that reminded me about a notice i read some years ago when the obbligation to fasten the belts while driving a car was introduced the street vendors in Naples promptly started to sell the T-shirts with the fastened belts painted on them....
i consider manipulating as a relatively popular modus operandi "in this most beautiful of all the possible worlds" as Candid by Voltaire used to say and, by any means, i'm not impressed by it...
in my opinion, the concept of the absense of the power struggle in a couple is a myth and the manipulation is only a tool that serves to obtain something the person thinks he/she wouldn't get in a direct way
50 shades of chemistry..
i see you're good with numbers, Inspector