Demanding forgiveness without making amends: The Weapons Sexist Men Use series (paid subscriber bonus)
Why do men feel so entitled to forgiveness, even when they offer little to no remorse, and even when the bad behavior continues?
“That’s in the past. It’s time for you to get over it.”
“I already said I was sorry!”
“You just love hanging onto resentment, don’t you?”
These are the words of a person who is not really sorry—but who believes they are entitled to forgiveness. This completely unreasonable bargain is a favorite weapon of abusive men. These men weaponize demands for forgiveness, even as they refuse to ever offer grace and forgiveness to anyone else, for any misdeed, however slight.
Forgiveness is not something someone can earn. It is a gift freely given at the discretion of the injured party. No one has to offer anyone else forgiveness, although ongoing forgiveness is necessary for any relationship to continue. Abusive men understand that a relationship cannot be healthy when their partners have not forgiven their misdeeds. But rather than earning forgiveness, they insist they are entitled to it.
For most people, remorse is necessary for forgiveness, especially in a relationship. The remorse must be proportional to the hurt. And, to be truly real, remorse must also accompany changed behavior—or at least earnest attempts at changed behavior.
These entitled men think that the failure to offer immediate forgiveness—even in the absence of remorse, even when the slight is ongoing—is the real harm. Because in a patriarchy, men view relationships as an entitlement. A woman’s failure to give a man the exact relationship he wants, including forgiveness on demand, is in his mind her failure, not his.
Here’s what that might sound like:
“I just can’t do anything to please you, and you’ll never forgive me.”
“When are you going to forgive me?”
“That’s all in the past.”
“That’s all irrelevant and you need to move on.”
“It’s your problem you can’t forgive me, not mine.”
“You’re being abusive by not forgiving me.”
“A good relationship requires forgiveness, so it’s your fault our relationship is failing.”
“I can’t do [x basic thing such as chores, not verbally abusing you, or stepping up to be a good parent] until you forgive me.”
“You just love holding [x terrible thing he did] over my head.”
“I’ll never get out of debt to you.”
Often, these men are demanding forgiveness for absolutely terrible behaviors such as hitting their partner or child, infidelity, or years of abuse. Often, they’ve never apologized. Often, they are engaging in the bad behavior at the very moment they demand forgiveness for it.
So why do they feel so entitled to forgiveness? And what can you do if this is your partner?
This is part of a bonus series for paid subscribers on the tools abusive, sexist, low-quality men use in arguments. Some examples of previous pieces in this series include:
The weapons sexist men use in fights: “We just have different standards!”
The weapons sexist men use in fights: Blaming women for their reactions to bad behavior
The weapons men use in fights: “You’re never satisfied with anything!”
The arguments sexist men use in fights—and what they really mean
The most important tool men use to maintain household labor inequality
You can read the entire series here.
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