Thought Manipulation: The Use and Abuse of Psychological Trickery by Sapir Handelman Page B

limited ability to oppose external influences like manipulative behavior— an assertion that, according to Hayek, is not true.
    Hayek emphasizes that freedom and responsibility are connected values. In other words, freedom without responsibility is an empty notion. If a person chooses to be maneuvered by manipulative tricks, this is his personal problem and he has to bear the consequences. However, this simplification of Hayek’s view is only the beginning.
    Hayek’s arguments point out that raising questions and problems, which belong to the individual mental private sphere, encourage the literal interpretation of metaphors. Such mistaken interpretations can lead to miserable consequences, which endanger the foundation of an individual’s personal responsibility. The concrete danger is that meaningless terms, such as “mental freedom,” will become guiding principles for regulation, and sketching policy according to meaningless principles removes any barrier and limitation. In this respect, the manipulation phenomenon, our case study, demonstrates the danger and the difficulties.
    ORWELL’S THOUGHT POLICE: FEAR-PROVOKING DELUSION OR A REAL DANGER?
    Social life is not always amusing but rather too often invites crises, difficulties, and problems. The frequent call for government intervention in response to social distresses should come as little surprise. Unfortunately, we tend to forget that governments and leaders should not be trusted. Their ability to cope with social crises is limited, particularly when focusing on the gray area, the location of manipulative behavior. How could leaders protect our “mental freedom,” the abstract individual domain, which cannot be demarcated by concrete physical criteria?
    Manipulative behavior in general and advertising in particular operate in the mental domain. They are geared toward influencing the decision-making process of the target without physically and overtly limiting his options. Moral and legal discussions regarding manipulative behavior is problematic because of our limited ability to formulate an objective test to quantify the impact of such influences on a person’s decision-making process. How it is possible to determine a concrete mental sphere, a place where manipulations are not able to enter?
    Aware of this limitation, advertisers direct most of their work at the gray area—the place where it is almost impossible to measure interference in our independence and free choice. Their elusive and sophisticated strategies make it almost impossible to formulate objective criteria to distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate and moral and immoral manipulation. How can we protect the individual from damaging influences that we cannot measure, quantify, and sometimes even identify?
    No doubt that the call for government intervention and control in the advertising market expresses sincere wishes to cope with real social issues, such as the desire to reduce the negative impact of irresistible influences, bring social justice, and improve quality of life. Free-market economists like Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek, however, will argue that governmental regulation and control in the gray area (the mental dimension) is not practical and will bring only social misery: What are the criteria to distinguish between a decent and an indecent advertisement? How can we decide which political candidate is a dangerous, manipulative demagogue and which is a true social reformer? Which political campaign expresses sincere intentions to bring a desirable change and which only uses attractive manipulative slogans to get elected?
    The problem is that even the most “professional” regulators with the best intentions lack any X-ray into the mind and soul. This very gap indicates that almost any regulation in this area is subject to guesswork and the regulator’s arbitrary personal view and judgment. The sad result is that such a clumsy regulation will probably fail while the