Send a text

Read the article on Substack

There's a psychological concept called "coercive control" that helps explain what happened here. It's the use of tactics designed to isolate, intimidate, and dominate another person, often through seemingly mundane interactions. Refusing to communicate about schedule changes, interpreting every gesture as hostile, withholding medical information, creating chaos around a child's activities—these can all be forms of control disguised as principled stands.

The research on pets in abusive relationships is particularly illuminating. Animals become leverage precisely because the emotional bonds are so strong. The threat—explicit or implied—is always the same: comply, or lose what you love. Mrs. Glasson's eventual decision to stop trying to coordinate Toba exchanges wasn't surrender; it was what researchers call moving toward a "liberation frame," removing the tool of manipulation from the equation entirely.

References: 

Glassen v Glassen, 2025 BCSC 640 (CanLII)

This is Heliox: Where Evidence Meets Empathy

Independent, moderated, timely, deep, gentle, clinical, global, and community conversations about things that matter.  Breathe Easy, we go deep and lightly surface the big ideas.

Support the show

Disclosure: This podcast uses AI-generated synthetic voices for a material portion of the audio content, in line with Apple Podcasts guidelines.

We make rigorous science accessible, accurate, and unforgettable.

Produced by Michelle Bruecker and Scott Bleackley, it features reviews of emerging research and ideas from leading thinkers, curated under our creative direction with AI assistance for voice, imagery, and composition. Systemic voices and illustrative images of people are representative tools, not depictions of specific individuals.

We dive deep into peer-reviewed research, pre-prints, and major scientific works—then bring them to life through the stories of the researchers themselves. Complex ideas become clear. Obscure discoveries become conversation starters. And you walk away understanding not just what scientists discovered, but why it matters and how they got there.

Independent, moderated, timely, deep, gentle, clinical, global, and community conversations about things that matter. Breathe Easy, we go deep and lightly surface the big ideas.

Spoken word, short and sweet, with rhythm and a catchy beat.
http://tinyurl.com/stonefolksongs