from: Bloodstone43956@i-mail.irs
to: Raventrap39996@i-mail.irs
date: 7518.42246
My Dear Raventrap ~
Your question about practical methods of controlling freedom of choice is appropriate, but somewhat banal. You should have learned all about the scam of bullying in Temptation 102. However, since this is one of my favorite topics, I’ll review it for you. You see, Raventrap, our business is to play upon the insecurities of our clients. They all have some, and with any luck we can magnify one or two of them sufficiently to cause a behavior known as transference. Let’s say one of your clients is afraid his father doesn’t approve of him. This is not at all difficult to manage, especially if you can push his father into verbal or physical abuse over trivial offenses. For example, if one of your young clients forgets to take out the trash, suggest to his father that he doesn’t want the boy to grow up to be a lazy, good-for-nothing lout who will no doubt disgrace the family name, and you just might get the father to shout a few obscenities and even accuse his son of disrespect or stupidity. A father or other authority figure can deeply hurt any child just by using the word, “stupid,” but sons are particularly susceptible to this kind of injury. Further, a wounded child is much more likely to transfer his pain to other children. And, just like that, a bully is born.
Incidentally, words like “stupid,” “fat,” “ugly” and other insults are much more powerful than any so-called “curse” word. The way some of our clients use these kinds of words against others is much more “indecent” than swearing. So, we must trick our clients into using any word that denigrates another’s intelligence, appearance, or worth. Our Competitor really doesn’t object too much to most “swear” words, even those that refer to parts or functions of the human body, or even the misplaced use of one of His aliases, as much as he deplores the use of words that in effect attack the way He made another of His little wretches. He would rather hear the word, “shit,” a thousand times than hear one of His creations say to another, “You stupid fat pig…you make me sick!” The real obscenity is in the way words are used to demean a fellow human being, one Our Competitor seems to genuinely “love,” not in the nastiness of the words themselves.
Derogatory words are of course essential to the behavior of the bully. He wants above all to make himself feel better ~ more secure and more powerful ~ by making others feel worse. To do this, he feels he must control their choices and actions, and he does this through intimidation. The bully needs to instill fear, and name-calling is often just the starting point. If you can get one of your clients to call another by some degrading name, the game is half-won. The principle of transference dictates that the bully will immediately feel more in charge if he can “do unto another” what was done to him. Next come threats, and if these don’t work, damage to the victim’s possessions or physical harm to the victim.
In extreme forms of bullying, threats are often made against other humans the victim cares about. In the end, the victim can come to believe he has no choice other than to do the bidding of the bully, or else lash out and possibly do something he might live to regret. The major proviso is that under no circumstances should the bully ever come to realize any connection between what it feels like to be bullied and choosing to act like a bully. We want our bullies to remain unaware of their deep psychological trauma, so they will not seek help and will continue to torment others. In the end, if we make the right moves, we will gain the contracts of both the bully and his victim in a sort of two-for-one special deal.
Be careful ~ in some cases, we can push the victim too hard ~ to the point where he physically attacks his attackers. There are a number of well-known incidents in which victims of bullying have turned on everyone who had any part in bullying them, even those who stood by and did nothing to help. They’ve sometimes taken up ballistic weapons and killed many, including themselves. Even though this scenario seems appealing, we can’t let it happen too often. Our Competitor has a stealthy way of interceding on behalf of the innocent, and some communities tend to come together and make it impossible for us to work there for a long time after these kinds of events unfold.
So, you must be careful. Confine your efforts to encouraging the bully while demoralizing his victims, but only as much as necessary to move both closer to The Corporation. Acts of desperation can work for us if timed to the millisecond, but if not; Our Competitor might step in and ~ unfortunately ~ redeem our clients. We obviously don’t want this to happen, so tread lightly and keep your clients’ choices under tight control until such time as they feel they have no choice but to sign their contracts over to Our Executive.
So much for the basics of overt school yard bullying. There are more advanced forms of bullying you may not have thought about, but are very useful to us. Bullying doesn’t have to be out in the open to work its magic. Subtle, silent, and sustained bullying is often much more powerful over time. Never underestimate the effects of a lifetime of inferred threats, unfounded insecurities, and unreasonable fears. A human doesn’t need to be the target of a big thug to feel he has no real choices and eventually no measurable worth. All it takes is a meaningless job, an unsympathetic boss, an ungrateful spouse or children, or a set of obligations he can’t seem to meet, and your client will gradually sink into a bog of despondency. Your task is to take away any sense of accomplishment your client may have and replace it with a sense of futility. If nothing he does is ever good enough, your client might just conclude that life really has no purpose and all that’s left is for him to find ways to satisfy his own desires. Remember, the self is the “be-all-end-all” of existence. If a feeling of being bullied by life results in your client giving in to his thirst for self-gratification or self-destruction, it will work as well as any other motivation to allow you to acquire his contract.
Your Devoted Cousin,
Bloodstone
MurrayWorks 