When manipulation erodes reality …
The term gaslight comes from a 1938 play called ” Gaslight” (which literally means gaslight), whose play tells the story of a man who lies to his wife and manipulates her psychologically until she truly believes that she’s crazy. The husband carries out all this kind of manipulation for a very specific reason: to hide his criminal activity. (Later, in 1940 in the Kingdom and later in 1944 in the United States, a film of the same name was released with Ingrid Bergman, Charles Boyer and Angela Lansbury, which had seven Oscar nominations, achieving two of them: one for best actress and the other. for best artistic direction; the rest of the nominations were for best film, best adapted screenplay, best cinematography, best supporting actress for Angela Lansbury and best actor for Charles Boyer).
In plays and movies, for example, the husband drives his wife near madness by convincing her that she is a kleptomaniac , when in fact they were the result of his search for her aunt’s lost jewels.
Since then, the term “gaslight” has been used to describe behavior intended to manipulate others. The goal is to control them for selfish ambitions, so anyone who uses gas light on another should be recognized as a form of abuse. In fact, controlling behaviors or personalities have the potential to end up as this form of psychological abuse.
The reason is quite simple: if you want to control people to achieve something, it is likely that that person will reach a point where they do not care about the other at all. Only the end. So the individual will do whatever it takes to achieve his goal.
This form of emotional abuse attempts to undermine a person’s perception of reality. If you find yourself in a situation where you start to doubt yourself because of what someone is telling you, the key is to start keeping a record so that you can remember what was said and done and confirm your memory. We cannot forget that gaslighting (or gaslighting, in English) can sometimes constitute criminal behavior.
