Emotional manipulation

Aristotle was concerned with the spread of his ideas through the use of persuasion. He understood that arousing prejudice, pity and anger could pervert any truth. He thought ordinary people were too gullible and that if laws could be passed to outlaw the use of fear and anger society would be more just. He spent a lot of time thinking about the use of emotional appeals and realized that man would have nothing to say if their use was prohibited.  http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/rhetoric.html

Aristotle wrote that there are three main points that man uses to manipulate or persuade someone  to buy into an idea. (1) working on the emotions(pathos), (2)the speaker’s character, and (3) the truth of the statements made.  He understood that emotional warnings could render a reader into a targeted slave in ways that logic or truth couldn’t. 

Arousing emotions be they happy emotions, anger, or frustration tend to be the primary catastrophic mover of ideas on the internet. If i tell you something happy it is more than likely that it will be passed around before you pass around something sad or truthful that i have also relayed.

Something funny will show up in people’s Facebook feeds or e-mail accounts way more frequently than something that makes you angry. Amusing stories framed in a positive manner…say a puppy or kitten saved by a good samaritan that goes on to do something goofy in a video gets way more play than a person who is injured but has healed and also does something goofy.

Any kind of sensational framing will make a piece popular. Staggering emotion and spine tingling arousal are the keys to getting someone to pass something on and believe it is true.

Go to Upworthy right now http://www.upworthy.com and look at all their links. In almost every one of them someone is smiling or grinning.

Why is this so…because emotional appeals force your subconscious mind to make you respond via “gut reactions.” When you are sucked in and fooled by that “Oh Geeeee"  or “WOW” or “OH MY GOD” subliminal message the person trying to persuade you has succeeded.

According to experts in neuroscience ruthless emotional appeals to brains that are parked in idle rather than thinking mode are more successful. And this my friends is why our nation is so divided today.

How many people out there are manipulated by Aristotle’s 14 emotions?

Have you felt anger, contempt, indignation, pity, shame, shamelessness, benevolence, emulation, love, enmity, fear, confidence, calmness or envy recently while reading something on the internet or in your in-box? These are all force-fed triggers that pull those emotional strings to persuade you to believe something maybe you shouldn’t. 

Jaw-dropping emotional appeals are used to get you to reach conclusions or judgements about everything under the sun.

Example: Global warming deniers rely on emotion...no jobs, things will be more expensive etc.,etc.,. Global warming advocates rely on science and have a tough time convincing those who have been emotionally manipulated. 

Creating jobs and opportunities for people in a clean(renewable) economy hasn’t taken hold because energy companies don’t want you to think about it that way. They want you to be afraid. They want you to see renewables as risky, a mistake that only a lunatic would support. Their profits are on the line here.

Energy companies think tanks have been fearless in their assault upon the citizenry and have played them well. They say the loss of jobs would strangle the economy.  Things would get more expensive…these ideas are much more memorable and emotionally charged than the idea of a clean economy.

But i would bet that all of us want a clean economy, we want a healthy earth we can pass on to our kids.

So when you are fearful, maybe a little depressed wake up. You are being emotionally manipulated in staggering ways. Exercise your curiosity and do some research before you get beaten down with the emotional bullshit.

See ya next week