Are you in a romantic relationship or not? It has its highs and lows, just like any other relationship. While all is well, there seem to be no annoying gestures or actions from the other person as such. But when you hit the low points, the emotional impact comes into play. Blackmail begins based on all the emotional triggers that the other person knows.

It becomes a passive-aggressive competition as the assembler begins to bring down the other person in the relationship. Phrases like “Do this or else..!!” It begins to appear and the comfort in between is immediately replaced by a sense of ruin.

This is called emotional blackmail. It describes a manipulative style where someone uses your feelings as a way to control your behavior, persuade you to see things their way or worse, and want you to do what they want. As subtle as it sounds, emotional blackmail is a very general and common nature for people to get what they want. It destroys even the best bonds on its way.

Emotional blackmail: definition and description
Like regular blackmail, emotional blackmail involves someone trying to get what they want from you. But instead of keeping secrets against you or any direct form of aggression, they are manipulating you with your feelings, weaknesses, and worse, your triggers.

Leaders in the field, Susan Forward and Donna Frazier outline the power dynamic that occurs in such manipulation. They suggest that emotional blackmailers use the fear-emotion-guilt tactic to get what they want.

FOG is a term coined by Forward, which suggests that fear, commitment, and guilt are emotional blackmail dynamics between the manipulator and the victim. The acronym FOG also accurately describes the confusion, lack of clarity, and reflection that can occur in these personal dynamics. Emotional blackmail can create a haze and contribute to feelings of fear, obligation, guilt, and anxiety.

According to Forward, emotional blackmail occurs in intimate relationships. The manipulator makes use of the knowledge gained about the victim’s fears. Blackmailers will use the information they learn about what the victim fears to manipulate them.

Forward notes that one of the most painful elements of emotional blackmail is they use of personal information about the victim’s vulnerabilities against themselves. Another motivator that blackmailers use is to put the victim’s sense of obligation to the test. They usually create undeserved guilt and blame for attributing their problems to the victim.

Forward and Frazier’s 4 Types of Emotional Blackmail

Forward and Frazier learn about four types of emotional blackmail, each with different manipulation techniques.

1 – The Punishers –
Punishers need to get their way, regardless of the other person’s feelings or needs. Their motto is “My Way or the Highway”. People with disabilities will insist on pressing for control and getting what they want with threats of harm or harm.

2. Self-Punishers –
   Individuals can make threats of self-harm if their partner does not comply with their desires.

3 – those affected –
This is the victim’s voice that conveys guilt to the partner if he does not do what is required. If they do not comply, there is a suggestion that their suffering will be the fault of others.

4. Stimuli –
   This can be the most subtle and confusing form of manipulation. There is a promise of what would be better if they complied. It inspires hope but still associates a threat with demand.

Read 8 Deep Questions To Ask Yourself If You Keep Attracting Toxic Partners

7 Signs of emotional blackmail

As emotional blackmail continues, there can be a large number of possible ways to do this and it can be modified depending on the actor’s intent and situation. But usually, there is a constant recurrence of the following blackmail signs which are as basic as they are common.

1. Use of threats
   It is very common for abusers to threaten others with violence to get what they want. And what better way to use it to threaten you and make you feel more genuinely afraid of the consequences than your loved ones or your things? This is the most common among emotional blackmailers, and more often than not, it gets the job done.

Sometimes the threat of violence or intimidation doesn’t come with words. If the abuser has already demonstrated a willingness to loudly rise, slam doors, punch walls, and look at you as if his tantrum was your fault, this behavior may be stressful enough and cast a large shadow on the horizon.

2. Arouse guilt regularly
   In this scenario, the blackmailer does not even know that he is using his guilt to get over his feelings. Half the time, they end up using it just to avoid disappointment in their face or not being able to accept the same. In situations where their reputation is on the line and you do nothing according to their bidding, emotional blackmail comes into play where it feels like it’s “happening because of you.”

Which is the absolute worst. With or without consciousness.

3. Warnings of self-harm
   Some emotional blackmailers may threaten to hurt themselves or even kill them to get you to do what they want, whether it’s to get back at them, to forgive them for hurting you, or to get work done that you wouldn’t normally do.

If you call their deception and walk away, they may hurt themselves just to blame you and see if you accept responsibility. If you do, they will recommend where they want you. If you are not, they have no power over you.

4. Arousing anger
   Some emotional blackmailers will deliberately provoke anger. They will do or say hurtful and abusive things so that when you react with anger, they can play the role of the victim or the “quiet person” who is the bigger one.

Then they manipulate you into doing something they want as atonement/compensation for your anger and misbehavior.

If you are the one who loses control, they use that against you. If you keep calm, and they lose control, they blame you for that too. Whether it be your anger or their anger, you are the culprit. It is a vicious circle and can be linked together. The vast majority would agree.

Read 6 Signs You Are in A Fake Relationship

5. Relinquishing jealousy and inferiority
   Emotional blackmail can also involve jealousy and fear of loss. Rather, it is one of the most effective and long-lasting forms of emotional blackmail.

Using the logic of the “other jealous person” to justify their misdeeds or misdemeanor, and then if the claim fails, label them as paranoid, eccentric, and insecure simply because they had issues with legitimate misconduct.

It’s a very bad job. Which eventually leads to an absolute inferiority complex and the fear of losing a person. And thus erases all legitimate concern and allows the misfortunes to continue.

As a result, the cycle of emotional blackmail continues.

6. Take Your Behavior Patterns for Granted
   When you show the other person that you will eventually compromise, they know exactly how to play similar situations in the future.

Over time, the emotional blackmail process teaches you that it is easier to comply than to face constant pressures and threats. You may accept that their love is conditional and that it is something they will withhold until you agree with them.

They may even learn that a certain type of threat will get the job done faster. As a result, this pattern is likely to continue.

7. Dramatic suffering
   This is a method of emotional blackmail where, at any other time or situation, you will not comply with your abuser.

And what about the truth? The person knows that.

As a result, it puts on a “dramatic” cover and creates a scene or causes suffering so much, preferably in a public place that it reduces your chances of saying no and refusing to comply.

Quite strategic for a dramatic person isn’t it? But that’s what it is.