I realise you didn't actually call him that - it's such a loaded comparison though, that it maybe should be avoided altogether, unless it's actually warranted.
Like others said, I'd have to hear what was actually being said, before I'd call it intentionally manipulative, but even then there's all kinds of... levels of emotional manipulation, conscious and unconscious, in almost all human interaction. If I'm being friendly to customers at work so that they like it here, and buy the book they want in our shop instead of another bookshop, even if I have to order it for them first, and so keep my job secure, am I being emotionally manipulative? I've occasionally given regular customers more of a discount when a book was a bit damaged than I would have given someone I've never seen before. I've even told them, a couple of times, not to tell my boss, though that was only half-serious, because it wouldn't actually have got me into much trouble. And while I try to be polite, friendly and helpful to everyone, there's stuff I'll do for regular customers, especially ones I like and are friendly (and occasionally bring chocolate, *g*), that I won't do for everyone. Is that being emotionally manipulative? Is that being emotionally manipulated? Or just human nature? And I'm not a born sales person by a very, very long way, that's just stuff one picks up after a while, even someone with very few social skills like me. And in a way JB, too, sells a product, and obviously to him interacting with people comes a lot easier and more natural than it does to me, so I guess a certain level of... if you want to call it that, manipulation, is inevitable. But if there no harmful intent, and no actual harm done, I don't really see a problem.
Now personally (but this is coming from someone who's never been to a con, so my perception might be skewed) the issue I have is with the basic concept of selling this kind of (pseudo)intimacy for money. I wasn't really a NIN fan any longer at this point, but I already hated it when TR did it with the (now, I gather, defunct) 'The Spiral' fanclub. On the other hand, if this is what people want, if it makes them happy (and it apparently does), who am I to judge. The vast majority of Barrowman fans are adults, so if they chose to honour his request, it's their choice. Doesn't have to be creepy manipulation. Maybe they want to feel special. Maybe they don't want to lose the fanservice. Maybe they just plain like him, which plenty of people seem to do, after all, and that outweighs the brief internet fame and the 483 comments they might get on livejournal for posting.
Which doesn't answer the question why he does it, I know. Now I realise that this is a very random guess, but... I was a bit of musical theatre fan once, for a while. Now I don't know how this is in the UK, but here in Vienna the interaction between the actors and the fans tended to be pretty personal. Maybe this is what he's used to and tends to forget that he has a very different fanbase now?
As for the Scott thing - it's mostly that I've read one too many 'Poor Scott' comment (see hamsterfur's comment above, which sums it up pretty well), and I kind of snapped - sorry it was at you.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-06-09 05:27 pm (UTC)I realise you didn't actually call him that - it's such a loaded comparison though, that it maybe should be avoided altogether, unless it's actually warranted.
Like others said, I'd have to hear what was actually being said, before I'd call it intentionally manipulative, but even then there's all kinds of... levels of emotional manipulation, conscious and unconscious, in almost all human interaction. If I'm being friendly to customers at work so that they like it here, and buy the book they want in our shop instead of another bookshop, even if I have to order it for them first, and so keep my job secure, am I being emotionally manipulative? I've occasionally given regular customers more of a discount when a book was a bit damaged than I would have given someone I've never seen before. I've even told them, a couple of times, not to tell my boss, though that was only half-serious, because it wouldn't actually have got me into much trouble. And while I try to be polite, friendly and helpful to everyone, there's stuff I'll do for regular customers, especially ones I like and are friendly (and occasionally bring chocolate, *g*), that I won't do for everyone. Is that being emotionally manipulative? Is that being emotionally manipulated? Or just human nature? And I'm not a born sales person by a very, very long way, that's just stuff one picks up after a while, even someone with very few social skills like me. And in a way JB, too, sells a product, and obviously to him interacting with people comes a lot easier and more natural than it does to me, so I guess a certain level of... if you want to call it that, manipulation, is inevitable. But if there no harmful intent, and no actual harm done, I don't really see a problem.
Now personally (but this is coming from someone who's never been to a con, so my perception might be skewed) the issue I have is with the basic concept of selling this kind of (pseudo)intimacy for money. I wasn't really a NIN fan any longer at this point, but I already hated it when TR did it with the (now, I gather, defunct) 'The Spiral' fanclub. On the other hand, if this is what people want, if it makes them happy (and it apparently does), who am I to judge. The vast majority of Barrowman fans are adults, so if they chose to honour his request, it's their choice. Doesn't have to be creepy manipulation. Maybe they want to feel special. Maybe they don't want to lose the fanservice. Maybe they just plain like him, which plenty of people seem to do, after all, and that outweighs the brief internet fame and the 483 comments they might get on livejournal for posting.
Which doesn't answer the question why he does it, I know. Now I realise that this is a very random guess, but... I was a bit of musical theatre fan once, for a while. Now I don't know how this is in the UK, but here in Vienna the interaction between the actors and the fans tended to be pretty personal. Maybe this is what he's used to and tends to forget that he has a very different fanbase now?
As for the Scott thing - it's mostly that I've read one too many 'Poor Scott' comment (see