It is no real surprise that when blogging on a reasonably regular basis there is a tendency for similar themes to recur. Anyone who has read through some of my posts will have seen some of these repetitive refrains and this post is yet another angle on the recurrent theme of “there is a lot of grey between black and white”!
Recently I talked about the way that what is “acceptable” behaviour has changed and much longer ago talked about the more generic “grey line” between “right” and “wrong”.
The particular topic here is manipulation – a word which, unfortunately, has an overwhelmingly negative connotation. None of us finds it fun to be manipulated – those who make it their business to manipulate others are usually painted in very dark colours indeed. Yet the truth is that we all practice some level of manipulation every day (I suspect). We certainly are all manipulated every day.
At the “wrong” end of the scale there are most certainly some very dark and evil manipulative practices – we can point to many instances – from individuals, to groups to whole societies – where others have been manipulated against their will – often without their knowledge. The manipulator has most certainly “crossed the line” – into the black? – probably – most certainly into the very dark grey!
I won’t give specific examples – as I believe that even when you get close to black there will still be different interpretations of where on the scale the manipulation lies – and if I were to give examples it could lead to differences of opinion that are irrelevant to this current discussion. I am not too worried (in this post) where particular actions lie on the scale – rather I am exploring the fact that there is a scale and – most importantly there is some “line” which we can cross.
Perhaps the easiest are to discuss in this regard is the whole area of advertising. Here we have a “profession” dedicated to manipulation. Again, no specific examples, but we can all agree that the whole point of advertising is to manipulate our thinking – to make something more desirable – often as an alternative to something else which – inevitably – becomes less desirable.
We can also agree that there is a line that the advertiser should not cross – this may or may not coincide with the powers of the advertising standards agency – we may or may not agree that the ‘right’ line has been drawn – but we can all be sure that A line exists.
Now – having got this far talking about manipulation I want to change the word – instead of manipulates I want to call the same thing “influences”. I do this to remove the unwanted negative overtones – influence is a much more neutral word – and, in doing this, I want to demonstrate things in a slightly recursive way since I am “manipulating” or “influencing” the reader’s mindset by changing how I am describing the phenomenon.
Without commenting on the “rightness” (or otherwise) there are plenty of other common forms of influence that we observe daily and which equally have A line of acceptability:
Our employer “influences” our working day – for some this may be a loose influence, for others it is a hard and fast set of rules.
The media (TV, Radio, Newspapers, etc..) “influences” our opinions – both by what they tell us and by what they do not tell us.
We “influence” each other – I am doing it here by not using manipulate – this influence may be overt or covert, subtle or “in your face”, conscious or unconscious. We do it all the times – when we are in a business meeting we will be keen to influence the others round to our point of view – when we are “advising” a friend about something we are influencing their thinking.
There are many more examples – but for the sake of brevity I will stop there! The last point – our influencing of others – is the crucial one as far as this post is concerned – and it was examples of this that triggered the thoughts.
I’d like to think that whenever I am influencing another person I am doing so in a benevolent way rather than a malevolent way. Unfortunately I am aware that as we consider those two extremes the boundary between them is – well I guess “blurred” is the best description. I know that in many situations I will “tailor” my communications to achieve an intended effect. I will word things in a particular way that biases the reaction to them. Knowing the people that I am communicating with I will attempt to predict their response to what I am saying and will adjust my approach accordingly.
Goodness – I am actually doing it now – as I write this I am choosing the words carefully – I was “open” about using “influence” instead of “manipulate” – but I am being less “up-front” about some other ways in which I am tailoring this post to achieve a “particular” effect. Some of the care is necessary – unless I am clear in my own mind about what I am trying to communicate there is no way that the right message will come across. Beyond that – at what point would I transgress the boundary between “influencing” and “manipulating”?
Recently I have started to work my way through back episodes of the hit US TV show “House, M.D.” starring Hugh Laurie. The series is a potential source of lots of blog posts, but of interest to this one is that House often uses manipulation (in its BAD sense) in order to achieve what could be seen as a GOOD outcome. Now when this happens where on that grey line are we?? If we are agreed that a particular action is manipulation in a bad way – is it possible that it can be excused because there is a positive outcome?
For the purposes of these thoughts, the important facet of House’s character is that he is – seemingly – oblivious to the normal boundaries of what is acceptable social behaviour. This generates plenty of tension between the characters – and plenty of “ooohh – he shouldn’t have said/done that” from the audience. Usually, his actions are not (in the absolute sense) wrong, simply that they are not commonly deemed to be “sensitive” to the situation.
Sometimes, his seeming lack of social awareness results in him saying/doing something that a ‘normal’ person would not say/do – but on reflection it is precisely what is needed. He influences people by creating situations where they are almost forced to follow HIS way of doing things. Now, as long as HIS way is the correct way (and to be fair to the series it quite often shows him being wrong) this strongarm influence is retrospectively justified. This does mean, however, that it becomes even more difficult to place his actions on the grey scale between good and bad influence.
Any attempt to do so begs the question “good” (or “bad”) given which definition and (more importantly) in who’s eyes?
Hopefully it is clear that this post builds on the previous ones – there is a “grey line” (thin or otherwise) between right and wrong – the position of that line on the spectrum between “absolutely” right and “absolutely” wrong can change over time – and now – here we find that even for a single instance it can be difficult to position it on the spectrum.
In the case of manipulation this is something that I am often concerned about – in dealing with people the way I do – am I manipulating them in a truly benevolent way? My motives are honest, my intentions are only to help – but are my methods underhand, unfair and unbecoming? Does that even matter if the outcomes are positive? Then again – who am I to judge what positive actually is?
More questions than answers. That is hardly surprising though. We shall return to this subject in the future….