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The Shared Delusion: Why Everyone Pretends Uncle Greg Isn’t a Problem
Inside the silent pact that keeps toxic family members untouchable — and why it keeps happening
At every Thanksgiving, Uncle Greg finds a seat at the head of the table, next to the turkey, the wine, and the children who now know better than to be left alone with him. He isn’t funny. He’s not charming. He’s the man who humiliated your cousin Rachel at her own wedding. The man who “joked” about your teenage sister’s body in front of a room full of relatives. The man who, once drunk enough, turns mean. And yet, somehow, every year, he is there — untouched, unmentioned, and accommodated.
No one in the family speaks aloud the obvious: Uncle Greg is a problem. A big one. But within the walls of a toxic family system, denial isn’t just a coping mechanism. It becomes a glue. A silent, shared contract that binds people together more powerfully than truth ever could.
This isn’t a story about one man. It’s a story about the infrastructure of silence that protects him. It’s a story about why entire families conspire to keep things hidden, why they invest in mythologies that hurt them, and why confronting the reality of someone like Uncle Greg feels not just dangerous, but almost blasphemous.
