Balance

As much as we initially fear manipulation, manipulative objects are primarily the things we love. The most influential artifacts all heavily affect our lives in both positive and negative ways. Electronic media, for example, likely the most common manipulative concept of the modern era, is loved throughout western culture and those it’s the people who love it the most that feel its strongest hold. Clocks, as I mentioned in class, though dreaded for waking us up, are undoubtedly one of the most useful objects in many peoples’ lives. As emphasis on our time love affair, our phones, computers, and other electronic accessories boldly project the time of the day even when locked.

It seems that objects that make life easier inevitably end up manipulating us in one form or another. Advertisements, though ever controversial, are fundamentally designed to make our decisions easier. While they may not project a logical, reasoned argument for the product they represent, the fast pace of modern life renders full, drawn out arguments unreasonable and improbable. Just imagine choosing as something as innocent as a book, even an academic collection of essays, without some sort of advertisement. The cover, the inside summary, and the reviews on the back all simplify our choice and allow us to make a more informed choice without reading an entire novel. I guess it’s a trade off. The popularity of highly manipulative but useful objects is dependent on how much reward we receive for the amount of control the object will take from our lives.