Anger and argument.. Are you a victim, a rescuer or a persecutor? These are three dysfunctional methods for gaining control.

In the drama of the roles of persecutor, rescuer and victim, the real issue at hand is power and control. Of the three roles, the victim is the most powerful. For the victim to react and get revenge, he will have to change roles, in this case, he will have to move into the persecutor role. To get his needs met, he will have to acquire a rescuer. If he were to become aware of someone else acting out the victim role, and he wants to "help him", he will have to go into the rescuer role. A victim acts as though he needs things done for him when he is perfectly capable of doing them himself. A victim never takes responsibility, every problem is someone else's fault. In acting like a victim, the victim avoids responsibility, guilt manipulates another person into doing the thing for them, achieves their goal through another person's nurturing/effort, and can move into persecutor (blaming the resuer) if they don't like the outcome.

A rescuer continually does things for others while disregarding his or her own conscious needs. The rescuer may also be into controlling the victim, by "helping" them with their life, but is gaining a vicarious sense of power out of controlling the victim. They may develop a martyr complex, but will be very unwilling to give up their rescuer role because they're "just trying to help".

A persecutor uses anger directly or indirectly to gain control. He may throw temper tantrums, be sarcastic, abusive, pout for days, or promise to do things and then not do them. The persecutor can be someone who was persecuted as a child, by an authoritarian or controlling parent, or who feels persecuted as a member of some social group. They feel justified in turning around and giving back to others what they feel has been dumped on them in the past. A persecutor never takes responsibility, every problem is someone else's fault. Being the persecutor also leads to becoming a victim. There is no revenge like the revenge of a victim who has become a persecutor. In his revenge, he wants his persecutor to "feel the pain." From this, he says he will get closure. His only closure will be "an eye for an eye." For the rest of his life, he will carry the burden of the pain of hurt and because he has not let go of the experience. If you persecute people with abusive comments, anger, name-calling or making sarcastic comments, eventually other people will not trust you and will leave you.

Functional methods of gaining control include taking responsibility for your own life, giving people the respect to make their own decisions, only offering help or advice if its asked for, treating people with courtesy even if you strongly disagree with their views, arguing with ideas instead of personal attacks.