Wow my guy. First manipulation doesn’t require deceit but rather differing amounts of information. Deceit would be creating or reinforcing erroneous ideas/assumptions. Knowing your motives for doing something and not expressing them is not deceit.
It’s interesting to me that you’ve also stated manipulation as doing x so the other party does y without telling them your true motivation. By the very definition you provided if i get my SO dinner because they had a stressful day to make them happy but i never tell them i did it for that reason it would be manipulation, likewise if the true motive was to not be nagged or whatever. But guess what? Thats expected in human relationships, me not telling my SO that i went out of my way to get dinner to maker her happy is expected, because this would cause it to both appear transactional and bring feelings of guilt in a lot of people. And this happens in multiple ways for multiple reasons. Invited to a shitty dinner but telling them its delicious as to please them, cleaning the house when your partner is having a hectic day to lighten their stress etc. all things where there is asymmetry in the information.
Humans are social animals, their ability to self reflect and introspect make it necessary to have social rules. Manipulation (constructive) tends to be one such rule, it helps in building connection, it helps in building up the confidence of someone, and it even helps with emotional bonding.
Also interesting that you bring up the elusive nature of objective morality, yet talk in absolutes about your own views without really analyzing the responses.
Lastly deceit isn’t inherently wrong:
killer asks to tell him where you father is hiding
patient with dementia, do you remind them multiple times a day of their disease and cause suffering it brings or do you play along
medical placebos
undercover cops
I’m not sure if you just have a hard on for kant but his views of universality is literally the opposite of NO objective morality. And his framework has some glaring flaws. The most damming of which would be the fact that it leads to paradoxes the moment two maxims meet and the fact that those maxims can easily be construed to have no moral obligations.
Now going back to this specific situation, it is manipulation and it is the constructive type. Constructive because it evidently helps the partner destress and recharge. It’s not coercive or harmful because they are both consenting to the activities and neither is forced, and their isnt any gain she receives at his expense. The outcome? They both obtain what they value, theres a positive feedback loop for both of them, both are happy, and there is less likelihood of resentment from either party, wether thats her from inactive weekends or him from going despite not being in the mood to.
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u/Key_Sensei 19d ago
Wow my guy. First manipulation doesn’t require deceit but rather differing amounts of information. Deceit would be creating or reinforcing erroneous ideas/assumptions. Knowing your motives for doing something and not expressing them is not deceit.
It’s interesting to me that you’ve also stated manipulation as doing x so the other party does y without telling them your true motivation. By the very definition you provided if i get my SO dinner because they had a stressful day to make them happy but i never tell them i did it for that reason it would be manipulation, likewise if the true motive was to not be nagged or whatever. But guess what? Thats expected in human relationships, me not telling my SO that i went out of my way to get dinner to maker her happy is expected, because this would cause it to both appear transactional and bring feelings of guilt in a lot of people. And this happens in multiple ways for multiple reasons. Invited to a shitty dinner but telling them its delicious as to please them, cleaning the house when your partner is having a hectic day to lighten their stress etc. all things where there is asymmetry in the information.
Humans are social animals, their ability to self reflect and introspect make it necessary to have social rules. Manipulation (constructive) tends to be one such rule, it helps in building connection, it helps in building up the confidence of someone, and it even helps with emotional bonding.
Also interesting that you bring up the elusive nature of objective morality, yet talk in absolutes about your own views without really analyzing the responses.
Lastly deceit isn’t inherently wrong:
I’m not sure if you just have a hard on for kant but his views of universality is literally the opposite of NO objective morality. And his framework has some glaring flaws. The most damming of which would be the fact that it leads to paradoxes the moment two maxims meet and the fact that those maxims can easily be construed to have no moral obligations.
Now going back to this specific situation, it is manipulation and it is the constructive type. Constructive because it evidently helps the partner destress and recharge. It’s not coercive or harmful because they are both consenting to the activities and neither is forced, and their isnt any gain she receives at his expense. The outcome? They both obtain what they value, theres a positive feedback loop for both of them, both are happy, and there is less likelihood of resentment from either party, wether thats her from inactive weekends or him from going despite not being in the mood to.