Indeed, turns out I may also have described "gaslighting," https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/here-there-and-every... , which is perhaps why I sound so grouchy.

Like a startup whose leadership in effect says, "we just raised way too much money and have no path to market fit, let's just gaslight the talent until they attrition out and we can blame them for the time lost, while hopefully our competitors will establish a market where then the board can find a greater fool to buy us before we have to raise another round."

Please, help me be wrong. :)