Estrangement Ideology – Part 5. The Hypocrisy of It

Contradictions and hypocrisy abound: Claiming the moral high ground is a risky business.

This is the fifth in a series of articles concerning Estrangement Ideology. Key concepts are introduced in Part 1. Tenets, Goals and Methods; Part 2. Transgressions, Moral Certitude and Traditional Values; and Part 3. The One-Sided Path to Redemption. Other parts can be found here.

While estrangement ideology claims to promote healing and fairness by achieving autonomy, emotional safety and accountability for its adherents, in practice it often features contradictions and hypocritical double standards, such as:

• Asymmetric Pathologising: Adult children often enforce asymmetrical standards in communication and behaviour by disproportionately pathologising parents while excusing or validating similar actions by adult children. This double standard absolves adult children of accountability for their behaviour, fostering a dynamic where parents are vilified and their actions scrutinised through a lens of assumed toxicity, regardless of intent or context.

• One-sided Boundaries: Estrangement Ideology’s emphasis on enforcing boundaries often reveals a stark double standard, where estranged adult children feel justified in disregarding or violating their parents’ boundaries while demanding strict adherence to their own. These actions underscore the hypocrisy of protection and respect of boundaries being applied selectively.

• Emotional Immaturity: The expectations estranged adult children place on parents often reveal a contradictory dynamic of demanding emotional maturity while exhibiting moral certitude and arrogant expectations that undermine relational repair. Yet, these same individuals often display an unwavering belief in their own righteousness, refusing to engage in mutual accountability. Such attitudes demand perfection and transformation from parents while ignoring the relational maturity required from both sides.

• Public Shaming and Emotional Manipulation: Estrangement ideology normalises public airing of grievances by adult children while condemning similar actions by parents. Notably, posts on all of the Reddit forums examined are open to public scrutiny and search engine exposure—not even requiring a registered Reddit logon id to read the content, let-alone membership of the particular sub-Reddits.

• Moral Judgments and Ideological Bias: Estrangement ideology often frames parental beliefs and behaviours in moral absolutes, dismissing complexity and context, and contradicting the purported focus on understanding and empathy. Often it appears that adult children have frozen their parents in a childish idealisation that denies the possibility that parents are human beings on their own journeys; people whose perspectives and emotional states change from day-to-day, month-to-month and year-to-year as they acquire new knowledge and perspectives and adapt to evolving events and changing life circumstances. Such as growing old and becoming less able.

• Reconciliation and Emotional Responsibility: Estrangement ideology places the burden of reconciliation entirely on parents, ignoring the mutual nature of relationships. Obviously, there is no chance of reconciliation while one party resolutely enforces a No Contact policy and sits back to criticise and judge the other party’s blind attempts to reform themselves according to the unwritten and uncommunicated standards of the demanded “self-reflection” and “accountability”.

• Emotional Victimhood and Double Standards: Estrangement ideology often positions adult children as sole victims, sidelining the parents’ emotional experiences and pain by dismissing their expressions of hurt as manipulative tactics or accusations of engaging in DARVO (Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender), effectively reframing any parental attempt to explain or defend themselves as further evidence of toxicity, while failing to acknowledge the complexity and bidirectionality of familial conflict.

Hypocrisies in Applying the Tenets

Estrangement Ideology is structured around ten core tenets that aim to provide a framework for understanding and validating the experiences of estranged individuals, particularly adult children. However, analysis of Reddit threads, articles and other materials reveals inherent contradictions and hypocrisies in the application of the tenets:

Tenet 1: Individual Autonomy and Self-Preservation

While Estrangement Ideology prioritises individual autonomy and self-preservation, adult children often undermine these principles when interacting with their parents. Adult children demand respect for their own boundaries while frequently disregarding the parents’ autonomy by framing all parental actions as manipulative or harmful. Public sharing of private correspondence on platforms like Reddit further erodes the parents’ ability to maintain emotional dignity and self-preservation. These actions are justified as necessary for healing, prioritising the adult child’s well-being at the expense of the parents’. This contradiction creates an imbalance that marginalises parents’ autonomy in the broader discourse and acts against their rightful claims to self-preservation.

Tenet 2: Pathologisation of Parental Behaviour

Estrangement Ideology pathologises traditional parental behaviours—such as authority, advice or reconciliation attempts—as inherently toxic while excusing or validating similar behaviours in adult children. For example, adult children use public platforms to shame their parents by sharing private communications or mocking reconciliation attempts. Meanwhile, therapy jargon like “emotional immaturity” or “gaslighting” is wielded to label any parental disagreement as pathological. This selective framing absolves adult children of accountability, creating a double standard where one party’s actions are vilified, and the other’s are justified under the guise of emotional safety.

Tenet 3: Moral Absolutism and Boundaries

Boundaries, treated as sacred by Estrangement Ideology, are inconsistently applied, so that while adult children often enforce strict boundaries, such as “No Contact (NC)”, while breaching their parents’ privacy by sharing personal details in public forums. These actions are justified by framing parents as morally deficient and less deserving of such considerations, yet similar behaviours by parents are criticised as intrusive or manipulative. For instance, parents expressing emotional hurt are labelled as “guilt-tripping,” whereas adult children’s public airing of grievances is defended as necessary validation. This double standard undermines the equitable application of respect and ethical standards, perpetuating estrangement as a power imbalance rather than a collaborative path to mutual understanding.

Tenet 4: Validation of Victimhood

The validation of victimhood in Estrangement Ideology often creates a one-sided discourse where adult children’s narratives of harm are prioritised while their parents’ emotional pain is dismissed. Adult children adopt a victimhood framework to explain estrangement, gaining community validation for their suffering while ignoring the profound grief and loss their parents experience, and also ignoring or marginalising any role the adult child may have had in creating the situation. This dynamic absolves adult children of responsibility for reconciliation while burdening parents with the expectation of repair. By centring one party’s healing and marginalising the other’s, this approach disregards the mutual impact of estrangement and the complexities of familial relationships.

Tenet 5: Rejection of Traditional Family Obligations

Estrangement Ideology rejects traditional family obligations, framing intergenerational responsibilities as contingent on emotional safety and personal alignment. However, adult children often expect parents to maintain certain aspects of traditional caregiving roles, such as emotional availability and accountability, without reciprocating similar effort or respect. This selective rejection creates an inequitable framework where adult children abandon traditional expectations for themselves while holding parents accountable to them. This imbalance deepens the estrangement divide by reinforcing one-sided relational accountability. The “Low Contact (LC)” and “No Contact (NC)” regimes enacted by adult children on their parents can be interpreted as a form of elder abuse called Cold Violence, defined as “…a form of emotional abuse that occurs within care relationships. It happens when the person with more power and resources in the relationship completely and intentionally withdraws communication and emotional support for a sustained period. Cold violence is used to punish people for particular conduct or to limit their independence and freedom.”

Tenet 6: Public Accountability and Shaming

Public accountability and shaming, frequently used by adult children, contradict Estrangement Ideology’s emphasis on boundaries and respect. Adult children justify airing grievances on platforms like Reddit as a means of validation, while condemning their parents for any public expressions of frustration or defense. While the identities of the adult children using these forums is hidden behind anonymous user ids, doxing of some parents’ identities was observed and even though this was ostensibly against the sub-Reddit rules, no attempt was made by forum moderators to remove the offending posts. Parents’ attempts to share their perspectives are labelled manipulative, whereas the adult child’s ongoing public critique is framed as necessary and therapeutic. This contradiction highlights an imbalance in accountability, where one-sided public shaming reinforces relational conflict and power dynamics.

Tenet 7: Prioritisation of Chosen Families and Communities

Chosen families and communities are often upheld as replacements for biological families, praised for their alignment with values and emotional safety. However, these chosen relationships are not subjected to the same scrutiny or effort that biological family relationships are expected to endure. While adult children criticise their parents for perceived failures, they invest emotional energy in chosen communities that validate estrangement and discourage reconciliation unless strict conditions are met. Additionally, these chosen communities tend to lack many of the traditional characteristics of biological and familial relationships—such as lifelong commitment, unconditional love and persistence through good times and bad. This selective prioritisation undermines the potential for growth and healing within biological families and perpetuates estrangement through one-sided relational effort.

Tenet 8: Conditional Reconciliation

Conditional reconciliation, as framed by Estrangement Ideology, positions parents as solely responsible for mending relationships, ignoring the mutual nature of relational repair. Adult children often demand accountability, behavioural change, and adherence to boundaries from their parents without reciprocating similar efforts. The refusal to engage in meaningful dialogue—especially under unilaterally self-imposed “Low Contact (LC)” or “No Contact (NC)” rules—undermines claims of seeking reconciliation and perpetuates estrangement, shifting reconciliation from a collaborative effort to an exercise in power dynamics and mechanism for control.

Tenet 9: Emotional and Psychological Costs

Estrangement Ideology frames the emotional and psychological costs of estrangement as necessary consequences of self-preservation for adult children, while downplaying the equivalent impact on parents. While adult children validate their grief and ambiguity, they frequently dismiss parents’ expressions of loss and longing as manipulative or self-serving. This selective acknowledgment of emotional costs marginalises the parents’ experiences and perpetuates unresolved emotional entanglements for both parties. The lack of mutual recognition fosters cycles of resentment, deepening the estrangement divide.

Tenet 10: Sociocultural Normalisation of Estrangement

The sociocultural normalisation of estrangement portrays it as an empowering and rational choice, aligning with progressive values of “autonomy” and “emotional safety.” However, this narrative often stigmatises alternative perspectives, such as advocating for reconciliation or valuing intergenerational bonds. While promoting estrangement as a means of breaking free from oppressive dynamics, the ideology reinforces rigid norms and exclusions that leave little room for diverse approaches to familial conflict. This paradox undermines Estrangement Ideology’s claims of fostering understanding and healing by entrenching divisive frameworks that discourage relational repair and empathy.

Conclusion: Addressing the Hypocrisy

The expectations estranged adult children place on parents often reveal a contradictory dynamic of demanding emotional maturity while exhibiting moral certitude and fixed expectations that undermine relational repair. Adult children frequently accuse their parents of being emotionally immature. Yet, these same individuals often display an unwavering belief in their own righteousness, refusing to engage in mutual accountability, exemplifying a lack of self-awareness and an unwillingness to reflect on their own emotional growth.

This moral certitude is further illustrated in statements that assume a superiority in values and dismiss the complexity of familial relationships. Such attitudes demand perfection and transformation from parents while ignoring the relational maturity required from both sides, perpetuating estrangement and limiting the possibility for healing.

In summary, while adherents of Estrangement Ideology ostensibly seek a framework for healing and empowerment, application of its tenets often exhibit inherent contradictions and hypocrisies that act to deepen familial divides and hinder mutual growth. Addressing these contradictions requires a more balanced approach that acknowledges the complexities of familial relationships, promotes shared accountability and fosters empathy on both sides.

Part 6. will focus on Estrangement Ideology as Elder Abuse.

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Note: This article was developed with assistance of ChatGPT, used as a structured analysis and writing tool. All ideas, interpretations and final outputs were authored, verified and edited by me. The model was conditioned to reflect my reasoning, not to generate content independently.