This is a big one too.
It is coercive power or power by threat.
This is what armies do.
It sounds like this:
"If you don't do what I want, I project anger on you, hurt you or destroy you"
Emotional threat can have many intensity levels.
Parents do that to children, punish them if they don't behave.
Partners do that to each other.
Social circles practice this a lot too.
"Do what I want or else..."
It is a threat.
It happens in organizations too.
Emotional threat is a management tactic that is used all the time in organizations.
That's how so many leaders sustain their power and control others.
Think of an alfa male gorilla threatening his tribe to stay in power.
Sometimes the threat is pure energetic intimidation.
Sometimes he will kick another gorillas ass to prove that he is the boss and show what happens when someone challenges him.
In modern society these original instinctual social behaviors are still used.
They still represent some of the core interaction patterns between human beings.
Emotional threat is used all the time in all levels of society and in all cultures.
The impact of emotional threat is fear.
This means that you will do things because you are afraid of what happens when you don't.
As a kid you will do what your parents say because you don't want to be yelled at.
Typical forms of punishment are anger, threat, physical abuse, freedom restrain, etc.
When someone says "If you don't behave, I take away your freedom to go where you want!"
"You are grounded"
"I take away your freedom"
How cruel is that?!!!
Seriously!
These threat patterns throughout your education leave a trail of traumas and fear in your mind.
You might have an angry teacher terrorizing its students.
On a larger scale you might have an oppressive regime constantly threatening its citizens.
In modern western world, a whole lot of oppression and threat comes from corporations and governments teaming up to abuse human freedom.
This means that citizens no longer trust corporations and governments.
Especially in the US a bit more than in Europe the overall feeling is that the government is fundamentally corrupt and serves first corporations not citizens.
So these are another set of threat patterns, removing civil rights and creating a fear based society where you don't know what happens if you dare to speak up.
In that case, challenging a government might expose you to heavy retaliation.
You might lose your job, be exposed to character assassination, be put in jail or even killed!
You heard these stories about scientist exposing the dangers of some drug of food additive and them losing their job.
They were exposed to organized discredit, character assassination and ruined career.
In that case, the corporations they work for threatens them with:
"It's either you say what we want you to say or we will destroy you!"
Threat!!!
Labs playing with scientifically exposing inconvenient truths or discoveries have been raided and destroyed in a similar ways.
This means that the corporate world in sync with governments behave like big alpha fat gorillas bullying anyone who challenges them.
That's very primal behavior!
These primal threat patterns are still often directing the way power interacts with its citizens.
This type of dynamics happens on a large scale but permeates all aspects of human interactions.
If you are a couple, you will often see emotional threat used to keep things together.
"If you are not kind to me, I will deprive you from sex and love."
"If you don't do what I want, I will hate you and not speak to you for days."
"If you see your ex again, I will explode and project emotional rage on you."
"If you don't keep the relationship interesting, I will withdraw, divorce and take the kids away from you."
"If you don't fulfill my sexual needs, I will find a new lover and cheat on you."
The classical way to sustain fear in relationships is to have frequent anger or threat outbreaks towards your partner.
Partners often train each other to be on the edge!
Frequent anger outbursts sabotaged peace and harmony in your couple.
The fact that one of you is emotionally abusive creates this background threat energy in your relationship.
If that pattern is strong, you feel that you walk on egg shells all the time, afraid of triggering anger outbreaks in your lover.
Fear!
Not that healthy and peaceful, iis it?
The emotional intensity of these threats varies a lot.
Your partner might be physically and emotionally abusive and attack you multiple times per day.
Here, the level of emotional threat is at 90%.
It never feels safe!
If you are the victim of this abuse, you are scared all the time.
You can never relax.
In other cases, soft anger outbreaks might be exceptional and happen once every few months.
Here the level of emotional threat is at 5%.
You are at peace most of the time but light emotional tension might exceptionally appear.
The first step is to see and expose these shadows.
We'll look into solutions and tactics soon.
The emotional threat can be something else than anger.
For instance it can be sadness or self destructive behaviors like drinking.
The threat you might be exposed to from your partner is
"If I am not happy, I will get drunk, and if I get drunk things will get even worse"
or it might be
"I feel sad"
The fear of being exposed to your partner's sadness is another form of threat.
But it's a different variation.
There are many more.
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Emotional threat or coercive power is potential energy.
It is a possibility, not yet a reality.
Emotional threat are warnings.
They sound like "You better do it or else..."
Emotional threat is omnipresent in all aspects of life.
It is used a lot in families, friendships, organizations, etc.
For instance a manager will threaten their employees with firing them.
Or a lover might withdraw love and sex if the requests are not met.
A friend might project and anger if their demands are not fulfilled.
-----
Emotional threat or coercive power is potential energy.
It is a possibility, not yet a reality.
Emotional threat are warnings.
They sound like "You better do it or else..."
Emotional threat is omnipresent in all aspects of life.
It is used a lot in families, friendships, organizations, etc.
For instance a manager will threaten their employees with firing them.
Or a lover might withdraw love and sex if the requests are not met.
A friend might project and anger if their demands are not fulfilled.