Manipulation

As we progressed through the semester in this course, we have come from the analysis of the search for truth to an investigation of choice. All throughout though, there has been manipulation. For many weeks, I have struggled to reconcile manipulation and its meaning in this course. Manipulation is not inherently true or false, and it is also not forcing anyone to make a choice, simply a persuasive argument (albeit sometimes very sneaky).

Janelle began the semester trying to make us aware of the manipulation going on all around us. At times this was overwhelming for me. Of course there is manipulation everywhere! Someone is always trying to further their own agenda by convincing, or tricking others into doing what they want them to do. Awareness of this manipulation may help me avoid being tricked sometimes, but it certainly can't help all the time, and the awareness can be crippling at times. Almost everything can be argued to act as manipulators, and having awareness of everything is extremely time consuming and probably more harmful than good. I then focused on the idea that hopefully with time, being aware of manipulation will help me hone the skills to filter out the noise. The relatively harmless manipulation that can't hurt me too much. Then hopefully I'll still catch the really important instances of manipulation.

With time though, I came to my current conclusion about manipulation. This is that it is essential in life. Self manipulation allows us to make decisions. Advertising manipulation helps businesses grow and spread their products across diverse markets. Oral manipulation allows speakers to move audiences for meaningful change in the world. Manipulation takes on many forms and many motives, sure, but we absolutely could not live without it, and therefore I believe that we should embrace it. Use it to our own ends. Learn from it. Make mistakes because of it. Awareness of the omnipresent nature of manipulation can only help us learn ever more from it and be better off as a result.