Genesis The Podcast

The Weaponization of Kindness

• Genesis Women's Shelter & Support

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Could your kindness be putting you in danger? This eye-opening conversation with Laura Frombach and Joy Farrow reveals how predators don't actually look for weakness—they deliberately target kindness, empathy, and accommodation. 

In this episode, Laura Frombach shares her powerful personal story of growing up with generational domestic violence, watching her once very kind mother transform under years of abuse and coercive control. Her journey to understanding took 50 years, ultimately revealing that domestic violence doesn't just harm the victim physically—it fundamentally alters their psychology, creating a cage they cannot escape. Laura's technological background offers a fresh lens: women's safety intuition is hardware, but society installs politeness "software" that teaches us to override our natural protective instincts.

Joy Farrow, drawing from her 28 years as a deputy sheriff, provides chilling examples of notorious predators who expertly hid behind respectable facades. From Larry Nassar to Ted Bundy, these individuals specifically targeted women who were empathetic, trusting, and unlikely to establish firm boundaries. This counterintuitive understanding challenges everything we thought we knew about victimhood.

The conversation delivers practical "software updates" for women: speaking instincts aloud, rehearsing boundary-setting like CPR, making politeness optional rather than default, and surrounding yourself with boundary-respecting women. Most importantly, they help listeners recognize "fawning"—being nice out of fear—as a trauma response that keeps women vulnerable to manipulation.

Whether you've experienced domestic violence firsthand or simply want to better protect yourself and loved ones, this conversation offers transformative insights about reclaiming your instincts and establishing boundaries without apology. Your kindness is a strength—but only when paired with clear boundaries that keep you safe.

Speaker 1:

Today we launch a three-part conversation addressing critical yet less understood aspects of domestic violence. My guests, laura Frombach and Joy Farrow, join the show to share unique perspectives on the topics of misogyny, predatory behaviors and growth beyond the abuse. I'm Maria McMullin and this is Genesis. The Podcast. Today's episode discusses the weaponization of kindness, a predatory behavior practiced by abusive men who prey upon women who were taught to be kind above all else, even their own safety. Laura Frombach knows this scenario firsthand, having lived it throughout her own childhood. Today, laura is more than a survivor of domestic violence. She is an army veteran, a successful businesswoman, an author and advocate for women everywhere. Lara was introduced to technology in the US Army, working on Pershing nuclear missiles, and spent much of her career as a technologist and engineer with Fortune 50 companies. A turning point in Lara's life was the aha moment when she correlated her mother's mental illness to domestic violence. Laura is the co-author of Street Smart Safety for Women your Guide to Defensive Living. She speaks on behalf of local domestic violence shelters.

Speaker 1:

Joy Farrow is a retired deputy sheriff with 28 years of experience. She worked road patrol in Pompano Beach, florida, and faced every single imaginable situation. After the 9-11 tragedy, joy transferred to the Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International Airport with the Broward Sheriff's Office to focus on the safety of air travelers. In 2017, joy assisted with the aftermath of the mass shooting at the airport. During her time on the force, she received numerous letters of commendation and several life-saving awards. She is the co-author of Street Smart Safety for Women your Guide to Defensive Living. This episode will discuss domestic violence and substance use. Laura and Joy welcome to the show, thank you so much Pleased to be here.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, maria, we're thrilled to be here.

Speaker 1:

I'm thrilled to have you here and I so enjoyed meeting both of you. We talked on Zoom recently and then we met up at the Conference on Crimes Against Women a few weeks ago, and we just have really had some very meaningful conversations about the work you're doing and all of the different work that's being done in the field of gender-based violence. But today we're embarking on a three-part conversation to cover some very nuanced topics related to domestic violence. In many ways, these ideas are not new. Rather, they are a fresh look at predatory tactics and resulting consequences that have resounded throughout the ages. Now, laura, you have very candidly shared your personal experience with domestic violence in the powerful account of your own mother, who, as you say, was once the kindest person anyone ever knew and yet whose life spiraled into violence and alcoholism. Tell us a little about your mom and what happened to her.

Speaker 2:

First of all, I grew up with alcoholism and generational domestic violence, so my father and his five brothers and my grandfathers far around as I could see in my family were all alcoholics and they were all abusers. My father's brothers married very kind women, and they all suffered at the hands of these men, so I believe that my mother's experiences with my dad turned her into an alcoholic. So, as brutal as my father was, though, and as violent as he was, he actually couldn't compare to the violence and brutality of my mother. Now, my father's drunken rages, if you were a smart kid like I was, were easy to avoid. You could avoid them by sensing them coming, but my mother's violence was very calculated, it was very cruel, and she took her violence out on her children, and so I hated her for many years because of that.

Speaker 2:

I wasn't fond of my father, obviously, but I particularly hated my mother because of the cruelty of her violence, and the interesting thing was that about my mom was that my mom's relative said she wasn't always like that. She was once the kindest person that anyone ever knew, but the mother I knew was not like that. She was, as I mentioned, cruel and violent. So what happened to my mom to turn her from that person to the cruel person, and so, actually, my family and I talked about this for many years, what could have happened to her, and she finally left my dad. And you know you would have thought that once she finally got out of the abusive situation she would go back to that nice person, but the truth of the matter is that she went downhill and she spiraled even further. She went downhill and she spiraled even further. She drank more, she raged out more, she really hated everybody. And so, despite all of this, there was one very interesting thing about her Despite all of the violence and all of the brutality, she never left the house in almost 20 years without my dad Never once. Now she could have my dad worked a lot, but she never once left the house, and so some people back in the day said, oh my gosh, that was love. But today we know that was coercive control, and my mom was dominated by coercive control to the fact she never even went shopping. So we have found that women who are under coercive control, you can't really picture what it's like for them unless you picture them being in a cage.

Speaker 2:

And so, as I said, you know we talked for so long about what could have happened to her. What could have happened to her. And then, just a few years ago, I thought to myself, just out of the blue, I thought could it have been the violence? And then I thought, well, that's stupid. Who in the hell can't take a punch?

Speaker 2:

I was appalled at my own thinking, because I'm 70 years old and I've been working on myself for 50 years to try and recover from this trauma, and what that showed me was that somehow deep down inside of me, that thinking is still there. So I started thinking back about my mom and I started researching and I realized that what I thought was cruelty there's no excusing that, that's true. But when I realized that my mother wasn't evil, probably was not intentionally cruel, but she was still in a cage and had never been able to leave that cage, and so that really influenced, that was a game changer for me. It was life changing and it really affected the way that I thought about domestic violence. You know, I knew I grew up in a violent home, but I didn't really put all the pieces together and so I thought, if I didn't understand this after so many years, I am certain that there are so many other people who don't understand it either.

Speaker 1:

That's a very powerful story and experience and I really respect the journey that you are on, for you know 50 years to understand what happened to you, what happened to your mother and how you can heal from all that. And in another episode we're going to talk about just that, about that healing part, post-abuse. Now you and Joy have a theory that you discuss in your book Street Smart Safety for Women, and you explore how societal conditioning teaches women to silence their internal alarms and how that conditioning functions less like a character trait and more like bad software. I appreciate the text reference and it's interesting. You made this connection, laura, through your work as a technologist over the years, so with your background in technology, you said that safety intuition is hardware, our built-in survival system, like what any other mammal has, but that politeness is the software society installs to override it. Can you walk us through how that FALTI program suppresses women's instincts and what it looks like to reprogram it?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely so, falti. Here's how I frame it Situational awareness, our gut instincts and what Joy and I call our safety intuition is simply our five senses reporting danger back to our subconscious. And you mentioned, maria, it's our hardwired survival system and it's baked into our biology just like it is with every other mammal. But then society installs a software app, so let's call it the Politeness Program. It's not bad, necessarily I mean we need a civil society, right. But then we believe an extra piece of software is socialized into so many women, and it's a special version of the Politeness Program, version of the politeness program which we call a virus actually. So this virus tells women that we have to be polite and accommodate others before we attend to ourselves. And this is where the problem begins. We are trained, especially as women, from the time that we're little girls, to prioritize being nice over being safe. And so the malware, or the virus as we call it, teaches us don't offend, don't overreact and especially don't be rude. And this software runs in the background all the time, and here's the kicker it overrides our hardware, it overrides our instincts. So our internal system might scream this doesn't feel right, but the social code quietly whispers be polite. So how do we start reprogramming? So we have four tactical upgrades that anyone listening can make right now.

Speaker 2:

Number one speak your instincts into consciousness. So when something feels off, tell yourself this feels wrong. And that simple act tells your brain my instincts matter. Number two rehearse boundary setting like you would rehearse CPR. It needs to be ready on demand. Practice saying no, practice in no-risk situations like maybe a restaurant or the grocery store. And the important thing is do not leave room for negotiation, because that's what happens when women leave room for negotiation. People don't want to hear no from women, so they start negotiating. And number three make your politeness optional. So treat it like a software setting, not a default. Turn it on when you feel safe, but if you don't feel safe, shut it down. Number four surround yourself with women who honor their instincts and don't apologize for it, because that's how you rewire your code faster. When you start living from the hardware and not the virus, you don't just feel safer, you are safer because those are your instincts.

Speaker 1:

That's great advice. Is all of this in your book?

Speaker 2:

Yes, so just to recap, number one speak your instincts into consciousness. Number two rehearse boundary settings like you'd rehearse CPR. Number three your politeness is optional, it's not a default setting. And number four surround yourself with other women who honor their instincts and they don't apologize for it.

Speaker 1:

Excellent advice. Hopefully listeners decide to pick up your book. They can find some of this information in it. So let's take this back and try to tie it into your mom's story for a minute. Could any of these concepts have helped her? Do you think she would have accepted or been able to accept that kind of advice at that time in her life?

Speaker 2:

I think if we would have gotten to my mom early enough, she would have. As I said, she was a very kind person and her relatives could not stress that enough. As I said, she was a very kind person and her relatives could not stress that enough. And if my mom had known, like so many other women, if they had known what they were up against, that their kindness makes them susceptible to predators, that kindness without boundaries was not in service to her, I think she would have taken that advice, because I think a lot of the problem with my mom is that she was so kind that she was naive, and if she would have had this knowledge and been able to implement it, she may have had a different ending to her story.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's a great observation. Now can you help us unpack how predators, in both intimate and public spaces, deliberately seek out empathetic, polite and accommodating women, not because they're weak or vulnerable, but because they've been programmed to override their instincts in the name of being nice?

Speaker 2:

They seek out kind women because they know the women will be accommodating, they know that they will be loyal and they know that they can do whatever they want in public or in private, and the women will forgive them over and over and over. And then, of course, as we know, the victims become accustomed to that behavior. Their self-esteem sinks lower and they don't expect anything different. They're hardwired because of the virus that's been installed in them. They think they have to be the answer to everything for everybody, over and over and over. And you know, because it's so ingrained in them and that software keeps whispering in the background. They don't protect themselves, nor do they listen to their own voice that says you know what? Something's wrong here, I need to get out. And by the time they do, often they're in so much danger that it's much more complicated.

Speaker 1:

That's very true. Now, joy, you've said predators don't look for weakness, they look for kindness. What does that mean, and how have you seen that play out in your own lives or in cases you've studied?

Speaker 3:

What we're saying, maria, is when we say predators don't look for weakness and they look for kindness, we mean that predators are targeting mainly women who are empathetic, trusting and polite. Predators look for someone who will give them a chance, someone who won't say no easily and someone who second guesses their own gut feelings to avoid seeming rude. You've heard predators hide in plain sight. I know because I've seen it over and over again during my career. So I know predators aren't all the same and they don't all look dangerous. I can give you three famous predator examples. No one saw coming. Oh yeah, let's hear them. So one is Larry Nassar. So he was the doctor of the US women's gymnastics team and a professor at Michigan State. He sexually assaulted 265 women and girls under the guise of medical care for years. Why? Because he looked like a good guy, because he wore a white coat, because predators blend in Two, ted Bundy.

Speaker 3:

He didn't look like a killer. He was smart, charming and he worked at a suicide crisis hotline, so women trusted him. That's how he lured them in. He faked needing help, like having a hurt arm or car trouble, and women helped him. He knew how to disarm them with charm. And that's what makes predators so dangerous. Bundy assaulted and murdered at least 30 women. Number three, robert Hansen. He ran a bakery in Anchorage, alaska, married. Soft-spoken people said he was quiet and hard-working, but behind the scenes he hunted women like animals, killed them like prey. He targeted women who weren't always believed or protected. He hid in plain sight for a decade because people trusted his mask. Hansen murdered 17 women. Now here's what I know Predators test boundaries, so if you're too nice to say no, they notice, and that's why trusting your instincts matters more than being polite. That's why we call it the weaponization of kindness.

Speaker 1:

I'm still thinking through the examples you gave, because those are such powerful stories. Especially the Larry Nassar example is a really remarkable one, because we don't often think about that connection to preying on kindness but truly it is because he had a captive audience, right, he had a just a whole pool of young girls that he could prey upon. He was the physician.

Speaker 3:

Right. So he would tell them that whatever procedure quote he was doing was preemptive of whatever the situation they had. So that's how he did it in front of parents at homes. They didn't realize what was happening to them until they started talking, actually years later, amongst themselves.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's a horrifying story. Now, Joy, let's keep going on these topics and talk about being polite. So there are costs to teaching girls to be polite, no matter what. Let's talk about those and how we can help women reprogram that obedience software to trust their instincts instead.

Speaker 3:

Teaching girls to be polite, no matter what can cost them their safety. It trains them to ignore their gut feelings so they may stay quiet when something feels off. It teaches them to prioritize other people and they confuse being kind with compliant Predators. Count on that and politeness becomes a trap. You know how can we reprogram that obedience software? Let's start by naming it Obedience isn't safety. Validate your gut feelings as real intelligence Practice in real life. The small no's are big wins. Role play, boundary setting with people that you trust, and when you're uncomfortable, that's your cue, not a flaw. You're not responsible for how other people feel about your boundaries. That's important.

Speaker 1:

That's a super important one right there, because, as a recovering people pleaser. I understand that my boundaries may not make other people happy, but they're important to me and so it doesn't make you always the most popular person to have strong boundaries and people don't always want to respect them, but I think that's a very important point right there. Now, Laura, for survivors listening what's one practical step they can take to shift from being nice out of fear to being kind and strong with boundaries?

Speaker 2:

For survivors listening. Here's the one practical step. Start noticing when you're being nice out of fear and name it. As Joy said, that's the pivot point. Ask yourself am I saying no because I mean it or because I'm afraid of what will happen if I do say no? So being nice out of fear is actually a trauma response called fawning, and we hear about freezing and fighting and running, but I don't think that fawning is talked about enough. Fawning is not specific to women, but it is observed more often in women due to our socialization to be accommodating. So I want survivors to know that being kind does not mean being passive. Kindness with boundaries is strength and you can say I hear you but I'm not available for that. You can say I'm not comfortable. That's not rude, that's having your own back.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and those are perfect statements. Any of us could use those in multiple situations and they don't sound rude to me, they just sound very firm. No room for negotiation? Absolutely, so I'd love to give people your website or how to find you on social media so they can learn more and also find your book. Street Smart Safety.

Speaker 2:

StreetSmartSafetyorg. We are on social. We are on social. We are on Facebook, we're on LinkedIn, we're on Instagram and we're on YouTube, but our headquarters central is our website, streetsmartsafetyorg.

Speaker 1:

Thanks so much for talking with me today. Thank you.

Speaker 2:

This has been wonderful.

Speaker 1:

Thanks so much, Maria. Genesis Women's Shelter and Support exists to give women in abusive situations a way out. We are committed to our mission of providing safety, shelter and support for women and children who have experienced domestic violence, and to raise awareness regarding its cause, prevalence and impact. Join us in creating a societal shift on how people think about domestic violence. You can learn more at genesisshelterorg and when you follow us on social media on Facebook and Instagram at Genesis Women's Shelter, and on X at Genesis Shelter. The Genesis Helpline is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, by call or text at 214-946-HELP 214-946-4357.