I get the feeling that if you told Jenny all this they’d get angry at you at some point of your explanation. It feels kinda manipulative. I don’t get this “manipulative” feeling from the example. The end result seems good, though.
You’re absolutely right, it was totally, consciously manipulative and I’m not going to try to justify that with a bunch of utility boilerplate—but I’d claim that the manipulation element lay only in my tacit implication that Jenny must, as a matter of course, see the question as I did. The “as I’m sure you already know” stuff. Is there a name for that? It’s like begging the question on purpose, treating an important assumption as though it’s settled and barreling ahead before they can get a word in.
It’s embarrassing—socially difficult—for someone to interrupt in order to correct you, to say “wait a minute, back up, that’s all fine and dandy but I actually believe that the crystals themselves are magic.” Especially someone with only a shaky ability to articulate their belief in the first place, like Jenny. It was intellectual bullying in a small way and I don’t really know why I felt I had to do it like that. Petty fun, maybe? The devil is strong in me where crystals are concerned.
But I believe the rest of my idea still stands—there goes the tablecloth again—if you remove that unnecessarily manipulative element. if I had just simply and honestly discussed all the reasons I find crystals and their—ahem—healing properties fascinating, which again are all true, I would have still been making a model available to Jenny which preserved most of what she valued about her belief while jettisoning the belief itself.
I get the feeling that if you told Jenny all this they’d get angry at you at some point of your explanation. It feels kinda manipulative. I don’t get this “manipulative” feeling from the example. The end result seems good, though.
You’re absolutely right, it was totally, consciously manipulative and I’m not going to try to justify that with a bunch of utility boilerplate—but I’d claim that the manipulation element lay only in my tacit implication that Jenny must, as a matter of course, see the question as I did. The “as I’m sure you already know” stuff. Is there a name for that? It’s like begging the question on purpose, treating an important assumption as though it’s settled and barreling ahead before they can get a word in.
It’s embarrassing—socially difficult—for someone to interrupt in order to correct you, to say “wait a minute, back up, that’s all fine and dandy but I actually believe that the crystals themselves are magic.” Especially someone with only a shaky ability to articulate their belief in the first place, like Jenny. It was intellectual bullying in a small way and I don’t really know why I felt I had to do it like that. Petty fun, maybe? The devil is strong in me where crystals are concerned.
But I believe the rest of my idea still stands—there goes the tablecloth again—if you remove that unnecessarily manipulative element. if I had just simply and honestly discussed all the reasons I find crystals and their—ahem—healing properties fascinating, which again are all true, I would have still been making a model available to Jenny which preserved most of what she valued about her belief while jettisoning the belief itself.