"Brain-washing"

[Angrboda]

I found this in a book I'm reading, and found it both funny and apropos.

The book is, "Mistakes Were Made (but not by me)" by Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson.

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The reason Big Pharma spends so much on small gifts is well known to marketers, lobbyists, and social psychologists: Being given a gift evokes an implicit desire to reciprocate …. Robert Cialdini, who has spent many years studying influence and persuasion techniques, systematically observed Hare Krishna advocates raise money at airports. Asking weary travelers for a donation wasn’t working; the Krishnas just made the travelers mad at them. And so the Krishnas came up with a better idea: They would approach target travelers and press a flower into their hands or pin the flower to their jackets. If the target refused the flower and tried to give it back, the Krishna would demur and say, “It is our gift to you.” Only then did the Krishna ask for a donation. This time the request was likely to be accepted, because the gift of the flower had established a feeling of indebtedness and obligation in the traveler. How to repay the gift? With a small donation .... and perhaps the purchase of a charming, overpriced edition of the Bhagavad Gita.

Were the travelers aware of the power of reciprocity to affect their behavior? Not at all. But once reciprocity kicks in, self-justification will follow: “I’ve always wanted a copy of the Bhagavad Gita; what is it, exactly?” The power of the flower is unconscious …. Once you take the gift, no matter how small, the process starts. You will feel the urge to give something back, even if it’s only, at first, your attention, your willingness to listen, your sympathy for the giver. Eventually, you will become more willing to give your prescription, your ruling, your vote. Your behavior changes, but, thanks to blind spots and self-justification, your view of your intellectual and professional integrity remains the same.

Carl Elliott, a bioethicist and philosopher who also has an MD, has written extensively about the ways that small gifts entrap their recipients. His brother Hal, a psychiatrist, told him how he ended up on the speakers bureau of a large pharmaceutical company: First they asked him to give a talk about depression to a community group. Why not, he thought; it would be a public service. Next they asked him to speak on the same subject at a hospital. Next they began making suggestions about the content of his talk, urging him to speak not about depression, but about antidepressants. Then they told him they could get him on a national speaking circuit, “where the real money is.” Then they asked him to lecture about their own new antidepressant. Looking back, Hal told his brother:

“It’s kind of like you’re a woman at a party, and your boss says to you, “Look, do me a favor: be nice to this guy over there.” And you see the guy is not bad-looking, and you’re unattached, so you say, “Why not? I can be nice.” Soon you find yourself on the way to a Bangkok brothel in the cargo hold of an unmarked plane. And you say, “Whoa, this is not what I agreed to.” But then you have to ask yourself: “When did the prostitution actually start? Wasn’t it at that party?”

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