Unraveling the Shadow of Dark Psychology and Manipulation
In the labyrinth of human behavior lies a realm both fascinating and unsettling — the domain of dark psychology. Far from positive psychology and self help spread in social media or articles, this realm is there delves into the shadow, manipulation, deception, and control.
This type of realm may appear implausible or fantasy-like, yet there are no wizards or ghouls within it. Some may claim that manipulation is not just a human strategy, yep in fact it can also be found in animals too. This simply means that manipulation is a faculty found in most sentient things. But compare to other creatures, we human are the only ones who can execute acts without justification. Animals? They only engage in violent and manipulative to protect their life or family and survive.
As a human, by nature, not everyone can tell immediately if they are being controlled. It is not because it’s more subtle form of deception. It’s just honestly, we cannot predict what other people will in any particular situation or setting, and what make this interesting and wild is the victim is not to blame for misfortune that has been brought upon them by manipulation and control. And thus we cannot predict because the manipulators aim are different for everyone.
For manipulation to works well, the victim must be led to believe that there are no other choice in certain situation or setting. They are most likely given misleading or manipulated information. The manipulator chose the evil side and they are an expert at curating situation so that they are excluded and cannot be blamed for anything.
Manipulators also frequently pretend to have some kind of connection with the victim. But in reality, they don’t care. They only take the advantage of a circumstance. Meanwhile the victim has a strong emotional commitment on the circumstance. The manipulator can walk away once they reached their goals.
Various strategies can be used to manipulate and control individuals. Basically these are the three most frequent manipulation techniques.
Love Flooding
This is the most common ways in intimate interaction, particularly in romantic scenario. although it has some similarity, but it is slightly different than “Love Bombing”. When it’s Love Flooding, the manipulator will eventually devote all of their “love” and “attention” just to make the victim feel unique and special. The victim may assume that this person has their best interest at hearth and have a deep non-romantic bond with them. It is works because as we know “Love is blind, and lovers cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit”. For some reason this method can be successful because humans have a tremendous to feel liked, desired, and adored.
Love Denial
It’s like giving someone an addictive drug, once the manipulator has showered their victim with love, they may easily deny it. It is a powerful method that can greatly benefit manipulator. They will then do whatever the manipulators desires, leading the victim to believe that if they do exactly what the manipulators asks or suggests, they will get the “dosage”.
Reverse Psychology
This might be the alternative for someone who doesn’t normally give in to persuasion. Otherwise, the person being manipulated because they don’t aware of what is going on. Reverse Psychology is a technique opposed to those desired. This strategy is based on psychological concept of “reactance”, in which individual has a negative reaction to being convinced and as a result choose the option that is being pushed againts. By all means, the manipulator will pretend that they want the person to take choice A, knowing full well that they will choose option B. In this way, the victim believes they are still in control of their choices while in fact they are not.
We have to know our roles that we play in other people’s lives. We all have our “evil side” and it is something everyone possesses. Does matters what culture, faith, or ethnicity one identifies with. The fact that we are never totally get rid of our darkness, make it a critical to equip yourself to deal with it. If we realized, the incapacity to manage our dark side is the cause of much evil in the world.
Again, victim cannot fully be blame, because it is not their fault. We human cannot protect ourselves from or againt something we are not aware of. Thus we need some insight and experience from others to avoid manipulation and deception.
Book reference: Dark Psychology and Manipulation by Margaret Morrison
