Cannot give enough stars. The worst thing about child abusers isn't the abuse, horrific and damaging though it is. It's the fact that absolutely no truth can get through their ego, particularly the part about what great parents they were.

My mom does exactly this. She was a completely atrocious mother and threw me out when I was 17 because I made a huge deal about her dating a coke dealer after he made multiple deals FROM OUR HOUSE. (Dealers and addicts are her type). During the arguing he went at me and took a swing and the neighbor called the cops…

That is just so fucking sad. Thank you for being her friend, and even post-mortem, bearing witness to her truth. The fact that they didn't suck you into their narrative shows what a good friend you are. It matters so much to those of us who struggle with such things. And I'm sorry you lost your friend.

Can't star this statement enough. In my family's case, it is a collective delusion. My father was an abusive alcoholic, mom was pathologically codependent, and the extended family didn't believe in "interfering". So many horrific things were either done to us or happened around us, and no matter how dangerous or…

That's sort of the case with my folks: while they never raised a hand, they were immature, careless with words and, while they put my needs above theirs, they puts their wants above everyone's needs. They partied a lot, used drugs, even tried to get money from me for them, the jerks. They expected me to automatically…

Oh for sure. My mother had a running narrative in her head about the glorious childhood she gave her children. And when she was in a good mood, she could be wonderful. But when things were bad, as they were often several times in a single day, they were horrible. She would become and enraged, terrifying monster…

Yes! Thank you. Yes. I'm not the most articulate with this whole thing but I am so damn happy someone else said. I say this ALL the time.

Exactly. I lost a very close friend of mine about 1 year and a half ago, she committed suicide. We knew she had a shitty childhood: growing in a house where she was treated like a maid (her own words) with her two brothers doing nothing and harassing her because she was overweight, being harassed at school (first…

YES. It it doesn't support their narrative, it didn't happen.

Vagnoni is 56, a few years older than I am (I'm at the boom's end.). When she writes about the ideas boomers have about how parents should be treated, I have to laugh. Boomers treated their parents like garbage. They had tons of advantages. The kind no group before or since had.

I think sometimes abusive parents have a tendency to believe the lies they've told themselves about how wonderful their children's childhoods were. Particularly if their children turned out to be decent adults.

No one drops mics like Gaston either.

#REKT.

...and I hate both hashtags and deliberate misspellings of easily-spelled words.

But seriously, though, this character actor ate that dude's lunch like he wasn't even trying. I -just- started back to the gym (a couple of weeks back, so I'm not -entirely- in the New Years Resolution club—just really close), and…

I'm thinking he may have also been trying to keep his costume clean.

Exactly, he was perfectly in character.

"Perhaps he needs a hand."

Heh, I think it's the same word with just regional differences. I hear people pronounce it both twot and twaat, but either way, I only ever hear it on uncensored British shows. We just don't get to hear that word much over here, period! And it's one of my favorites— so friendly-sounding yet still plenty abusive.

I think it would actually make it a bit better, shaming someone on a full train teaches not only that person but everyone within earshot that it is not okay.

If the train is empty, it's acceptable. If the train is filling up, move your fucking bag.

"It's going to be pretty hard to keep your legs parted as if they were letting every Jew in Egypt escape a pharaoh between them, when a disembodied voice is reminding you to keep your balls in check."