We've all found ourselves in conversation and felt attacked like we started off talking about one thing and then the other person twisted our words and before we knew it, we lost our cool, lost respect in their eyes, and maybe even acted like a jerk.
I’ll be discussing how you can handle someone who uses subtle conversational tricks to bully you into looking dumb. I’ll also explain firsthand some of the most common tricks that people might be using on you. Finally, we’ll take a look at how you can reverse those tricks so that you can walk out of a kind of aggressive situation in a way that earns you more respect than you had going in.
First off, to stop a conversational bully, you have to realize what's going on before it's too late.
Now, typically, a person will reveal their aggressive attitude early on with their tone of voice and their word choice. Even when they're being passive-aggressive, people will often indicate that they're about to attack you before they actually do.
So if you hear someone say something like, "Well, what do you have to say for yourself?" be prepared. That person thinks that you've done something wrong and you need to be very careful what you say next, not because you did do something wrong but because a conversational bully may be trying to trap you into saying something that you disagree with so that they can attack that straw man.
And the first way that this often happens is called the "so-you're-saying trap." The general pattern here is that someone says, "So you're saying..." and then proceeds to oversimplify or mischaracterize what you actually said.
Fortunately it's rather simple to avoid and get around by saying, "Well, actually, what I was saying is..." and then repeat yourself.
But there's a much sneakier way that people may mischaracterize your beliefs and then attack them. Basically, it's when someone's words imply that you believe something you don't and they don't actually say it.
So in business, they call this "assuming the sale" like when a car salesman says, "So would you like that with the leather interior or with the fabric interior?" And they say this before you even decided to buy the car.
Now, with the several thousand dollar purchase, you're likely to notice this and say, "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Who said I was buying in the first place?"
But it's very likely that this is happening to you in conversation all the time and you don't even notice.
Here's how it might look. Someone starts by asking you a direction question with a presupposition. Then the inclination (which is a trap) might be for you to start arguing for things that we don't even really believe just out of habit.
Instead, you need to identify that hidden presupposition and then call it out. You can start by saying something like, “I'm not saying (blah, blah blah)… What I’m saying is that…
Here’s a practical tip as well. One simple thing that you can do to make it easier on yourself is to purposely assume a relaxed posture throughout your entire conversation. Now, this posture actually helps you to think less frantically because your body is signalling to your brain that everything is okay; you're in control.
You'll also want to give yourself some time to pause after each question. In addition, you're going to want to study up on frames and frame games because there can be a whole level of conversation that is going on behind the words.
A third conversational bully tactic is called the "smash technique."
It can be subtle, but it’s when a person smashed together two very different terms. It can be frustrating to deal with because people are embedding hidden statements that you actually disagree with and then moving through them before you have the time to voice that disagreement.
You may also have seen people barrage you with questions just to overwhelm you into having to accept their points. In this situation it can be easy to get overwhelmed and to lose focus as you try to answer all of these questions but with the smash technique in general, the best policy is to slow down the tempo of conversation and tackle one question or one point at a time.
For example, you can reply with something like, “let's just go to the first question; those both are complicated questions.”
So hopefully, you're now more aware of the so-you're-saying trap when people "assume the sale" and of course, the smash technique.
The next thing I want to discuss is how to persuade someone in these kinds of situations.
First, do not straw man the other person's ideas even if they're doing it to you. And to be clear, straw manning is when you create a caricature of their ideas and then attack those rather than what they truly believe.
Instead, show the other person that you are truly engaging in their real points, attempt to understand them, and sometimes this means that you have to ask them to repeat themselves so that you can.
Then, after you've made an honest attempt to understand them, you need to make sure that they can understand you, which is necessary for persuasion. And to do that, you often have to use visual imagery.
Adding concrete examples especially ones that people can easily imagine is a smart persuasive move.
Lastly, when you're arguing, oftentimes the best way to get someone to change their position is not by changing their mind but by gently showing them that they are already agreeing with you.
For example, something you might no longer arguing that their point is wrong; you can start arguing that they already agree with you. This can show the other person how much you’re actually in alignment with each other on something.
People have a strong desire to remain consistent with things they've already said and done. So oftentimes, this becomes one of the few ways to persuade someone who's really dug in their heels.
You're basically showing them that they don't have to move in order to agree with you; they already do right where they're dug in.
Just be careful that when you do this, you don’t make the other person feel silly and wrong as opposed to feeling happy to discover that you’re both really on the same team.
One final thought to keep in mind is that answering all of someone’s questions can be good, but it can be even better to proactively address any deeper unstated emotional concern.
One example of an emotional concern is that you are their enemy. So if you believe something, it must be against their best interests. In this situation, once you’ve found the emotional concern, try to point to common ground that you both share (which of course we all have). This can help a discussion to continue in a less argumentative fashion.
YOUR THOUGHTS...
Have you ever been in a situation where you felt bullied or tricked during an argument or discussion?!