoting what he said himself during the conversation, he shows that he got upset and emotional. He does not paint a picture where she is yelling and screaming while he remains calm, civil and serene.
* He searches for some understanding for her behaviour. “I can’t understand why she would do that. Did I make her angry? Was I misunderstanding something?”
* He does not use words like “crazy” or “psycho,” though he may say she “has issues she needs to work out” or that she “should seek help.”
The extremely frustrating thing is that not only are men automatically believed when they talk about women being “crazy,” but women who have had abusive relationships with men are scolded for outing him. Even if they are believed, they are expected to protect him. The double standard is astonishing. I also find that “crazy” is often shorthand for “She accused me of sexually harassing, molesting, or raping her.”
Ida(Quote) (Reply)
Ida,
Oh, wow. That list is EXCELLENT, and totally fits my experience. Truly abused people often don’t realize they’ve been abused. And even when they do, they often realize it in their heads but not their hearts, and tend to talk rationally and calmly about all the irrational things the abuse made them feel. Most importantly, under either circumstance, they demonstrate they tried to understand where the person was coming from and never dismiss them as “just crazy” even when they suggest the person might have mental health issues or whatever.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
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