The (Jonah) Hill I Will Die On
This is about so much more than a known white cis dude celebrity
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Sarah Brady, a professional surfer and law student (and former partner of actor Jonah Hill) outed him on Instagram for being emotionally abusive, and I’m here for it.
I’m not going to rehash the whole thing, but you can Google to see the various text messages that Sarah Brady showed on her Instagram. The texts are controlling, manipulative, and just generally awful. Jonah Hill weaponizes therapy-speak against her and misuses the term “boundaries.” This is about so much more than a known white cis dude celebrity, though. It’s about men using therapy-speak in inappropriate and incorrect ways. It’s also about the fact that emotional abuse is believed even less than physical abuse, and the general public doesn’t seem to understand what emotional abuse even is.
The National Domestic Violence Hotline describes Emotional Abuse as:
…includes non-physical behaviors that are meant to control, isolate, or frighten you. This may present in romantic relationships as threats, insults, constant monitoring, excessive jealousy, manipulation, humiliation, intimidation, dismissiveness, among others. Sometimes emotional abuse is more obvious, like a partner yelling at you or calling you names. Other times it can be more subtle, like your partner acting jealous of your friends or not wanting you to hang out with someone of another gender. While these emotionally abusive behaviors do not leave physical marks, they do hurt, disempower, and traumatize the partner who is experiencing the abuse.
With the uptick of “Instagram Therapists” and the (now heeded) calls for people to “go to therapy,” anyone is able to mimic and parrot back therapy lingo. I stopped yelling at people to “go to therapy” a long time ago. After my own harmful experience of decades of CBT, I realized that the type of therapy really fucking matters. This is why I don’t even bother with saying that men need therapy (or anyone needs therapy). Access to therapy and access to good therapists is difficult. Once you are in therapy, your work doesn’t just stop after the 50-minute session. The client needs to be working on themselves outside of those sessions. But many people, specifically men, are picking up language to parrot back whenever it suits them, and generally don’t seem to be working on themselves. Or, if they are, it’s in a very limited scope. Too many women have examples of this. I, of course, have my own.
From November to March, I dated someone who went to weekly therapy (and even put it in his Hinge profile like badge of honor). He loved-bombed me from the beginning, and the entire time we dated, it felt off, but I couldn’t pinpoint why. He was so nice. Now I see it very clearly: sure, he was nice, but he was completely inauthentic. He said a bunch of shit about his “attachment style” and how open and honest he was in his therapy sessions. Early on in our relationship, he admitted he could be manipulative. I filed this red flag away—not to ignore it, but to see when or how it may come up. Later, I found out he was using so much weed that he couldn’t hang out with me sober, nor could he even get shit done that he needed to get done. I asked if he had talked to his therapist about it. He responded, “No, because then I’d have to tell her about my weed use in general, and I just don’t want to go there.”
If you can’t be honest in therapy, what are you even doing?
It was clear to me that he was not actually processing much in therapy. He was simply learning the language, because he knew women would appreciate it. I don’t believe he did this maliciously, nor do I believe all men do this maliciously, but I think there’s a real societal problem with men (primarily) doing something to look “good” or get “credit” for it with women.
It reminds me of when men started self-identifying as “feminist” over a decade ago. I would see this all over the dating apps and it initially made me feel safer. However, many of these men used the word to lure women. I dated many of them, and their actions were most certainly not “feminist.” I see this, too, in how many of us white people want to self-identify as “allies” to people of color, to Black communities, etc. To me, you don’t self-identify as an “ally,” you just do the work requested of you. It’s up to members of those communities to bestow that label upon you if they choose to do so.
Language is fluid, and social justice language is always getting updated. Therapy language also changes, but not quite as quickly. Thus, it’s a bit easier for people to mimic things like, “My attachment style…” or “This is a boundary for me,” when, in fact, it’s not a boundary, it’s controlling. Words mean things and it would appear that many people have forgotten this.
Boundaries are about the person who created them, not about anyone else. They are markers of consent and comfort. They have nothing to do with another person. Telling your partner what they can or can’t wear is not a boundary for you, it’s a way for you to have control over them. It’s placing a limitation on another person.
What the Jonah Hill texts reveal is a man who is incredibly insecure in his own being. The texts show a man who a) isn’t/hasn’t worked on himself, b) doesn’t actually understand the terminology he’s parroting, and c) has a very shitty, enabling therapist.
I’m really worried about women, especially in this moment, because too many are seeing these texts and commenting, “What’s the problem?” I’m really worried about folks in queer relationships, because I know emotional abuse is still not talked about nearly enough in LGBTQ+ communities (nor is it believed).
Emotional abuse is very real even if nobody believes it, and you don’t always know you’re dealing with it until you’re out of the situation. It can be insidious, subtle, a slow burn of confusion and heartache. It would do everyone some good to be more educated about it (about all forms of abuse, tbh).
It would be great if you could be the person who someone comes to for help, because they know you’ll believe them.
It would be great if we could all do this for each other.
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Such a perfect summary of the cultural moment we’re in. I visibly cringed when I read “he put it in his Hinge profile”.
Emotional abuse is a topic that is not discussed nearly enough, and I’m so grateful that you did!! On more than one occasion I’ve gaslit myself for even calling it “abuse,” thinking that the conflict was all in my head...but that’s just it! Abuse that affects the mind!