Continuing my previous post
Here comes the living examples of me detecting manipulation:
In certain period of time, I could be constantly receiving text messages from strangers who claim they were introduced by our mutual friends. Whoever they are and whatever they want, I'm always interested to find out.
Here are the structures of the most common manipulation techniques I find out people applying step by step, not pointing at any specific person, but in general.
- They firstly start with the warm up by general greetings along with compliments. The most common way is to tell me how good I look or I'm a nice person, so that they can build the connection. They clearly understand that we all want to feel superior! They play into this feeling by being charming. They believe that once I will feel attracted to them, I will be more likely to submit to their demands. However it doesn't seem usual to me when they still don't know me well, it seems over-acting instead.
- Then they make me feel isolated from the group by saying something like "Everyone is ignoring you", "I'm telling you this because I want all the best for you", which means they are the only ones who are being my friends, so I will be relying on them and start complying. Well this doesn't work for me as I'm friends with nobody and I never fit in.
- After they create their "good person" image of themselves, they start projecting their feelings, mostly negative thoughts on others, to psychologically suggest me that those people are not good for me. "They are always after something and gonna make you lose." As I explained in one of my previous posts about projection, they project the way they are onto others, which relfects that they are after something themselves.
- Soon they start showing their true intentions of whatever they are after and using the tactic of pleasure induction, which is a harmless manipulation tactic. When someone invokes the pleasure induction they are simply telling the person that they action that they were trying to get them to do will be fun that the person will enjoy it. "Come on. It will be fun. Let's do it." Remember one thing, if they want to persuade me, they firstly need my approval. I'm not close to them so there is no way to approve them. It's never their turn to teach me what to do. They surely have some manipulation skills however need some emotional intelligence.
- They always have backups to blame on, who will be taking all responsibilities in case something unpleasant happens and I complain. "It's him. He introduced you and passed me your details." They sell their friends out instantly by pushing all the things onto them so they can be fully out of responsibilities in this matter. Well they are the root cause themselves from the beginning, none of their friends would pass my details if they never ask. These master manipulators certainly have skills to convince their friends to do it.
Not all manipulation tactics are unethical, but they may be used unethically. Manipulators are more likely to use and also justify their use of manipulation tactics. They believe that they are above ethics and deserve to get what they want, even if it's through manipulation. Instead of going out to manipulate other people with these tools mentioned above, allow yourself to take this article as a warning in order to avoid becoming a puppet on strings.
