Kidpower Shorts – Episode 9: Recognizing and Resisting Emotional Coercion


In the latest episode of Kidpower Shorts, we’re focusing on a particular type of boundary lowering tactic — emotional coercion.

Emotional coercion is when someone uses feelings to get you to behave differently, lower your boundaries, or do things against your best interests. Sometimes, people use emotional coercion when they are trying to be hurtful. A lot of times, people end up acting in emotionally coercive ways not because they are trying to cause harm – but because they are having a hard time managing their feelings or communicating respectfully.

Emotional coercion can be hard to spot, no matter what anyone intends. This video can help you recognize emotional coercion and take charge of your safety.

Many of us have lost time and money, have gotten into unsafe situations, have felt overwhelmed with shame, have harmed relationships, and have tolerated abusive or disrespectful behavior far too long because:

  • I was afraid of being embarrassed.
  • I didn’t want to offend someone.
  • I admired someone so much.
  • I felt too ashamed to speak up.
  • I wanted someone to like me.
  • I was afraid of being left out.
  • I didn’t want someone to feel sad or unloved.
  • I didn’t want anyone to think badly of me.
  • I wanted to make them happy.

Putting our safety and well-being ahead of uncomfortable feelings is at the heart of resisting emotional coercion.

This is why Kidpower’s “Put Safety First” Principle — Our safety and well-being are more important than anyone’s embarrassment, inconvenience or offense — has stood the test of time!

Many people are using Avery’s Kidpower Video Shorts to address important safety issues for themselves and with the youth and teens in their lives. Here’s the whole series: https://www.kidpower.org/library/videos-shorts-series/

Avery is a Kidpower native and is currently studying Zoology at the University of Glasgow. He is glad to be supporting Kidpower by producing the Kidpower Shorts, which he hopes will be accessible and helpful to people of all ages around the world!

This video was produced with help from Chris Graham, CEO of The Marketing Department, a Glasgow-based design agency helping clients flourish in Scotland and worldwide. Find more about Chris and The Marketing Department at tmd.scot.

Music:
From Soundroll, downloaded from upbeat.com

Video credits:
Intro: Canva
Outro: Canva

Photo credits:
Photos are downloaded from Unsplash, Pixabay, and Canva. Sources include:

Priscilla du Preez, Canva, Candid Shots, Gift Habeshaw, Nasty Gepp, Linkedin Sales Solutions, Christina Wocintechchat com, The Creative Exchange, JD Chow, Rahul K, & Bruce Mars.

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Kidpower Teenpower Fullpower International is a global nonprofit leader dedicated to protecting people of all ages and abilities from bullying, violence, and abuse by empowering them with awareness, knowledge, and skills. Since, 1989, Kidpower has served millions of children, teenagers, and adults, including those with special needs, through its positive and practical workshops, extensive free online Library, consultation, and publications. Instead of using fear to teach about danger, Kidpower makes it fun to learn to be safe! Our K-12 curriculum is used by families, schools, and youth organizations for their own child safety programs. Publications include: Bullying: What Adults Need to Know and Do to Keep Kids Safe, the Relationship Safety Skills Handbook for Teens and Adults, The Kidpower Book for Caring Adults: Personal Safety, Self-Protection, Confidence, and Advocacy for Young People, and our cartoon-illustrated Safety Comics series and Introductory Curriculum for Educators.