Excerpt from Where There’s Smoke

Relational aggressors are those who use a relationship, either theirs or the relationships of other people, as leverage or weapon, to bully, intimidate, control and/or punish another person. The aggressor can be an acquaintance or an old friend. She can be a long-standing enemy or a new rival.

Targets are the ones who stand in the line of fire. They are usually the aggressor’s peer, if only in common goal or desire. Although in the dynamics of female covert aggression, targets are generally other females, males can find themselves targets of female aggressors, as well.

Collaborators are those who actively join the aggressor in the relational aggression, to whatever degree. They can start out as active participants and co-instigators, or they can be, initially, bystanders who are drawn into the drama of relational aggression. They are the relationships through which the aggressor channels most of her negativity toward the target.

Other bystanders become Silent Witnesses. They do not actively participate in any way, either to support the aggression or to stop it. Usually, they feel powerless or fearful to help. Many wind up struggling with guilt for their inaction and find it difficult to make peace within them selves.

Enablers are a unique group of bystander, who carry some kind of authority or status within the social network. They can make a difference by virtue of their standing, but don’t. For whatever reasons, they choose to look away or trivialize what little they’re willing to see. This behavior often serves to legitimize the relational aggression, and so in this sense, enablers are not only bystanders but indirect collaborators.

These roles are fluid. They are not end-all categories. People change and roles blend into one another, as circumstances rise and fall. These definitions are tools to help us understand human dynamics, which can change, as quickly as one can change one’s mind.

Demian,
~DreamSinger