A scapegoat is a person or group you place blame on. When scapegoating children, the child is blamed or shamed for all the issues that arise within dysfunctional households. Here's how scapegoating works: The parent with NPD blames their child (or children) for family issues.
For individuals, scapegoating is a psychological defense mechanism of denial through projecting responsibility and blame on others. [2] It allows the perpetrator to eliminate negative feelings about him or herself and provides a sense of gratification.
Often intuitive and empathetic, caretaker scapegoats can become powerful healers as adults. But if they continue to prioritize the needs of others over their own they are likely to experience anxiety, poor self-care, resentment, and burnout.
Scapegoating refers to the act of blaming a person or group for something bad that has happened or that someone else has done. 1 Scapegoating can happen to protect the image of the family or people who are favored in the family, not just the self.
For Girard, scapegoats are always innocent of the specific charges laid against them; the accusations are always false; scapegoating is always a heinous act of injustice.
Although the strengths of the narcissistic family scapegoat make her/him a target, they are also her/his salvation. Scapegoats' ability to see and question, along with their desire for justice, enable them to escape the family tyranny when others cannot.
Like the strong goat Aaron selected, the target of family scapegoating is also often the strongest and healthiest member of the family. At first blush, this may sound counterintuitive. But think about it a little more.
Many times, healing the scapegoat role on a personal level is about deep healing of trauma, empowerment, and a place to process emotion and find safety in relationship. Healing the scapegoat role in community means learning how to forge new relationships of repair and effective emotional communication.
Scapegoating is a common form of parental verbal abuse. Research shows that scapegoating allows a parent to think of the family as healthier than it is. Scapegoating lets a parent minimize responsibility for and explain negative outcomes, enhancing a sense of control.
The “plebs” might resent them, but a scapegoat is a victim that can be safely attacked.
A narcissist will decide who their scapegoat is based on their own fears, feelings of jealousy, sense of inadequacy and insecurities. From a narcissist's perspective, a scapegoat is someone who somehow triggers their fears, feelings of jealousy, sense of inadequacy and insecurities.
Family Scapegoating Abuse occurs when your primary caregivers or other important 'power holders' in the family (grandparents, dominant siblings or extended family members) single you out as being 'defective' and repeatedly give you the message that you are 'bad', 'different', or 'not good enough'.
The narcissist charms everyone around them. They manipulate others to support their distorted version of reality. All the while, they enjoy the feeling of power they get from making the scapegoat suffer. The narcissist is driven by envy, jealousy and a lack of empathy.
1: Bill Buckner
In the world of sports, no scapegoat is as infamous as Bill Buckner, the Boston Red Sox first baseman who booted a routine ground ball that cost the Red Sox their first title since 1918.
Scapegoating is the ultimate abuse of power and a dehumanizing experience, as targets are considered to have few or no human rights by family members who mistreat them. When understood from this perspective, 'No Contact' is an essential psychological survival strategy.
The scapegoat was sent into the wilderness for Azazel, possibly for the purpose of placating that evil spirit, while a separate goat was slain as an offering to God. By extension, a scapegoat has come to mean any group or individual that innocently bears the blame of others.
Family Scapegoats can certainly become narcissistic as they get older. Many family scapegoats experience immense rage due to their status in the family. What is this? They know their role is unfair, but they are powerless to this dynamic when they're young.
Without the common chaos of “dealing with the scapegoat,” the narcissist's partner may decide that enough is enough. In other words, a scapegoat going no-contact tends induce chaos. The family has become so used to pinpointing issues onto one person that they now feel completely off-guard.
When a scapegoat leaves their family of origin they are going to experience a lot of invalidation, devaluation, dehumanization, and chaos that is designed to manipulate them back into the abuse cycle and remain a repository for the family's negative emotions.
If and when the golden child does break free, the process will be much more painful than it is for the scapegoat because their parent wasn't all that bad to them. Meanwhile, scapegoats often better recognize their toxic upbringing.
The scapegoat then feels worthless and unable to do anything right; just their mere existence is wrong, bad, and a burden. They feel unlovable and this carries throughout their entire lives.