39. Aggressor-Victim Contact Rebus

The destructive aggressor-victim contact rebus contains a test as to whether others will connect with either the aggressor or victim role. This element of the contact rebus takes the form of role-testing that, when carefully observed, is of much help to the motivational worker. Within the contact, rebus is a hidden invitation to associate with either the role of aggressor or victim (Motivational Work, Part 1: Values and Theory, pages 308 – 367).

Case Study

Thirty-five-year-old Felix has been living at a hostel for the homeless for the past two weeks now. All of the hostel staff are afraid of him as he has behaved threateningly a few times and they know that he has been incarcerated for assault on numerous occasions.

That evening, Felix goes ballistic and trashes all the furniture in the communal lounge in a fit of screaming and swearing. None of the staff dares do anything until the hostel manager comes in, takes Felix by the arm, and asks him how he feels. Felix quietens down and starts to cry, after which the manager sits and talks to him about his problems for quite some time.

Discussion

This aggressively anti-social contact rebus invites the staff to become either aggressors or victims. In angering and hurting people, Felix tests whether anyone will respond by returning his violence to bring him back in line (in which case the person would become an aggressor) or if anyone will be scared and immobilized (in which the person would become a victim).

It appears as though all of the staff adopt the role of a victim apart from the manager, who solves the contact rebus not by adopting the aggressor or victim role, but by giving affirmation to the suffering individual who is concealed within the contact rebus.