What is "manipulative?"

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This is all true.

I think it's very common in autistic people to be mistaken for being manipulative. Also it's possible to be manipulative and not even know it. Can you still be manipulative without intending to be? That's something I have wondered for a while now. Is it possible to have a manipulative personality and it's in your nature to act that way and you don't intend to be that way? Or does it all have to be intentional to be considered manipulative? Is it possible to have an agenda and not even know it? Is it possible to be doing something and you aren't really aware of the reason why you did it, instead you think you did it for the other reason? Is it also possible to say something that is considered a guilt trip and not even know you said it for that reason and instead you think you said it for the other reason?


I have been thinking about the word and wondered if manipulation is manipulation? It doesn't matter what your intent is or what was going on in your head, it's the behavior that counts and that's it.

I don't think that works as an absolute, and such a perspective is actually pretty disastrous for autistic people, I think. I find among my family that often their behavior doesn't count because intentions matter but my behavior always count because intentions don't matter. It seems to me like it's more a matter of whether anyone is willing to acknowledge your perceptions as valid or simply shoot them down whenever possible.

Or: If it is seven times harder for someone to do the same work as other people, and only manages to get 1/4 of the work done that other people can manage, are they being lazy? Other posters I have discussed this with on this forum have said yes - one even said it was unfair to take cognitive effort into account and I am not sure he even believed in the possibility that many tasks require more cognitive effort from some people than they do from others. If we simply accept the behavior at face value and there's no allowance for intentions, autistics are screwed.

Anyway, this article is about BPD, but talks about how behavior can be perceived as manipulative when it may not actually be the case:

http://www.psybc.com/pdfs/library/What_ ... Anyway.pdf

I've posted this multiple times, but I think it's worthwhile reading.

Intentions behind manipulation are out of the definition of manipulation, imo. However, they do count when it comes to judging morality. Unduki made a point where manipulation is acceptable (school, parents). The degree it is used to is also in important factor. "Moral" in this respect is connected with "common sense".

In my experience, my ex gf accidentally admitted during the conversation in which I told her it's over between us that she almost succeeded with separating me form my family... Reveals (among other similar bits) how manipulative she had been with me. Nearing the end of our relationship I was more and more exposed to the thing I call double-standard-to-cube. Something like the cornering described above. You can do anything, you just can't win (or come off neutral), you'll be always judged guilty within the virtual space of an arbitrarily warped reality. The only possible move is to step out / walk away. Now I strongly suspect she has a kind of BPD. I would say I'm 99.9% confident Verdandi can't have such thing.

Manipulative is failing to get away with what other people are doing. -- Ambrose Bierce (not really)

Almost all social interaction is based on manipulation, technically speaking. I mean just look at all the "games" NTs play with their social interactions... That's all manipulation.

It can be hard to tell when you're being manipulated until it's too late unless you've had personal experience which you've recognised already, so a list of manipulative behaviours is rather useless for that purpose. It's also quite useless to try and use it to recognise your own behaviour, because if you intentionally manipulated people, you'd probably know about it. But if you want to know if you're manipulative or not, OP, my personal opinion is no.

I don't think I am manipulative in the manner that I have been told that I am, and I didn't start this thread to seek reassurance as to whether I am manipulative or not. Or for that matter, whether I have BPD or not. I was trying to read about the behavior to understand what a particular person was saying about my behavior, but I didn't come to any clearer understanding. I did, however, recognize the behavior that was being used on me in the pages I read about manipulative behavior, which actually was a help to me.

I disagree that reading about the behaviors is useless. It can be very helpful if one is being manipulated and doesn't know, or doesn't know how to respond.

If you're currently being manipulated by someone who's actually good at manipulating people, you won't notice it IMO.

Glad you got the info you wanted though

I think they are helpful, thank you.

Sorry for this being a little tangent to your thread, but I heard somebody say 'primary mover', and am a little nonplussed over its usage.

The user spoke, '...[some organisation] has a lot of primary movers.'

It was directed at somebody else, and although I was supposed to be paying attention to what was said, and was not paying said attention, it felt like a phrase being used for my 'benefit'.

Perhaps, but I suspect knowing more will make it easier to see these things than knowing less. While manipulation is a skill, so is perceiving it. It may require after the fact analysis a lot of the time (as it does for me), but still doable.



What do you mean by being used for your benefit?

Sorry, I mean - I've heard things I thought were phrased a certain way for my benefit. I mean more specifically, why do you think so? And what bothered you?

I found this nugget from the OP's first link interesting:

Anyone dealing with a covertly aggressive person will need to heighten gut-level sensitivity to the use of these tactics if they're to avoid being taken in by them.
http://www.rickross.com/reference/brain ... ing11.html

Who among us has gut reactions that they can immediately trust? I often get the feeling that I'm being played, but I think mostly I'm not. How can we make our feelings work reliably in this area? It seems to me that reading about it isn't enough.....I'd possibly do better in some kind of workshop with simulations, where I might be able to directly learn the actual look and feel of such situations in real life.

I also think that one of the main blocks to understanding these things better is the strong level of privacy in most relationships. How do you know whether a partner is guilt-tripping you or just trying to get you to see that your behaviour has been hurtful, if you have no outside opinions to run these events past? And even if it were normal to wash dirty linen in public, how do you find people with no axe to grind, to tell you what it looks like to them and to help you to clarify your thinking? Who do you ask? A parent who never thought your partner was good enough? A potentially jealous friend with whom you spend less time with because of your commitment to your partner? A counsellor who thinks all marital problems can be elucidated in terms of his favourite sociological theory?

I've been in relationships that have taken on an apparently gamey quality. At such times I would have given a lot for a friendly fly on the wall to give me a second opinion. I remember a clue a Relate counsellor gave me after he'd seen me and my partner arguing......he said that she kept saying things that she must have known were likely to hurt me, as if they weren't. That smacks of some of the stuff I've read about here. But to this day I can't recall anything she ever said that fell into that category, and for all I know, she might have been an Aspie who simply didn't understand the emotional impact of her behaviour.

That is a problem, as I don't have that "gut reaction" that I'm being played. This is why I don't spot trolls very well (and why if someone has a troll-like pattern, I hold back to see how others respond).

I tried to link pages that described explicit behaviors that could be analyzed, but I apologize for any that fail at that.

I perceive manipulation directly. Realness looks and feels utterly different to motive-driven action. It took me a while to believe that not everyone else could see this, so now I ascribe it to childhood defence mechanism. Anyone else could learn to spot it with standard autistic bootstrapped learning, I think. You would have to apply yourself and be interested.

I think you did well. I just have trouble relating anything "on paper" with actual scenarios from my life. It's part of this thing where Aspies often need to actually perform a task before they really grasp it. I guess a few good actors could change my life if they staged a few classic manipulation tricks on me and coached me through the process of sensing the signs for myself.

The nearest thing I've seen to that were some of the demonstrations that Derren Brown has done on the telly....one in particular showed the sheer power of guilt in all its glory. But the methods were highly cunning and specialised....in particular, they were collaborative efforts requiring several people to be "in the know," and not the typical machinations of one lay individual working alone. And there's also the ever-present suspicion that the guy is a showman who may be rigging his stunts for dramatic effect. Nonetheless, it's eye-opening to see people doubting the evidence of their own senses when their emotions are being manipulated.

It's interesting to me in the sense I may perceive information that should tell me that someone is being manipulative, but it doesn't seem to be processed in direct connection to the actual interaction. Am I making sense? Sometimes, with some people, when I'm not directly involved in the interaction (face to face stuff), I can see that someone is being manipulative. I can see right through my sister whenever she tries to manipulate someone else, and explain what she's doing and what she expects to get out of it. But it's much harder for me to see anything when dealing with her directly, and I'm not as good with people I didn't spend about half my life living under the same roof.



That's a fair point. I need to do that "perform a task" thing to learn most things.

I have strong, dependable gut reactions to things...not just "gut" feelings but various physical/energetic sensations that tell me what is going on. My gut feelings have never failed me or led me wrong, IF I trust them. The only problem is I don't always let myself trust it right away. I have this curiousity to see how the situation plays itself out, to see the logical reason for my feelings. I'm not satisfied until I see the "evidence" for my gut instincts.

For me, getting opinions from other people is not helpful. It only distorts things and clouds my judgement.