Husband called me a gaslighter. I had proof, is he manipulating me?
Last week me, my husband and our child were eating outside at fast food joint. A man in a wheel chair came up and started asking a group of guys at another table for money or food and mumbled some some other things I couldn't make out. Then the man came over to our table and started asking us the same things. My husband didn't really acknowledge him, so I said, "I'm sorry, we don't ever carry cash."
The man turned to me and told me he's not talking to me, that he's only talking to the man at the table because men are the only ones who deserve respect. He kept rambling on and on with other nonsense similar to that, just yelling at me. Getting angrier and angrier.
No reaction from husband at all. I ended up saying something like, "Whatever you say. That's fine, dude," just to get the guy to go away. The man had gone several feet away but then turned around to yell at me some more from across the dining patio. Acted like he was going to come back towards me.
Still nothing from my husband. We left almost immediately after that, I didn't feel safe with how that man reacted with so much anger to such a simple statement. In the car my husband tried to say that he didn't know what was happening or what the guy was saying. I told him I was upset that he allowed someone to go off on me like that, he didn't need to hear the words to understand the tone, and that I felt abandoned by him in a situation that felt unsafe. He never apologized, never said he wished he would've reacted differently, etc.
We were arguing later about it and my husband told me that he already apologized in the car for not making me feel safe, that he was sorry for not protecting me. The argument then turned into me saying, "No, you never once apologized for doing any of that." He then started yelling at me, calling me a gaslighter, that I don't get to tell him what he said because he knows what he said.
Left the argument, about 30 mins later I realized, 'Oh hey, I have a dashcam. Go listen to that conversation.' Watched the recording of the car ride, and sure enough, never once did he apologize for not doing something. I went to show my husband the footage and he wouldn't even listen to it.
There's been so many arguments like this, where he will die on the hill that he has already apologized and taken accountability when I tell him he hasn't. He's in therapy for a couple of years now, and accountability seems to be a big thing, but he only ever talks about it, rarely does it happen right out of the gate. Calling me a gaslighter feels like a new level. Is this actual manipulation at this point?? What do I need to be telling him?
Tl;dr: I feel like my husband didn't defend me or make me feel safer in a situation where I was being yelled at by a stranger. He told me he apologized for letting me down, and called me a gaslighter when I said he hadn't. I had video proof that showed he never apologized. Is he attempting to manipulate me by calling me a gaslighter?