Not all anger is the same, and in order for us to stand a chance at de-escalation and conflict resolution, we need to understand what motivates it, and where it comes from; if you spill a drink over one person in a bar, they may become slightly aggressive, but not committed to physical action, whilst another individual may aggressively explode into you, with no other thought than to cause you maximum damage and harm, etc. When we can understand the personality, along with the “thinking errors” that accompany the character of such violent individuals, we can tailor our responses accordingly. If we treat all aggression and anger as the same, or reduce it to the trigger or cause of the dispute (such as believing the issue is the spilt drink, etc.), we are in danger of misreading the situation i.e. if people respond with differing levels of anger after having a drink spilt over them, it’s not the drinking that is the driving force in the incident; it’s the individual’s personality, character, and thought processes – and these may differ from person to person. This article looks to explore some of the different types of anger that we may face in aggressive confrontations and recognize when certain types of resolution may be appropriate, and when not.

One well-defined type of anger is Narcissistic Rage. Narcissism is a personality disorder, which is comorbid with many others e.g. if an individual has a personality disorder such as Paranoid Personality Disorder, they are also likely to have certain traits and characteristics that are found in Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Narcissists are self-serving individuals, who will often try to justify their selfish actions, by stating that they are for the greater good, when in fact the individual who ultimately benefits from them is themselves. However, it can be hard for them to continually convince themselves of this argument, and/or reconcile the discrepancies in the way they see themselves, with the way others treat or see them e.g. they may believe that they should be recognized as the expert in a particular field, or the person who is most qualified to occupy a certain position, but find that there are others who fail to acknowledge this, etc. This puts a strain on their identity and idea of self, and at some point, manifests itself in extreme anger and rage. Somebody will trigger this with something they say and do, however this isn’t what the anger is about. It’s not about anything external, but rather an external manifestation of an extreme internal frustration, and like everything connected with narcissism, the rage is entirely selfish and self-serving; it is not a highly emotional expression of righting a perceived wrong, it’s about dealing with internal emotional disparities, as an attempt to reset the balance of how they see themselves with how the world views them. After such aggressive and possibly violent outbursts, the narcissist will congratulate themselves that they have restored order to the world, and everybody sees them as they deserve to be seen.

A long time ago, I did some youth work with gang members in the UK; although they were referred to as “gang members”, they were really loose affiliations of teenagers, from different locales who hung around together, and were aggressive towards others who were not from their area – occasionally groups of them would visit other districts, looking for violence. All of them carried knives. I would often ask them about the types of scenarios that would cause them to pull their blade, and the universal number one answer was when they felt disrespected. At the risk of generalizing, those who engage in criminal activities often use language slightly differently, to the law-abiding population, and this is certainly true when it comes to the idea of, and the use of, the words “respect” and “disrespect”. I could never make the argument that I’m a fashion guru – I don’t care too much about clothes. When appropriate and necessary, such as when dealing with corporate clients, I’ll make an effort, but day-to-day, I don’t give much consideration to what I’m wearing; if it’s clean and it fits, I’m good to go. If somebody was to point out that I don’t dress as well as I could, I wouldn’t feel disrespected, I’d agree with them. The person making the remark might mean it as a slight, or as an attempt to provoke a certain response from me, but I don’t feel disrespected because what I wear, the car I drive, etc., isn’t part of my identity. When I talked to the teenagers about respect, they had great difficulty articulating what respect actually was, and often what it boiled down to was that they didn’t have particularly thick-skins, when it came to dealing with interactions – both aggressive and non-aggressive – because they didn’t have a strong sense of individual identity and a stable character. It wasn’t about respect and disrespect, it was about not being able to deal with anything that was perceived as a slight; and for this there was an extremely long list, that demonstrated several “thinking errors”, such as making consistent eye-contact when talking to them – if you didn’t look away every now and again when talking to them, it was being disrespectful. The source of their anger and aggression was having an extremely thin skin, coupled with an inability to deal with what they thought was adversity.

A certain level of adversity is something most of us expect to deal with i.e. we’re not just going to be handed things, we’re going to have to work for them, etc. If we expect to get a high-paid job, we’re going to have to put in the hours to gain enough experience to qualify us for the position, and we’re probably going to have to do a certain amount of self-education – we’re not just entitled to it. Certain individuals don’t recognize this, and believe that they don’t deserve to have to do these things i.e. they should be recognized for who they are and receive the appropriate rewards they’re entitled to. This may be as simple as not believing that they should be stuck in traffic, or stuck behind a car which is moving slower than the speed they would like to be driving at, etc. Most of us accept that these things are part of life, but some individuals aren’t able to cope with these minor inconveniences and adversities – in their view this isn’t what their life should look like. If you’ve ever been in a subway carriage that has broken down, and see somebody just lose it, dollars to donuts, it’s not because they are going to be late to an important, potentially life-changing meeting, but rather that they’re unable to cope with adversity and feel that they are entitled to a different experience.     

The things which trigger aggressive and violent outbursts are rarely the reasons for them, however it is easy to get caught up in trying to resolve the conflict, by making it about the event. To de-escalate a situation successfully we must be able to see past the incident, and deal with the individual, recognizing that their anger may come from a number of different places, and be motivated by internal rather than external factors.