The dangers of propaganda and to less of an extent marketing have long been established.  But how do they work?   Either by rearranging your emotions or generating brand new ones people can change your behavior without your consent.  When being blitzed by these techniques you really only have two options.  You can either remove yourself from the outside influence, or you can recognize and actively ignore the external messages.

The emotional maps that can be used to manipulate you can be derived from broader societal trends, or can extracted from you personally using psychoanalysis techniques.  Scale effects the technique, but not the result.  If  I can trigger and emotional reaction in you, I can change your mood and to some degree your behavior.  Even if you are aware of the attempt and actively trying to stop me.

As mentioned simply removing yourself from the environment is effective.  For example turning off the television or more personally shunning a psychopath.  Once they can no longer communicate with you, you will not form further emotional connections and they can not interfere with the metamind’s predictive abilities.

But we know that the real world is rarely so simple.  You may need to endure many sources of emotional manipulation during any day.  Further, being self aware can help you to block emotions, but the very act of blocking intruding emotions can make you angry or depressed.  Now upset that you have been toyed with, you may still change your behavior, perhaps drastically, providing a wanted response.  This two layer manipulation is insidious, but hardly unstoppable.

Contrary to popular belief, forgiveness is a wholly personal affair.  While it may play an important role in your particular faith, it serves the health of your mind directly.  Another popular belief is that forgiven is forgotten.  It is critical that you separate these two things.  Forgiveness is your best method to completely stop external manipulation of your emotions without changing your behavior.  Forgetting is opening up yourself to further manipulation attempts by people and organizations that you may have already identified as a psychopath or psychopathic.

Consider forgiving the psychopathic cultures and psychopaths in your life.  Not as a benevolent act of compassion, but as an act of self defense.  Recognize psychopathic behavior for what it really is, the selfish whims of the mentally limited.  Show them pity and you , not them, will be saved from the torment of a distorted conscience