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🎭 Manipulation: small & big
That's influence: making small things big and big things small. When we set the frame and then provide the relevant information, our brain always makes a comparison. An example:
During a sales pitch for a car, the prospective buyer asks about the price. The salesperson says:
“This car, with all its extras and special features, doesn't cost €200,000, of course. It costs €90,000.”
What's happening here?
He first sets a large frame and then presents the price within it. That's it.
Incidentally, it doesn't matter at all if the frame is utopically large. He could also have said with a friendly smile: “The car doesn't cost a million euros.” It makes no difference, because the buyer's brain only checks the statement for accuracy and he says yes, it does NOT cost 1 million, which is true.
Where else do we encounter this?
Well, when marginalized issues repeatedly appear in the news, one automatically gets the impression that it is a significant and important topic. Of course, one should not exaggerate this. On January 6, 2026, Tagesschau, a German news program, aired an extended report on the extinction of a particular species of penguin. At the same time, they devoted only a few seconds of the same program to the dramatic situation of 40,000 people in Berlin. These 40,000 people had been without electricity for days in freezing temperatures and some of them had to be evacuated. After two days, the first looting began.
Do you see what I mean?
I did exactly the same thing in the text. Just by the amount of time I spent on the news item, it takes on a different weighting for you.
Sure, it's a gross simplification, but perhaps you can think of examples yourself where someone first set the scene and then moved you to take a certain stance on an issue. 😉
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🎭 Manipulation: small & big
