COERCIVE CONTROL IS ...
MURDER IN SLOW MOTION
(Source: Laura Richards, Criminal Analyst and Coercive Control Expert)
Terror and unpredictability are the baseline of daily life.
Victims are slowly trapped, erased, drained, exiled and targeted for destruction
not in a moment of rage, but through long-term domination, manipulation, and deprivation.
In many cases, coercive control ends not in escape, but in murder.
Women and children around the world are being killed in
predictable, preventable patterns of coercive control every single day
THE FOUNDATION OF ALL DOMESTIC ABUSE
Experts now agree that domestic violence is not defined by incidents of physical injury
but by an ongoing pattern of coercive control
Coercive control is not just one type of abuse — it is the system beneath all abuse
the ongoing pattern of domination and fear
designed to erode the victim's freedom, autonomy, and safety
captivity - A TRAP NOT A RELATIONSHIP
Leading researcher Evan Stark likens coercive control to “other capture crimes”,
such as kidnapping or hostage taking
(Stark, 2007, p.203).
"The universal tactics of torture are the same tactics that are employed by
cult leaders, pimps, human traffickers, hostage takers, and perpetrators of coercive control,
essentially anyone “who trades in captivity” "
(Hill, 2019, p. 28).
Coercive control is a trap — not a relationship.
made up of an inescapable web of coercive tactics including:
fear, isolation, dependency, deprivation of resources, destruction of identity, support and reputation, threats and
intimidation, threats to take or harm her children, surveillance, legal intimidation, fear of retaliation
and the very real risk of being killed if she tries to leave
DOMESTIC TERRORISM
“It’s not a fight. It’s not conflict. It’s a regime of entrapment — a kind of domestic terrorism.”
– Dr. Evan Stark, “Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life”
Unpredictability creates psychological captivity
Systemic terror and unpredictability are used to dominate and force submission
CALCULATED MALEVOLENT regime of total domination.
Victims are entrapped and stripped of
freedom, kinship, support systems, autonomy, identity, and safety,
then used as resources to sustain the controller's power.
The victim's life is constricted entirely to serving the needs of the controller
ENTRAPMENT. EXPLOITATION. ENFORCEMENT.
“Coercive control is ... about creating a hostage-like condition in the home
in which the victim becomes trapped in a world of fear, surveillance, and subjugation
"Coercive Control installs a regime of entrapment — a liberty crime that destroys the person’s freedom, not just
their safety.
– Dr. Evan Stark, “Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life”
CONTINUOUS COURSE OF CONDUCT
Coercive control is not an incident of violence
It is continuous, systemic abuse that impacts every area and every moment of a victim's life
controlling her even in his absence, even while she sleeps
A GLOBAL PANDEMIC
In 92% of domestic femicides, coercive control was present in the relationship prior to the murder.
In 2022, globally 137 women were killed every day by a family member (48,800 women)
In the US, 3 women are killed every day by a current or former intimate partner
In Canada, 1 woman is killed every 3.6 days by a current or former intimate partner.
VIOLENCE
Total domination and destruction of freedom, safety, and selfhood
through power, control and terror
–without needing to leave a mark
────────────────────────
COERCIVE CONTROL tactics
ENTRAPMENT.
Grooming. luring. intermittent kindness. false promises
Love-like tactics serve to bond and bind victims
(Pittman, 2017)
false promises, misinformation, manipulated choices, concealed intentions.
love bombing, fake support, faked values, “dream future,” exploiting prior trauma or loyalty.
The victim enter the cage willingly, without realizing it’s a cage
creating and exploiting vulnerabilities
Identify, manufacture and exploit personal and structural vulnerabilities
Sabotage support systems, career, culture, and autonomy
Covert isolation, relocation
Misinformation, reproductive coercion
INVISIBILITY.
The invisibility of his control enables the victim's entrapment through luring and grooming
Invisibility to others blocks her support, prevents her escape and
recruits others into (often unwitting) collusion against her.
Invisibility leads to the victim being discredited as
the controller appears calm and victim appears distressed.
Violence hides in plain sight while the controller’s territory of control expands.
dependency.
ISOLATION. Deprivation of NEEDS AND resources.
Deprivation is used to entrap the victim and obstruct their ability to
resist, escape, or recover.
By isolating the victim from support, friends, family, and outside perspectives,
he monopolizes her perception and blocks her support
Monopolization of perception, gaslighting and silent treatment force the victim to disconnect from truth
By blocking access to finances, career, help, information, sleep, movement, and other basic needs
— and extended needs like rest, kinship, and connection —
the victim becomes dependent on the controller for survival or the survival of their children.
DEBILITY.
ENFORCING TRIVIAL DEMANDS. CONSTANT CRISES.
Coercive control wears the victim down systematically
dismantling capacity and identity
destabilizing daily life and enforcing subjugation.
Time, energy, and life force are consumed by responding to the controller’s demands
not living, not recovering, not resisting
Forced overfunctioning while being discredited
Consistent sabotage, undermining, exhaustion, and survival-based submission
Micromanagement, gaslighting, reversal of blame
CONTROL OF INFORMATION AND PERCEPTION
In coercive control, the abuser doesn’t just restrict physical freedom — they distort the victim’s entire perception of reality.
Coercive controllers control information and distort reality to control the victim and eliminate resistance.
Monopolization of perception, gaslighting, and the silent treatment severs her connection to memory, judgment, and truth.
This psychological violence traps the victim in a state of confusion, fear, and obedience
— making her easier to control, punish, and discredit.
He controls her life through controlling of reality itself.
degradation. HUMILIATION. REPUTATION DESTRUCTION.
Degradation aims to break the victim internally.
Reputation destruction aims to break the victim externally.
Together, they dismantle her identity and take her ability to fight back, seek help, or rebuild.
DREAD.
COERCION THROUGH FEAR, INTIMIDATION AND CREDIBLE THREAT
Control is maintained through the constant presence of credible threat:
Unpredictability, the means, access and past patterns of escalation for resistance
Isolation increases the risk as she may have little to no protection, allies, exit or safety.
Fear becomes the logic of daily life.
The threat doesn’t need to be acted on — only believed.
That belief is enough to strip freedom, silence resistance, and ensure compliance without visible force.
Self-policing: The victim adapts in advance to prevent escalation.
Intimidation and escalation or the threat of escalation to physical violence
COERCION THROUGH PUNISHMENT, Escalation AND Retaliation
Victim-survivors live under constant terror of unpredictability threat of harm and retaliation
leading to hyper vigilance and obedience, erasure of choice, freedom, identity, and self
The victim’s thoughts, choices, and movements are controlled by fear, not freedom
NO SAFETY. NO RESOURCES. NO EXIT.
Why doesn't she just leave? There is no safe exit.
Victim-survivors face extreme escalation when control is resisted, exposure is risked, or escape is attempted.
Victim-survivors who successfully escape are punished with post-separation tactics including: legal abuse, custody threats, stalking, and femicide
When faced with the loss of control, some controller's often seek the ultimate enforcement - murder
76% of intimate partner femicides – and the majority of filicide and familicides –
occur during separation and custody disputes
Source: Dr. Evan Stark, “Coercive Control: How Men Entrap Women in Personal Life
informants. Invasive monitoring. surveillance. stalking
Constant pervasive surveillance traps the victim in a state of terror, control, and submission
The more she resists, the more control is enforced through surveillance, retaliation, and institutional manipulation.
enforcers of control and terror
Third parties, systems and Institutions are co-opted as enforcers of the regime, and used to:
silence resistance, institutionalize surveillance and compliance, block escape and
remove of children if speak out or resist.
False allegations, narrative control and engineered evidence become tools of:
credibility destruction, state-enabled control, silencing and punishment
EXPLOITATION.
OBJECTIFICATION. LOSS OF PERSONHOOD.
The victim’s entire existence is controlled, exploited and drained as a resource for the controller's personal gain.
The victim becomes a resource, not a partner. This phase is quiet, parasitic, and long-term.
The controller harvests resources and extracts value, power, protection, and cover from the victim,
draining her life and weaponizing the outcome against her.
Unpaid domestic, emotional, or caregiving labour
Use of the victim’s credibility, social ties, or community standing as cover
Emotional extraction: affection, anguish, or silence to mask abuse
Financial exploitation, reputation shielding, or use of her professiona skills
Child used as leverage, weapon, shield, tool, image management.
Resistance or distress used as “evidence” to destroy her
────────────────────────
COERCIVE CONTROL IMPACTS
psychological torture.
dependency, debility, and dread
Coercive control's sustained campaign of violence
and the cumulative effect of progressive entrapment, control and ever present credible threat,
mirrors the internationally recognized conditions of
psychological torture as
outlined in the Biderman's chart Coercion.
used in military and POW contexts.
LOSS OF HUMAN RIGHTS.
LOSS OF LIFE. LIBERTY. SAFETY
When all signs of independence are punished,
and survival depends on avoiding retaliation,
every choice is shaped by fear – not freedom,
and autonomy, agency, and identity are erased.
Deprivation of PERSONHOOD. ERASURE. objectification. EXTRACTION
The victim is no longer treated as a full human being with needs, rights, or personhood.
She is reduced to:
A function (caregiver, service provider)
A possession (“my wife”, “my child”, “my problem”)
A tool to serve the controller’s image
A resource to be drained for the benefit of the controller.
Deprived of autonomy, independence, liberty and safety, the victim must subordinate her will to the controller
— existing not as a person, but as an instrument to serve him.
harming children.
CHILDREN WEAPONIZED AS TOOLS OF TERROR, COERCION AND CONTROL
Terrorists strategically use children as weapons, messengers, couriers, fighters, and human shields
because children are the most powerful tool of coercion and control.
Severing ties or threats thereof, between loving protective parents and children
ensures the power and control of the dominant order is maintained, truth erased, and resistance punished.
The ensuing anguish of the loving parent is used to further punish and discredit.
CHILDREN DIRECTLY AND INDIRECTLY EXPOSED TO COERCIVE CONTROL
Children are a target of the control regime not just collateral damage
Children are directly and indirectly exposed and harmed daily
and their lives sabotaged to punish and control the targeted victim
CHILDREN STRIPPED OF HUMAN RIGHTS AND PROTECTION
When children are stripped of autonomy, liberty, safety and independent will,
they are coerced into serving the controller’s interests,
and stripped of the right to develop their own identity and agency,
and the right to self-determination.
Freedom
Autonomy
Independent Will
Safety
Identity
Agency
Truth
Right to self-determination
CHILDREN STRIPPED OF EMOTIONAL AND DEVELOPMENTAL NEEDS
Love
Connection
Trust
Post Separation Abuse Wheel
(Source: One Mom's Battle - Tina Swithin)
Biderman’s Chart of Coercion
Prisoners of war were psychologically broken
using the same methods of torture used by coercive controllers in family violence
– a system of domination designed to strip a person of freedom, identity, and the will to resist –
Children are both direct and indirect victims of coercive control.
Children are also often the most powerful tool of coercion the abuser uses against the protective parent.
Coercive Control Is Legally Recognized as Family Violence in Canadian Law
Divorce Act 2021
Department of Justice Canada — “Coercive Control and the Divorce Act: A Fact Sheet” (2021).
ONLY LIGHT CAN DRIVE OUT DARKNESS
adapted from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.