The suicide of Peking University girl Bao Li has stirred up the popularization and discussion of PUA and mind control overnight.
Even the melon-eating masses may also know the five-step trap of pua: the trap of curiosity built by man, subversion of man, the establishment of contracts, the destruction of self-esteem, and emotional abuse.
Others hesitate to suspect that this may be just an exaggeration. Is emotional manipulation really that magical?
Take a look at Othello, one of Shakespeare's four great tragedies. It's a famous love tragedy.
The story begins with a suspected emotional manipulation.
Brabanius, the venetian elder, discovers that his daughter Desdemona is in love with the mercenary leader Othello of the Moor, believing that her daughter is being manipulated. "For a man without a disability, bright eyes, and able-bodied intellect would never have made such a ridiculous mistake if he had not been seduced by magic."
Desdemona and Othello's life experience, family background and other external conditions are too different. Desdemona was a famous lady in the city of Venice, with white skin and beautiful skin, and almost all the aristocratic youth of the city were fascinated by it. Othello is an erratic mercenary leader with a dark complexion and a dozen years older than her. Brabansius could hardly have imagined that they could cross these chasms and generate love.
What is Othello's emotional manipulation?
Storytelling. It begins with the events of wars, sieges, and accidents that have been experienced year after year. Later, he gave a complete account of the unfortunate blows suffered by his youth. In the end, "She loved me for the tribulations I had gone through, and I loved her for the sympathy she had for me." ”
If this is a trap of curiosity caused by a trap set by man, Othello is undoubtedly a prodigal son. Desdemona was fascinated by what he called exotic scenery, sympathetic to his tragic past, and adored his brave gestures against fate.
The shy girl made a surprising move, and she took the initiative to hint at Othello: "If I have a friend who is in love with her, I can get her love by teaching him how to tell my story." ”
Othello understood, quickly confessed, and held the wedding ceremony in secret.
But this is only the beginning of the tragedy. Because of the real emotional manipulation, this is the beginning.
Othello's flag officer, Iagu, brought the man and woman in love to their deaths.
Iagu's provocative tactics are crude. He first hinted to Othello and then made it clear that he had tricked Othello into believing that Desdemona was cheating on him by forging evidence.
This old-fashioned method is particularly effective because Iagu is a master of emotional manipulation, and because there are indeed hidden dangers within the flash marriage.
Iaeagu is an honest man in Othello's heart, and he has always stressed his loyalty to Othello, and his personality is very standing.
Iago is adept at using interpersonal relationships to create specious facts, such as maliciously pouring wine on Cathio, creating conflicts to get him removed from his post, and then having Caseo intercede with Desdemona; for example, he asks his wife to pick up a handkerchief, which eventually becomes ironclad evidence of adultery.
The most important thing, of course, is that Iago has insight into the blind spots in Othello's self-confidence.
In the third act, Iagu's first infidelity to Othello's hint at Desdemona is actually three points forward.
The first is that Desdemona is good at disguise, and when she was in love, she could hide from her father Brabantius, and now she can also hide from Othello's husband.
This emphasizes the alliance between husband and father as patriarchal parents of women.
The second emphasizes that Desdemona's marriage choice is unsuitable. "At the beginning, many people of the same nationality, the same color, and the same class proposed to her, and in our opinion, if they succeeded, it would be a match made in heaven, but she ignored it, which was obviously a move against common sense." "I'm afraid she regretted the mistake of her choice because Meng Lang followed you for a while, and maybe later felt that you could not meet the standards of her country in all aspects."
Desdemona, as a pampered aristocratic girl, the venetian white rich beauty in the palm of her hand, her world is pure good, no evil, not even prejudice.
Desdemona never realized the divide between nationality, skin color, and class, and her world was black-skinned and white-skinned Venetian Moors were all human, all the same. She probably didn't understand that her father had been angry to death because of the fact that he was married to Othello. Although she instinctively knew that her father would oppose the marriage.
In her eyes she was just marrying an older man, and if she was happy in the future, her father might forgive her. In her father's heart, the daughter is married to a distant, ignorant and dark outlier.
It was her innocence, but also her fraternity and greatness.
So when Iagu's wife reminded her of Othello's jealousy, she said that the hot equatorial sun had roasted Othello's jealousy dry.
Othello, as a gentile who was desperately contested and ostracized from time to time, was well aware of the power of these prejudices. Deep in the subconscious mind, it both despises these prejudices and humbles itself.
Finally, Iagu once again stressed: "I know the temper of the ladies and daughters in our country, and in Venice they do the drama behind their husbands' backs, and they do what they want to do, without shame, as long as they don't let their husbands know, they can be ashamed." ”
This reinforces the solitude of the Othello Gentiles. Even as a couple, he and Desdemona are still in different worlds.
Othello lived a life of licking blood as a young mercenary, and his memories of women probably came from the women he and, as adults, he may have known in taverns and other places for mercenaries' amusement.
The mother's world is conservative and closed, and the price of death is required for the loss of virginity, and women for recreation cannot talk about chastity.
As for whether the real Venetian aristocratic women were lascivious, he believed in Iago.
Although it was not until act V that Othello officially decided to kill Desdemona, the tragedy was already doomed in act III. Because the next thing is nothing more than Tomoko's suspicious neighbor, everywhere biased to Iagu, everywhere suspicious and speculative Kasio and Desdemona.
Iagu's emotional manipulation is not complicated, and in the name of thinking of Othello, he magnifies Othello's hidden worries, creates Desdemona's chastity anxiety, sells panic, and finally makes this panic kill Othello and Desdemona.
This is everywhere in our lives.
Just as Tony's teacher at a barbershop will tell you that your hair is not good and needs to be softened or otherwise treated, just as some beauty salons tell you that you have large pores and various imperfections and need to buy various products.
Even in close relationships such as relatives, friends, and couples, this kind of control is not uncommon, not necessarily a deliberate or malicious emotional manipulation, sometimes just an intimacy beyond the boundary, the enhancement of exclusivity.
As Mother Emmanuel said, "It is our nature to actively seek the full development of the individual, which contains pleasure and possession, as well as the desire to boast of self, but also the impulse to give, to serve, to sympathize with others, all of which are intertwined." ”
When Othello claims to have loved Desdemona too much and killed her, believe that it is not love, and that it is no longer the person you have loved.
Mind control, in the final analysis, is the unconscious transformation of a two-way relationship into one-way control.
It's not so hard to get rid of it, it's about knowing yourself and sticking to yourself.
Beware of those who say they love you, but blindly belittling you and hurting you, regardless of gender, please turn around in time.
After all, not all people who say they are good for you know what it means to be good for you, and not all people who say they are good for you are really good for you.
author: Liu Yangfeng, college teacher, doctor of literature and art, writing enthusiast.