power and control

I sat in sb trying desperately to be interested in my work, but as I put in my headphones, I overheard this:
"well, I know this is hard for you, but you could have chosen to use a condom..."

There was more, but I rushed to turn up the music so as not to hear. It was a tense interchange that continued for longer than 20 minutes.

One might argue it was just another difficult discussion between a mom who is not getting child support from the father of her children. It was fairly clear that they were not married, never married. But they seemed to have two kids together, so they must have been a couple at some point.

It was, in fact, much more than a conversation about money or support or responsibility. It was clear to me and my study companion as well as to the two of them.

It was a conversation about control and power. It was a negotiation about submission and domination. It was a yearning for the ability to use power and control to bend someone else's emotions.

In the moment I was struck by how unequal the power dynamic could appear ... she was white and a professional. He was an immigrant and seemingly struggling to make ends meet, though he was drinking a venti frappaccino which must have set him back more than $5 and then another large drink.

[aside: I mean, I am always interested in people who claim poverty who hang out at sb. In fact, I am frequently asked this by folks in a not so caring way. Truthfully, I am paying for the right to be in their air conditioning or heat, depending on the season. At first, I didn't have a chair in my apartment, making my time at sb even more precious. But, I buy one drink that I can get refilled three or four times for free... so I pay less than $3 for four to six hours of study time. Back to the story...]

The richness of the power dynamic did not stop there, however. One of the first snatches I heard between them was his chuckle and her indigent question/demand: "why are you laughing at me?" I am sure in all break ups and custody battles, the people play off each other's weaknesses... it would seem that we have only loved someone in order to find their weak spots so that at some point exploit them to our advantage. [Super cynical...did I really say that? It is a sad admission of things I have seen but would rather never participate in again.]

Another thought that crossed my mind, was in this struggle for power and control, who was protecting the interests of the children? There are many ways to co-parent, or not co-parent as the case may be, but these folks did not seem to be interested in finding accommodation in order to benefit their children.

I won't pretend to understand the intricacies of custody battles or negotiations (I hope some of them are not so contentious that they all must be called battles). But I was left wondering how any child's welfare could be considered in the midst of so much ego.