My favorite way of shutting people down when they try to straw man me is to respond, with no emotion, "No, what did I actually say?" In most cases, the person trying to straw man me just gives up and leaves the conversation. It has saved me so much mental and emotional strain.

"Why are you adding emotionally-charged non-sequiturs to what I just said?" is what I have asked when this happens. It usually stops them dead in their tracks with a blank stare.

As somebody with a passion for truth and effective communication, it hurts my brain trying to grasp that some people strategicaly break conversation to shut down truth.

My neighbor tried to do this to me the other day. I repeated my answer to her, and told her I had nothing else to say. She stormed off and I haven't seen her since. :) Thank God for channels like this because I've learned and continue to learn things I should have learned in school.

After many years of this tactic being used against me, the only way I have managed to shut down the escalation is to repeat (the broken record approach) my key point with no emotion. It happened today, for example, with someone trespassing on the historical site insisting that he be allowed to look round at the ancient ruins. I did not counter that in any way, I just repeated "This is private property and I am asking you politely to leave" no matter what his comeback. I did not react in any way and just repeated the statement three times no matter what came out of his mouth. On the third time, I just said it again and walked away. He left the site. The answer is to be bland, to show no emotion, to state the fact each time and not to respond in any way by getting embroiled in their way of thinking. He starts by saying "Oh, I am so glad you are here. Can you tell me where the ancient castle ruins are on the site?" "This is private property and I am asking you politely to leave." "I know the ruins are here and I want to see them because I have come a long way and I---" "This is private property and I am asking you politely to leave." "Look, I know they are here and this is---" "This is private property and I am asking you politely to leave." Works a treat. Try it yourself!

The last one is by far the most effective in my own experiences. Asking "Did I say that?" "You implied it" "Did I? Why don't you repeat to me what I actually said." If they try to give me any other answer than what I said, then I'll ask them to try again. If they still don't, I'll repeat it one more time. And then either terminate the conversation or If they do answer back correctly, I'll say okay so go from there, what's the issue?

This is a great video because this can be so irritating. I like the tip about asking directly, "What did I actually just say?" Thank you, Darren! My favorite way to handle this is to ask them "How did you arrive at that conclusion?" when they try to twist my words or make an outlandish statement concerning my character or behavior.

I've experienced this and I've seen journalist 'straw man' their guest. It's a sneaky way to cause doubt, distort the facts and redirect the conversation. How like a narcissist to avoid responsibility and accountability for their actions. I can see politicians using this tactic to destabilize/confuse their opponents. Thank you Darren for an excellent video!

The Coverts do this! They become the “victim,” you, the “bad guy.” Thank you for the tips on how to handle these situations.

To try to understand the gaslighthing and the word salad and other circular reasonning of a narcissists I know, I followed an advice: I reccorded and transcripted the conversation once. It was so helpfull to me as I was able to clearly identify each of the emotionnal tactics used. It's so difficult to do this live in the middle of the heat. Most of it was more about culpabilizing me at every turn that it was about anything else. Most of the "arguments" were actually quite vague and the narcissist over-interpretates and over-exagerates almost everything. As usual, the "conversation" led no where. The goal was just to unload the narcissist's emotional rubbish and makes me feel bad about nothing, everything and its contrary.

My comeback is: "I'm worried about what it is that you heard me saying. Could you please tell me what it is that you're hearing?" Then, if it is misleading etc; I respond assertively, "Ok, now that I understand what you have heard, I'm going to tell you what I actually have said." By the way - your contribution to mental health awareness and healing is simply lovely... Keep spreading the message.

Thank you for this! As of late I feel very confused. I agree it is like gaslighting. Yet. Now I know what has been going on for me is Straw mannng. You also have given me a tool so that I can HELP myself!!

One of my husband’s three key techniques, along with word salad and both-siding. Sometimes, he’ll put all three together in an angry tsunami of etymology-based illogic, to which I have to listen in respectful silence. If I try to question what he’s saying or ask for clarification, as suggested here, he accuses me of not understanding English. This is an extra dig because I hold an English Lit and Lang degree.

Another great video, Darren. Misdirection was a frequent tactic used by the narc in my last relationship. I 've never been so misquoted so much before. And I did not know how to handle it well. I'll keep an eye out here for suggestions from other targeted folk that may work.

My now passed brother in law would practice trying to fence you into some predetermined corner with nearly every conversation.He aways needed it to reflect his superior intelligence. Nearly every tactic you illustrated he used.His obituary described him as a "sparkling conversationalist".

This video reminded me of arguments with my ex. I remember how confusing and frustrating they were, and now I better understand why. I think I will be better prepared for this kind of thing if I encounter it again in the future. Thank you!

Every single fight was a nightmare. I’d say something like “I need you to try to calm down, you’re interrupting everything I say so my message isn’t coming across and you’re not hearing me.” He’d say “Oh so now I’m a monster!?? What the F is wrong with you?! This is f’ed up, YOU started this fight and now you’re making me yell!” I can’t fully wrap my head around what happened in those fights, just that I’d always be the one apologizing and trying to make things better and he’d have already gone off the deep end. Never in my life did I feel the need to record a conversation to prove who said what or what was true until this relationship. If I had recorded it though, he’d have flipped out so hard and while he never actually did it, I always felt that he would destroy me if needed because I became his full blown enemy in arguments.

I have learned when someone says "So what you're saying is ..." or "So what I'm hearing is ..." to say to them "No, that is what YOU'RE saying. What I said was ..." and then repeat the original point. Do this as many times S necessary. Practice!!!

Thanks Darren and I'm about to watch this now with my coffee ☕🤗 Best wishes and have a lovely day too ❤️☀️

husband and wife at a restaurant. wife: I saw you take a glimpse at the lady on the opposite table. husband: you don't trust me anymore?

One of my thankfully estranged siblings did this to us for decades. I never fell for it because “Daddy warned me about it” but our mom is very timid and easily frightened. Additionally there are one too many people who engage in this dysfunctional misconduct in the work environment. They are both exhausting and counterproductive, often costing departments and projects thousands of dollars/pounds worth of losses, through their inability to prioritise the company’s objectives over their ego.

Awesome vid. Thank you! Sadly in my family this is just called having a conversation. 🥴

This sounds so much like both of my younger sisters! I tried repeating myself to adnauseum and it didn’t work. I finally decided I had enough and don’t talk to them anymore.

Been there, done that. Narcissists do this so easily and quickly, it just boggles the mind. Drives us non NPD people NUTS! i am constantly asking him to repeat what I just said verbatim, and he can NEVER do it! EVER. Or if we go round and round, sometimes for HOURS, he will finally on the 6th, 7th, 8th try (sometimes more) begrudgingly repeat what I said, just to get me off his back and because it has become so obvious what he is doing. But I never knew what he did had a term or name, just that it was maddening beyond belief!!! This is a very helpful video! Thanks you!

Darren I cracked up laughing when you said about the part where make them aware how the point they just made is the one you made in the first place because this happened me online 😂 I made a comment about something I believe in only for a random troll to aggressively come on and attack and twist my words. In fact, they made a very similar comment to mine in one of their own comment threads which I found odd they disagreed with mine but I think they felt jealous and undermined someone else like me came along with the same thought and of course being the nasty narcissistic troll they were had to rain over my comment 😅 pathetic and trolls need to find something better to do with their time instead of attacking others! Use your haters as motivators as the quote says. Thanks again Darren and best wishes ☀️

I didn't know this type of interaction is called Straw Man argument, but omgoodness did my bf use this all the time, esp at the beginning of the relationship. I thought he was the dumbest person I had ever met, like how can you possibly glean that from what I said?? All manipulation.

This is what I've been missing - how it gets from me calmly stating "A" only to wind up at point "C" - tongue tied, with my stutter back, exasperated, trying to defend myself against an insinuation, that I am quite an inferior specimen and possibly violently crazy and ruminating over how it happened. In the latest iteration, before I saw this video, I reported a small problem at work. My boss responded, and got back to what I was doing. But her boss then confronted me (alone) and said 'you seem to have a problem resisting change'. After that, she took it further, and put it out there that she is the victim of my emotional outburst. Now I have to take classes she assigned in 'emotional intelligence'. I might just retire.

Oh, this is very helpful for something I'm currently dealing with, perfect timing, thank you so much!

I thought I was crazy for so many years. Time and again my words were manipulated in every way possible. I have learned so much from this channel. My broken heart hurts more and more. I don’t want to believe any of this was intentional 😢

So, what you're saying is: you hate people who use the strawman fallacy.

Excellent resource. I couldn't answer anything to his liking because of this tactic of verbally annihilating everything I said . So with no skills I just would answer off the wall. Going back years for me. Why are you divorcing me? Me, I want to square dance. Its all i had, or get devoured.

Yes. My spouse would do this and I didn’t know what was happening. He also did it in reverse. When I would call out something messed up that he said, he would pretend like I was extracting different meaning from What was intended. He would say I was straw manning him. But this was something he frequently did. I was so confused all of the time. I figured I was just a terrible person and tried not to complain until (accidentally) some of these things came up in therapy and I was given some new insight on these tactics. Ultimate this what ended my marriage. He took something that I said and twisted it to mean I was directly insulting his mental health ( I was talking about my own mental health and feeling frustrated) he kept pushing me a corner demanding to apologize. I handled this poorly. This happened on top of a series of very traumatic events for me and I just shutdown and refused to engage in arguments. There was a third party witness so I thought I’m not going to defend myself. someone else heard what I said and the context. Instead, he said to me “ that person isn’t here so it didn’t matter that there were witnesses. I told him to believe what he wanted…. And he did and took steps to destroy my life and reputation.

Don;t allow yourself to become emotionally reactive with these tactics. I found it's better to laugh. Then i say something like, "OK Explain to me exactly how you made THAT assumption out of what I said! " Ha ! HA! Ha! Too funny!!!!

Ty Darren for another great video. Darren could you please explain to me why a narcissist feels the need while being verbally agressive and abusive to beat their own chest and shout out how good a man he is, and no man could do anything as good as him and how grateful I should be when I would dare to contradict or go against his opinion or judgement. It would happen all the time when I would suggest that we get a professional workman in to do a job that clearly needed a professional to repair. This is where as you said in this video I'd get the "oh your a professional roofer now, etc". I lost my confidence in living!

This is happening to me RIGHT NOW... thanks so much for letting me know what's going on! THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!! THANK YOU!!

My cousin has actually changed sides in an argument against me and kept arguing. Just pointless abuse

Narcisists aim is to create confusion in their targets so that they can manipulate better and get what they want. We need to be focused while dealing with these abusive people.

Awesome info. Explained in an easy to understand way.

Thank you so much for doing this videos. I learn something new every day. Knowledge is power.

I said to him, “how you know me, and how you diagnosed me? You even didn’t see me one hour, one day, you don’t know me at all, and you said that I am borderline?” And then he get angry,.

It is new term to learn. Clarity and consistency is very important to deal with confusion and inconsistency effectively.

Straw manning? New concept! Thanks always need to know new things. I have dealt with this often!

Spot on, as always xx

My narc spouse will say something, then say they didn't say it...🤔

I have a close friend whom I've known for decades, who just started doing this within the past few years. It's curious how he didn't do it in the past, but only just started recently. Maybe it was because I began disagreeing with him on politics, but he does it now when we aren't even discussing politics. In fact, I try really hard to avoid that topic with him anymore.

Mind games at the highest level. The person gets a high by doing this and gets in your head

Fantastic content 👍👍

Fascinating...my ex used2do this to me in arguments esp restating and changing my point and I was often accussed of claiming I was a scientific expert because I dared question my doctors treatment of my severe allergies and auto immune illness. I am very well educated and most importantly I'm entitled to my opinion of my medical care....do u know more than a doctor so? I was often asked? I got used2that claim... that I was saying I was an expert. I was NOT entitled to an opinion of my medical treatment. Also his daughter used to do what you mentioned to him when she wanted money...quilting him saying 'so you want the baby to starve do you?' ....knowing he would b guilted by this ludicrous scenario....all lies anyway as she had lots of money which she spent always on herself

Thanks. Excellent advice that’s easy to remember.

Hey Darren,. Yep, Discuss the Intense Evil Leering Stares these these Terrible Creatures use for Intimidation

When I get a straw man thrown in my face, I try to tell them, Nice Try. Then I move on.

I find that the straw man is usually inserted when someone is attempting to dictate the pace of the argument. They insert the straw man in the middle of a rant - then move on before it can be refuted - leaving the impression that it is true. You can use verbal 'stop signs' - to interupt their pace - with words like 'now' and 'so'. "Now...(pause)...I don't think you understood what I actually said." - or - "So...(pause)...you seem to be misunderstanding what I actually said." The 'stop sign' words interupt the pace quickly. The pause draws their attention in. You focus on their 'misunderstanding' (that it wasn't deliberate) then state that there was something different that was 'actually said'.

Thank you! I think these management techniques will help me discern the narcissists from fellow imperfect but well meaning humans.

This happens all the time w my birth parent. Dragon lady has all the reasons/excuses. She lives on word salad.

Yes, my x told me what my words really meant 😒 And then attack me for thinking what he told me I thought

That has exactly happened to me so now I don’t want to have any conversation with the twisted brains cause there’s two of them in my life 😩

i just love you your words are so good so healing and clearfying thank you

My response is either "prove it" or "if that's what you want to believe."

I just noticed all the star wars stuff in the background....😍

"So, what you're saying is..." x 100, Cathy Newman.

I have experienced this directly many times. Thank God we actually had logic courses in my university. It seems no one is taught logic anymore. I reccomend finding basic logic books and reading up for anyone watching this. It will help you pursue rational.conversation with others or if you are with a narcissist at least for your own sanity! You will see all the more clearly exactly what he is saying here and be able to consistently review in your own mind a logical premise for your own thought process and not be thrown off by the narcissists constant irrational and chaotic thought process. It is quite demonic actually. Think of how in the Bible the demonic responds to Jesus by constantly answering a question with a question. When you are relating to a person with either high levels of narcissism or NPD, they will most times create questions and word salads completely irrelevant to the point to create chaos and confusion. They love to also do this in front of others for an audience. Save yourself the time and confusion by either doing as he reccomended and simply repeating the original point or simply abandon the conversation by redirecting it! Because even if you manage to have a rational conversation with a narcissist, the probability is high that they are simply faking it to obtain some indirect reward anyway! Happy travels and remember, it is never to late to leave a narcissistic relationship! Jump.ship! You will be so glad you did!

Wow, thank you, this is very helpful. This can be so frustrating & confusing I thought it was just a matter of poor perception on their part. I've gone through this so many times. Its aweful. Also, I noticed Fox News uses this tactic very often. People fall for it, I just completely stopped watching Fox.

I often go with "you reveal more than you intend". Or, if they are really venomous, a simple "you embarrass yourself".

Excellent video, thank you!

You are disrespecting me with your personal interpretation. What is your motive?

Darren did you see Real Time with Bill Maher this past weekend 8/26/22? Check it out it's really funny; he put a literal life size straw man in the chair for " new rules." This description of yours is helpful and now I'll replay.

Very helpful 😊

*Don't respond to their version.* Just say "no, that's not what I said" "no, you didn't listen to what I actually said" Both are likely true.

Intriguing. Now I understand what my husband does to me. We don't argue, we discuss. Happily married.

It's a breach of one's minds peace. Redeemable in law..

So this is what my x spouse was doing and my oldest daughter. Now i understand....

I said to my narcissistic wife that I don't feel appreciated, and she came back with "Oh so I always say the wrong things." Not only invalidating my point, but making me defend her, when she was in the wrong to begin with. I've had to totally grey-rock and direct her to long-term counselling.

Factz

The best method of shutting down strawman and ad hominem attacks is -to point out/ expose the obviousness of such attacks having occurred, -identify/ reiterate the initial core structure of the original point/ argument, -exploiting the distinction between the two, -then highlighting the intended intentional effort to discredit and detract from the focal point of the issue at hand, Primarily for the sole purpose to make the original speaker appear foolish or incorrect/ uneducated and therefore incompetent and thus inconsequential

The solution is to strawman back and make them defend themselves which takes the conversation back to the core point

Do narcissist ask u questions every second of everyday? My one does, I try to keep my distance from this person as much as I can, they drain my energy and I can't help it, I always seem to react to there madness. Helppp

no, gaslighting is when you're trying to make the person doubt the reality they witnessed, strawmanning is just trying to control how the conversation flows.

Thank you 💝 shared love from Albuquerque.

For example you see a plus size model who is pregnant and on the catwalk and you say "Curvy is great" and someone says "Well she is pregnant". You think "God help us I am aware of that, her plus size figure is nothing to do with her pregnancy".

Great video 💯🙌

Theres no having a rational logical argument with a narcissist. Once you stop engaging with them and their petty behavior. They will discard you for someone else

Wow. Good shit mate. Subbed.

Hey hey. (Jyst trying to get attention). I would like to know about the intention. I have noticed that highly neurotic people use this (but I would say unintentionally) during the process of catastrophising the intention you have. I’m interested when they honestly don’t realise they are just exaggerating beyond all reality and reason. I’m also interested in how we can step out of this misrepresentation loop.

I have had to say “ no my exact words were “ then repeat, on occasion more then once.

Very thorongh presentation.

The strawman has basis in law. Specifically Uniform Commercial Code. Lay persons call it a strawman but in terms of business code, the name in All Caps is defined under article 9-102(a)(71) as a registered organization. The All Caps name is required for all business entities, trusts, estates and corporations per UCC 1-201 (10) entitled "Conspicuous Format."

Holy Toledo, this was my mother!!!🤦‍♀️😵‍💫🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯🤯

Thank you.

It happens people (in forums) “read between my lines”, and just have to answer that I just checked with a magnifying glass - there’s nothing written there. I especially hate when people come up with pure and undiluted BS and I present fact or data and this factual information is twisted and thrown back at me with “So you are claiming/believing ….”.

Thank you

So what are they really saying when they wanted to borrow money? if you love me you'll do it for me. A good saying I had to reply was, "And if I really loved you I would be prepared to throw myself off Leeds Bridge just to prove how much I cared for you ". I will then say. Don't give me that crap and don't try and make me feel guilty for making a reasonable request. In other words, call the bastards out (please pardon my language)

This was fabulous

They love to twist what you say. Turning your statements into something else, Imply things with a new meaning and not the original. All in effort to make you look bad and smear you. This has happened to me a lot

How do you handle someone living on a fixed budget, who asks, month after month after month to borrow from you (ALWAYS in this form: "I could really use a favor OR I really need a favor") in the 3rd week, but who also pays you back~? Suggesting and/or offering to help them budget hasn't worked. Saying no a few times hasn't worked. I think this person lives like this and does this to any newer friends, as well.

It can be uncertain if the misrepresentation is deliberate or accidental

good video ✅

The narcissist used this when I discarded them, reframing my words and then they self activated their rage tantrum

Call them out on it. Point out their vexatious claims and how they are disingenuous and purposefully misdirecting the conversation. Then tell them they are putting words in your mouth and making frivolous strawman arguments, and if they don't want to listen, then be gone.

I’ll never understand why people do this.

♥️