The behavior of Pashinyan and his wife, which has become the subject of heated public debates and criticism, also interested me not only from a political but also from a medical and psychological point of view.
Having analyzed their public position in detail: aggression, insults, “educational” campaign, labeling, I came to a hypothesis that I would like to share with you and substantiate.
Pashinyan and his partner are engaged in political gaslighting. What is it? In the classical sense, gaslighting is a type of psychological violence, during which one party, through certain manipulations, presents the other party as “inferior”, inferior, imperfect, while simultaneously forcing the other party to doubt their adequate perception of reality.
The Pashinyan couple, as an aggressor, does exactly this: insulting (“stupid”, “louse”, “silly”, “four-legged”, “herbivore”, etc.), instilling a sense of inferiority (“you are not as good as Estonia”, “education is in fashion”, etc.), synthesizing a parallel reality (fun, concerts, festivals, etc.), they purposefully turn the Armenian people into victims of this clearly developed psychological violence. They make the victim, the people, doubt their memory, their identity, their history, their emotions, their perception. They deny the facts, feelings and values that are important to the victim. They instill in the victim inferiority, dependence and fear (for example, “if there is no Nikol, there will be a war”, “let’s give in so that they do not attack”, “poverty is in your head” and other manipulations of a political nature – from the same opera). Of course, they are not the first in the world in the field of political gaslighting.
This technology has been and is actively used by various authoritarian and despotic regimes. And Nikol’s use of this tool is another clear indicator of his ongoing authoritarianism.
The ultimate goal of this process is to keep the situation under control by intimidating opponents, distorting facts and sowing suspicion.
By resorting to gaslighting, the Pashinyan couple solves the problem of not losing power.
If before the 44-day war, Nikol made himself out to be crazy by starting a war, now he is trying to make the entire nation look crazy in order to perpetuate the consequences of the war forever.
How to fight this?
If in personal cases victims usually seek help from psychologists, social workers, and in extreme cases – from law enforcement agencies, then in the case of us, human victims, it is unrealistic to count on the support of the world’s “global orderlies” or “Baywatch”, since in their relations with Nichol they are guided by the principle of “doing on the outside what we want, so that you do on the inside what you want”. Therefore, we ourselves must fight this psychological violence carried out for political purposes, and the proposed toolkit is as follows:
• Do not escape from reality and continue to live a real life.
• Do not be afraid and continue to express yourself. Do not doubt and continue to think for yourself.
• Do not give up and continue to fight.
• Do not isolate yourself and continue to make new acquaintances and connections.
• Do not remain silent and continue to demand responsibility from the regime.
• Do not be submissive and continue to work on your “I”.
• Failure to accept the status of a victim and continued attempts to punish the aggressor
ARMEN ASHOTYAN
DEPUTY CHAIRMAN OF THE RPA
“DZORAHBYUR” TSI
05/27/2025
2025-05-28