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In the book, "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism"[1], it talks about the MO for the big tech companies. How they push and often subtly change things slowly. The

by mfer 6y ago

In the book, "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism"[1], it talks about the MO for the big tech companies. How they push and often subtly change things slowly. The book provides a number of examples of this. I never expected FB to walk back the privacy change. I even expect their full expectations to be in place in a couple years. It's what they have successfully done in the past. [1] https://bookshop.org/books/the-age-of-surveillance-capitalism-the-fight-for-a-human-future-at-the-new-frontier-of-power/9781541758001 https://bookshop.org/books/the-age-of-surveillance-capitalis...

Person5478 6y ago
In the book "ordinary men" it describes a group of conscripted soldiers during the nazi regime. They were former police for Poland, so not even German Nazi's, but by the end they were doing things like taking pregnant women out in fields and shooting them. The takeaway from the book is that you can get ordinary people to do extraordinarily evil acts by asking them to do more heinous things in small steps. The gist is that anyone who thinks they COULDN'T do horrible things is the most at risk of this type of manipulation. The idea of a slippery slope is a very real thing. edit: One of the most harrowing descriptions from the book imo is a description of an event where they were killing so many jews it eventually turned night and they attempted to use lights from cars to keep going, but that proved unsuccessful so they were FORCED to wait until the next day to finish up. Until you read things like that you don't fully grasp just how horrific the holocaust was. We all know it was horrible in an abstract way, but those stories really bring it home in a more concrete manner.
musha68k 6y ago
Indeed, a powerful trick out of the manipulator’s playbook. Also thinking of “Death by a thousand cuts”, “slowly boiling a frog”, etc. “Creeping normality (also called gradualism, or landscape amnesia[1]) is a process by which a major change can be accepted as normal and acceptable if it happens slowly through small, often unnoticeable, increments of change. The change could otherwise be regarded as objectionable if it took place in a single step or short period.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creeping_normality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creeping_normality

by mfer 6y ago

Person5478 6y ago

In the book "ordinary men" it describes a group of conscripted soldiers during the nazi regime. They were former police for Poland, so not even German Nazi's, but by the end they were doing things like taking pregnant women out in fields and shooting them. The takeaway from the book is that you can get ordinary people to do extraordinarily evil acts by asking them to do more heinous things in small steps. The gist is that anyone who thinks they COULDN'T do horrible things is the most at risk of this type of manipulation. The idea of a slippery slope is a very real thing. edit: One of the most harrowing descriptions from the book imo is a description of an event where they were killing so many jews it eventually turned night and they attempted to use lights from cars to keep going, but that proved unsuccessful so they were FORCED to wait until the next day to finish up. Until you read things like that you don't fully grasp just how horrific the holocaust was. We all know it was horrible in an abstract way, but those stories really bring it home in a more concrete manner.

musha68k 6y ago

Indeed, a powerful trick out of the manipulator’s playbook. Also thinking of “Death by a thousand cuts”, “slowly boiling a frog”, etc. “Creeping normality (also called gradualism, or landscape amnesia[1]) is a process by which a major change can be accepted as normal and acceptable if it happens slowly through small, often unnoticeable, increments of change. The change could otherwise be regarded as objectionable if it took place in a single step or short period.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creeping_normality https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creeping_normality