November 16, 2004
SO WHY DID I HAVE TO SLEEP ON THE COUCH ALL THOSE TIMES?:
Oh, Fine, You're Right. I'm Passive-Aggressive. (BENEDICT CAREY. 11/16/04, NY Times)
The marriage seemed to come loose at the seams, one stitch at a time, often during the evening hour between work and dinner. She would be preparing the meal, while he kept her company in the sun room next to kitchen, usually reading the paper. At times the two would provoke each other, as couples do - about money, about holiday plans - but those exchanges often flared out quickly when he would say, simply, "O.K., you're right," and turn back to the news."Looking back, instead of getting angry, I was doing this as a dismissive way of shutting down the conversation," said Peter G. Hill, 48, a doctor in Massachusetts who has recently separated from his wife. Even reading the paper at that hour was his way of adamantly relaxing, in defiance of whatever it was she thought he should be doing.
"It takes two to break up, but I have been accused of being passive-aggressive, and there it is," he said.
Everyone knows what it looks like. The friend who perpetually arrives late. The co-worker who neglects to return e-mail messages. The very words: "Nothing. I'm just thinking."
Yet while "passive-aggressive" has become a workhorse phrase in marriage counseling and an all-purpose label for almost any difficult character, it is a controversial concept in psychiatry.
After some debate, the American Psychiatric Association dropped the behavior pattern from the list of personality disorders in its most recent diagnostic manual - the DSM IV - as too narrow to be a full-blown diagnosis, and not well enough supported by scientific evidence to meet increasingly rigorous standards of definition.
Studies have repeatedly shown that the key to a good marriage is for the husband to just yield to his wife rather than argue. Most of us have sense enough to do so. Of course, if you do talk back you're accused of being passive-aggressive--which they must all read about in women's magazines, because no straight man has any idea what they're talking about. Now it turns out it's bogus anyway? Posted by Orrin Judd at November 16, 2004 8:18 PM
GenX could easily be named "The Passive-Aggressive" generation; apparently, it's the best way to get Boomers' goats...
It's not a psychiatric disorder, it's simply a habitual behavior, quite changeable.
Posted by: Michael Herdegen at November 16, 2004 8:52 PMA story I quite like:
The Modern Young Woman, attending her grandparents' 50th wedding aniversary, goes over to ask them how their marriage has lasted so well.
"A clear relationship," says her grandmother, firmly. "He makes all the important decisions; I make the minor ones."
MYW is put off by this answer, but willing to explore the matter a bit further. She asks her grandfather, "What's the most recent important decision you've made?"
He considers a moment. "Well... so far, there haven't been any."
Posted by: mike earl at November 16, 2004 9:28 PMThe "passive-agressive" types I've encountered can just as easily be described by one of two much simpler words: lazy and cowardly. And often both, in that such people are often lazy and too cowardly to admit it.
See also "procrastination", as applied to personal relationships.
Posted by: Raoul Ortega at November 16, 2004 11:13 PMThere's a great scene in the film "White Men Can't Jump" which goes something like this:
Woody Harrelson is in bed with his girlfriend, who is reading Cosmopolitan or some such.
"I'm thirsty" she says. Up leaps Woody to fetch a glass of water.
"Where are you going?"
"To get you a glass of water."
Cue that look of disgust we all know, which means 'Ugh, typical neanderthal'.
Woody (confused): "But you said you were thirsty."
Girlfriend: "Yes, but I want you to sympathise, not offer solutions. All you men do is offer solutions."
It is sadly often the fate of men to be often plagued by whatever blarney the good lady has recently picked up from Cosmo.
As far as I know, "Ok, you're right" is the only rational response.
Posted by: Brit at November 17, 2004 5:22 AMMy wife doesn't argue with me when I'm fixing her car -- or maintaining her computer -- or reading the manual, so she doesn't have to -- you know, stuff like that.
The rest of the time, she likes me best after a few beers. When I've become, in her words, "unbearably nice."
Posted by: Randall Voth at November 17, 2004 7:23 AMI remember one comic's line:
"The counselor said I was Passive-Aggressive, which pissed me off, but there was nothing I could do about it."
"key to a good marriage is for the husband to just yield to his wife rather than argue."
truer words were never spoken
Posted by: Bob at November 17, 2004 5:05 PM