If you have never watched Derren Brown Mind Control, you should go look at a couple of clips on Youtube right now. What Derren does is a psychological concept called "suggestion". He's not the first man to exploit this, and he's not even the first man to make a living doing it. Have you ever heard of Houdini? Check out the video below:
If you're thinking to yourself "Obviously this is staged", You're wrong. The fact that you'd even think that means that you're highly susceptible to suggestion.
If you believed that last sentence...well I think I've proven my point. We are all susceptible to these things. Let me give you a couple of real world examples that sound more realistic:
I work in a call center like one of our other writers. I was speaking with a women today who was upset because we had not processed her request. I work for a company which handles accounts that are highly regulated by the government. We are constantly under supervision and cannot break rules. I apologized to her saying "Ma'am, I'm on your side. Really I am. These things take too much time and they're too complicated. We simply cannot process this request until we've received proper documentation, it would be a breach of contract. We're not trying to be bureaucratic." Do you know what she said next? Of course you don't so I'll tell you. She said "Well I'm not gonna let a bunch of bureaucrats hold this up!".
Do you think she was susceptible to suggestion? As defiant and unreasonable as this woman was, she somehow picked up on a word that I used that she probably would not have used, and she used it herself. She couldn't even generate her own insult. She had to steal it from me. This infuriated me. I don't like when people imitate me! It's like that stupid game you play when you're a child trying to annoy your little sister. You know, the one where you repeat everything she says. I'll tell you one way I used "suggestion" to my advantage though by telling you my favorite and most secret childhood story...
As a child, I was very small. Or at least I felt small. I didn't have any friends in school that I remember. I had a couple who used me for my brain (yes, this was elementary school and children are evil, and yes, I was brilliant for my age), but no real friends. In fact, a couple of kids really hated me for some reason. One such demon child was named Kenny. Kenny had definitely had a rough life, but he was a bully. Walking home from school one day in this Chicago suburb sometime during the winter, I spotted a gigantic icicle which had become detached from the roof of a neighbor's house. It was awesome! I remember that it was the shape of a guitar. I picked it up and walked with it for a couple of minutes. And then Kenny showed up.
"That's mine!" said Kenny "Give it back!"
I hated Kenny. He was short and ugly and a jerk (sorry it was true).
"What do you mean? I just picked it up from the ground a few minutes ago" I said in an attempt to reason with the brute.
"I found it earlier and hid it on the ground."
"I doubt it"
"Give it to me dweeb!" (Yes, I was a dweeb)
"NO!"
At this moment, I made the most reckless decision I had made in my entire life. I had to stand up for myself. I wasn't going to let him bully me anymore! Do you know what I did? Of course not. I SMASHED THAT STUPID PIECE OF ICE OVER MY KNEE! It felt so good, but Kenny was steaming! Or at least he was breathing hard and you could see his breath because it was cold.
I started walking home. I moved quickly of course. Every few seconds I would turn around to see if he was still following me. He was. Each time I turned to look at him, he was closer. I noticed something, though. Kenny was susceptible to suggestion. Each time I turned to look over my shoulder, he would look back too (try this yourself. If you look somewhere people around you will look too). I looked over my shoulder every few seconds, and each time, I'd grab a little bit of snow. After doing this a few times, I had a full grown snowball. A perfect snowball! I started to think about the possible consequences of throwing that snowball at Kenny, especially if I missed. I tested the waters by looking over my shoulder and seeing how many seconds I had to take aim. And then, finally, I did it. I turned to look over my shoulder, Kenny turned too. I turned the rest of my body. Aimed! And FIRED! In slow motion, the snowball flew as if guided by an angel or a jerk detection system. Kenny started to turn back around (also in slow motion). Just as he got to the half way point the snowball struck him right in the left ear. If you haven't been hit in the ear by a cold ball of ice and revenge, don't try it. It hurts. Kenny started to cry and ran home. To this day, only 3 or 4 people have heard this story. Consider yourselves lucky.
My point is, friends, we're all susceptible to this kind of thing. Whether we start speaking ebonics when we're around our black friends, or whether we use words that aren't in our normal vocabulary when we are around smart people, we all do it, and it's annoying. So please, STOP IMITATING ME OR I'LL HIT YOU WITH A SNOWBALL!
If you're thinking to yourself "Obviously this is staged", You're wrong. The fact that you'd even think that means that you're highly susceptible to suggestion.
If you believed that last sentence...well I think I've proven my point. We are all susceptible to these things. Let me give you a couple of real world examples that sound more realistic:
I work in a call center like one of our other writers. I was speaking with a women today who was upset because we had not processed her request. I work for a company which handles accounts that are highly regulated by the government. We are constantly under supervision and cannot break rules. I apologized to her saying "Ma'am, I'm on your side. Really I am. These things take too much time and they're too complicated. We simply cannot process this request until we've received proper documentation, it would be a breach of contract. We're not trying to be bureaucratic." Do you know what she said next? Of course you don't so I'll tell you. She said "Well I'm not gonna let a bunch of bureaucrats hold this up!".
Do you think she was susceptible to suggestion? As defiant and unreasonable as this woman was, she somehow picked up on a word that I used that she probably would not have used, and she used it herself. She couldn't even generate her own insult. She had to steal it from me. This infuriated me. I don't like when people imitate me! It's like that stupid game you play when you're a child trying to annoy your little sister. You know, the one where you repeat everything she says. I'll tell you one way I used "suggestion" to my advantage though by telling you my favorite and most secret childhood story...
As a child, I was very small. Or at least I felt small. I didn't have any friends in school that I remember. I had a couple who used me for my brain (yes, this was elementary school and children are evil, and yes, I was brilliant for my age), but no real friends. In fact, a couple of kids really hated me for some reason. One such demon child was named Kenny. Kenny had definitely had a rough life, but he was a bully. Walking home from school one day in this Chicago suburb sometime during the winter, I spotted a gigantic icicle which had become detached from the roof of a neighbor's house. It was awesome! I remember that it was the shape of a guitar. I picked it up and walked with it for a couple of minutes. And then Kenny showed up.
"That's mine!" said Kenny "Give it back!"
I hated Kenny. He was short and ugly and a jerk (sorry it was true).
"What do you mean? I just picked it up from the ground a few minutes ago" I said in an attempt to reason with the brute.
"I found it earlier and hid it on the ground."
"I doubt it"
"Give it to me dweeb!" (Yes, I was a dweeb)
"NO!"
At this moment, I made the most reckless decision I had made in my entire life. I had to stand up for myself. I wasn't going to let him bully me anymore! Do you know what I did? Of course not. I SMASHED THAT STUPID PIECE OF ICE OVER MY KNEE! It felt so good, but Kenny was steaming! Or at least he was breathing hard and you could see his breath because it was cold.
I started walking home. I moved quickly of course. Every few seconds I would turn around to see if he was still following me. He was. Each time I turned to look at him, he was closer. I noticed something, though. Kenny was susceptible to suggestion. Each time I turned to look over my shoulder, he would look back too (try this yourself. If you look somewhere people around you will look too). I looked over my shoulder every few seconds, and each time, I'd grab a little bit of snow. After doing this a few times, I had a full grown snowball. A perfect snowball! I started to think about the possible consequences of throwing that snowball at Kenny, especially if I missed. I tested the waters by looking over my shoulder and seeing how many seconds I had to take aim. And then, finally, I did it. I turned to look over my shoulder, Kenny turned too. I turned the rest of my body. Aimed! And FIRED! In slow motion, the snowball flew as if guided by an angel or a jerk detection system. Kenny started to turn back around (also in slow motion). Just as he got to the half way point the snowball struck him right in the left ear. If you haven't been hit in the ear by a cold ball of ice and revenge, don't try it. It hurts. Kenny started to cry and ran home. To this day, only 3 or 4 people have heard this story. Consider yourselves lucky.
My point is, friends, we're all susceptible to this kind of thing. Whether we start speaking ebonics when we're around our black friends, or whether we use words that aren't in our normal vocabulary when we are around smart people, we all do it, and it's annoying. So please, STOP IMITATING ME OR I'LL HIT YOU WITH A SNOWBALL!
Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery!!!! So sometimes we can be happy when people imitate us, cause it means that they think we're really cool and want to be like us, and they may feel that the only way they can be cool is to do what we do, instead of developing their own personality! But when they do it to insult/mock you, then that's just proves that they really need a personality!!! Cause mocking someone is just a sad way of saying: Hey I have NO personality except these really irritating things that I can do that makes other people fell bad about themselves.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the above situation above in the video, I also believe it shows that some people (well, really all of us) enjoy someone asking for our help (so that we can prove how smart we are/how much we know compared to them) and taking an interest in us soooo much (and it really is a very natural trait), that we allow ourselves to be distracted away from what's really important at the time----like getting the money we need for a product or service or checking to make sure that everything "is on the up and up". When Derren Brown asked questions of people like: "How long have you worked/lived here?" he was taking an interest in them and of course, everyone loves that and could easily be swayed from concentrating on other things. Or he was talking so much and asking so many questions that the person's brain couldn't decipher between small talk and important questions---thus they lost sight of what was really important----getting their money! It really is a life lesson for us to not fall prey to fast talkers and people taking an interest in us who probably really don't have pure motives---why do care sooo much about me---we just met (and it's just a guy buying a hot dog/why does he care so much)????
That's a true story? Wow, you must have been just as smart as you looked. I am sincerely impressed with the way you handled Kenny. Congratulations, you are now a child prodigy in my book.
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