tl;dr: Gaslighting and rationalisations of gaslighting can be used against you, so protect yourself.

First, here's a definition of gaslighting from a recent Everyday Feminism post that prompted this article:

In short, gaslighting is a form of psychological abuse “in which information is twisted or spun, selectively omitted to favor the abuser, or false information is presented with the intent of making victims doubt their own memory, perception, and sanity.” Essentially, gaslighting is a tactic used to destabilize your understanding of reality, making you constantly doubt your own experiences.

An example of this behaviour would be telling a partner (with absolute certainty) they promised to come with you to a sporting festival, then blaming them for failing to attend and making them feel awful for forgetting.

There's obviously potential for you to gaslight people as a game tactic; perhaps you'd call it "dread game" or something similar. I personally think this behaviour is incredibly abusive, so I'm not going to discuss it here, but it's up to you. Rather, I want to make two points:

1. You may be directly gaslighted

You are particularly vulnerable to this if you assume personal responsibility for the health of the relationship (which you should!), or there is emotional attachment involved. Gaslighting can create a feeling of debt to make it up to them for your mistake, or even stronger attraction / protective instinct if paired with the "just an innocent, sweet girl who got her hopes up..." sigh act.

2. Gaslighting may be used to rationalise their mistakes

One of my ex-girlfriends was a wonderful girl, but occasionally had a poor response to criticism. If I called her out for failing to remember something (say, a promise or agreement), she would initially feel terrible since she regarded it as a failure to stay consistent with her own morals and words. Eventually, to deal with the discomfort, she would rationalise that I was just gaslighting her and it might even be my fault. This can occur to the extent that, again quoting Everyday Feminism:

"Even if a relationship seems otherwise non-abusive, gaslighting is emotional and mental violence."

In other words, perceptions of gaslighting (which can obviously be legitimate, but could also be falsely rationalised) can be used by a girl, her peers, or a potential competitor to convince her that she is in an abusive relationship. This might not be a permanent perception, but it might be enough to justify bad behaviour temporarily - ignoring you, badmouthing you, cheating, etc.

So, how should we respond?

I would first urge all men to remember that we are also human, and it's entirely possible we will forget or misremember things... or simply have a different but equally valid interpretation of how they occurred (e.g. you might insist you weren't angry at her for a past mistake, but weren't aware that your facial expressions and tone were reasonably giving that impression). We make mistakes too! It's also possible that you gaslight people without consciously knowing or desiring it. (I did a lot of self-analysis after first encountering the gaslighting claim with my ex, and while I determined that my memory was serving me correctly, my approach to her occasional failures wasn't particularly healthy. Lesson learned for my next relationship!)

Accordingly, don't go overboard and start imagining that every girl is constantly trying to use gaslighting against you, and give benefit of the doubt where reasonable... or sometimes even when unreasonable. A healthy relationship can be worth more than always being right, as long as you're not compromising your principles or otherwise TRP behaviour. Pick your battles.

However, you do also need to protect yourself against these behaviours. I'd recommend a few strategies which I'm working on to make myself a better man, and seem to be doing alright:

Lesson 1: Make sure you keep an accurate mental log of relevant information. This particularly includes any fights you have, any agreements about the nature of the relationship, anything she's said about past relationships, etc. Be extremely conscious during these interactions and make sure you catalog the information correctly and with CONTEXT. (e.g. not just "she said X"... but "we were talking about Y, and I asked Z, to which she responded X.") This is essentially self-improvement advice - work on building a good memory, and you're less likely to have a bad memory used against you, or gaslight people without meaning to.

Lesson 2: Make the importance of certain information abundantly clear to her. One example is that I differentiate my promises (which are golden) from my other agreements (which are liable to change), and heavily impress this difference on girls I'm with. Recognise that girls are human too - they can't read your mind to tell if her statement "I'll come to the footy with you" is being interpreted as an absolute guarantee or an idle wish / thought. It's your responsibility to make the difference clear, and to your advantage so she can't rationalise that you're gaslighting her later if a difference of opinion arises.

Lesson 3: Provide a solution for improvement if she makes mistakes. If you pull her up sharply for failing to stick to a promise, and all she's left with is anger and confusion and upset emotions... of course she's going to rationalise why it wasn't her fault. That's just human nature and guys do it too all the time. Rather (assuming you're going to continue the relationship after her mistake), propose a way forward - "You broke a promise which means a lot to me. In future, we're going to have a rule that our promises are absolutely golden. Just don't promise anything unless it's 100%, and we'll be fine." It's much easier for people to accept they were mistaken if they can class it as a one-off mistake, rather than an inherent flaw in their character or intelligence. A good woman genuinely does want to be a better person, so show her how.

Note: Notice that all this advice is urging you to take complete responsibility for the health of the relationship. One of the most common themes of TRP advice is shifting questions of "whose fault is it?" to "what can I do about it?". Both partners in a relationship should have this philosophy.