Manipedia

The encyclopedia of manipulation

They pit us against each other.

If a post leaves you furious at your neighbour, your uncle or half the country, that’s not always an accident. Divide and rule now runs on comments, ads and shares. The goal: votes, geopolitical leverage, or simply your money.

We won’t tell you what to think. We'd just like to make you aware of some of the things that go on online.

Start reading Can you spot the trick?
@real_talk_88, 3h

So the ministry lost 40 million on a contract with no bidding process?

@patriot_pulse, 2h

Funny how you never post about the last government’s stadium deals. Selective outrage much?

Whataboutism The question never got an answer. It got a different scandal. Entry 001

Contents

  1. Why does that argument feel off?

    Rhetorical tricks 14 entries

    Whataboutism, False dilemma, Strawman, Ad hominem, Scapegoating, Us vs. them, Loaded language & euphemisms, Just asking questions, Moving the goalposts, Gish gallop, False balance, Appeal to fear, Appeal to nostalgia, 'Common sense' & the silent majority

  2. Is this even real?

    Fake & misleading content 10 entries

    Out-of-context photos & videos, Fabricated quotes, Fake screenshots, Deepfakes & AI-generated media, Cheapfakes, Misleading headlines & clickbait, Misleading charts & cherry-picked statistics, Fake experts & fake institutes, Cloned news sites, Satire shared as real news

  3. Why am I seeing this everywhere?

    How lies spread 12 entries

    Bots, Troll farms, Astroturfing, Sockpuppets, Coordinated inauthentic behavior, Undisclosed paid influencers, Hashtag hijacking, Brigading, Rage bait & engagement bait, Algorithms that reward outrage, Echo chambers, Firehose of falsehood

  4. Where have I heard this before?

    Recurring narratives 7 entries

    ‘Brussels dictates and controls you’, ‘Sanctions only hurt you’, ‘The decadent West’, Energy crisis blame-shifting, ‘Peace’ messaging that means capitulation, Migration fearmongering, ‘Nothing is true, everyone lies’

  5. Who profits if I click?

    Economic manipulation 8 entries

    Deepfake celebrity investment scams, Crypto pump-and-dump, Fake reviews, Greenwashing, Dark patterns, Fake scarcity & FOMO, Native ads posing as articles, Lobby-funded 'studies'

  6. Why does it work on me?

    Psychology 6 entries

    Confirmation bias, Illusory truth effect, Emotional hijacking, Bandwagon effect, Authority bias, Information overload

  7. What can I actually do?

    Defense skills 7 entries

    The SIFT method, Lateral reading, Reverse image search, Checking domains and dates, Pause before sharing, How to talk to a relative who believes it, How and where to report

How people use it

Someone posts a reply that feels off. You find the trick here, by name or by what it does. Then you paste the entry under the post calmly, as information, not as an accusation. Every entry comes with a few ready-made replies for exactly that.

Defense skills: Seven habits that take a minute and catch most of the above.

About the tricks, not the parties

We show how a trick works, whoever is using it, so examples come from across the political spectrum. Documented campaigns, such as pro-Kremlin disinformation catalogued by EUvsDisinfo, are named because the evidence is public.