Sob stories work; that’s why con artists use them.
And it is so successful as a manipulation because it’s hijacking natural interactions that exist between people and that rely on the benefit of the doubt we give each other for society to work.
It pricks someone’s compassion
…it can also make a person be aware of how they would look to others if they said “no”. It can even cause a minor existential crisis because you might be aware that it is manipulation but you don’t want to be the kind of person that manipulation would no longer work on.
Manipulation often occurs from weaponizing our good qualities.
The only sure way to prevent that kind of manipulation is shut down the parts of yourself that would be kind to someone in distress and to assume everyone who tells you a sob story is trying to con you in some way, or that everyone who says they need help or are in danger is lying.
I find that victims of abuse in particular are extremely concerned with being ethical and want to be good people (versus just appearing to be a good person).
…genuinely being concerned on an ethics- and human-level, especially since that was likely a major component of HOW they were abused. Being told they were a bad person or partner, a bad child or friend.
And so victims may have to retreat from compassion – at least for a time – to give themselves space to learn healthy boundaries and what safe people look like.
But part of learning to protect oneself is figuring out how to be open to supporting others without making oneself vulnerable, and without cutting ones heart off from connecting with people, while recognizing that there is a point where ‘helping’ becomes enabling.
And so much of the healing process for victims is a process of navigating their understanding of what is ethical, what it means to be a ‘good person’.
…how to participate in the fabric of humanity without being torn themselves.