Field Reference · 86 Mechanisms

The Tactic Library.

A working reference of persuasion mechanisms the Decoder detects — drawn from the full source library. Naming them is the first step to seeing them.

Framing

5 tactics

The lens installed before you notice a lens exists.

Primary frame

The interpretive container the message asks you to receive it inside.

Emphasis

What is repeated and enlarged until it feels like the point.

Omission

What must be missing for the conclusion to feel obvious.

Presupposition

The unstated claim that the argument quietly assumes as already settled.

Emotional priming

The mood set before the content arrives, so the content lands pre-approved.

Fear & Crisis

7 tactics

Compressing time and space so questioning feels reckless.

Fear appeal

Attaches danger to a claim so acceptance becomes safety.

Threat inflation

Enlarges the stakes to justify what would otherwise be rejected.

Catastrophizing

Frames the worst case as the default case.

Manufactured urgency

Removes the space in which questions could form.

Temporary-measure framing

Introduces permanent changes as short-term exceptions.

Compliance morality

Reframes obedience as care for others.

Security trap

Trades freedom for the feeling of safety — permanently.

Choice Illusion

5 tactics

Selection is not authorship. Who wrote the menu?

False binary

Two options presented as if they were the only two.

Curated menu

Real choice smuggled inside pre-approved options.

Team selection

Choosing sides inside a game whose rules you did not write.

Vote-as-consent

Participation reframed as endorsement of the entire system.

Illusion of dissent

Sanctioned disagreement that never touches the actual mechanism.

Consensus Engineering

5 tactics

Perceived agreement, manufactured on purpose.

Consensus as proof

Treats perceived agreement as evidence of truth.

Repetition-as-truth

Familiarity mistaken for correctness.

Manufactured majority

Amplifying a minority position until it appears mainstream.

Marginalization of dissent

Dissent recoded as fringe, dangerous, or unwell.

Sanctioned voices

The narrow set of speakers permitted to represent all sides.

Authority & Scientism

7 tactics

The costumes authority wears in the modern era.

Appeal to authority

Substitutes credentials for evidence.

Sacred science

Treats an institution as beyond questioning.

Consensus science

Confuses institutional agreement with the scientific method.

Data theater

Numbers used as ritual rather than as inquiry.

Credential shield

Uses titles to place a claim outside the space where it can be examined.

Pseudoscience performance

The visual grammar of rigor with none of its constraints.

Deference pressure

Frames skepticism as disrespect.

Language

5 tactics

Words that do work while pretending to describe.

Loaded language

Judgment smuggled in as description.

Euphemism

Softens harm by renaming it.

Thought-stopping phrases

Ready-made phrases that end thinking instead of guiding it.

Semantic inversion

Words used to mean their opposite.

In-group vocabulary

Specialized language that signals belonging and closes the frame to outsiders.

Logic Distortion

5 tactics

Reasoning shaped to reach a predetermined door.

Straw man

Argues against a weaker version of the opposing view.

Slippery slope

Extrapolates a small step to catastrophe without evidence.

Moving goalposts

Shifts the criteria for acceptance whenever they are met.

Whataboutism

Deflects scrutiny by pointing at another target.

Category smuggling

Treats two different things as if they were the same to inherit the emotion of one.

Identity & Social Control

7 tactics

Belief fused with selfhood so disagreement feels like attack.

Identity fusion

Merges belief with selfhood.

Loyalty pressure

Frames dissent as betrayal of the tribe.

Purity testing

Demands ever-narrower conformity to prove belonging.

Shaming

Uses social pain to enforce agreement.

Demonizing dissent

Frames disagreement as danger.

Making examples

Punishes visible dissenters to enforce silence.

Self-policing

Trains the audience to enforce compliance on each other.

Inversion

6 tactics

The mask that becomes the face.

Control framed as freedom

Restriction dressed as liberation.

Censorship framed as safety

Silencing dressed as protection.

Obedience framed as virtue

Submission dressed as morality.

Dependency framed as care

Fragility dressed as compassion.

Aggression framed as defense

Attack dressed as protection of the vulnerable.

Uniformity framed as diversity

Sameness dressed as pluralism.

Projection & Deflection

5 tactics

The accusation is often a confession.

Preemptive accusation

Naming the opponent as the thing you are doing to inoculate against exposure.

Attention hijack

Introducing a louder story to move eyes off the original one.

Blame reversal

Casting the target as the aggressor.

Moral outsourcing

Assigning your responsibility to someone else's failure.

Whistleblower flip

Recoding the person exposing the pattern as the person causing the harm.

Fatalism

5 tactics

Agency disabled without needing to be censored.

Inevitability framing

Treats an outcome as decided so opposition feels pointless.

Learned powerlessness

Repeats "nothing can be done" until the audience believes it.

Cynicism as maturity

Recodes surrender as sophistication.

Overwhelm flood

Buries the audience in problems so no single one can be acted on.

Complexity shield

Uses scale and detail to make participation feel unqualified.

Salesman Quadrant

5 tactics

The four postures of persuasion — how belief is moved.

Conviction posture

Certainty performed so strongly that doubt feels embarrassing.

Pressure posture

Time, scarcity, and consequence used to force a decision.

Seduction posture

Belonging, aspiration, and identity offered as the real product.

Authority posture

Position and credential used to make the pitch feel non-optional.

Objection reframing

Turning your resistance into evidence that you need the offer more.

Archetype Performance

6 tactics

The role the speaker is performing — often not the role they claim.

Savior

Positions the speaker as the necessary rescuer of an audience it also frightens.

Fear Merchant

Sells relief from a threat it is helping to amplify.

Ideological Guardian

Defends the boundary of acceptable belief against "contamination."

Martyr

Uses visible suffering as unfalsifiable proof of virtue.

Insider

Grants forbidden knowledge as a bond with the audience.

Sage

Elevates the speaker above the arena so their claims are read as neutral truth.

Belief & Spiritual Framing

5 tactics

Sacred language used to place a claim beyond examination.

Sacred framing

Wraps a position in reverence so scrutiny feels like sacrilege.

Cosmic stakes

Elevates a mundane conflict to a battle of good and evil.

Prophetic voice

Speaks in tones of inevitability and revelation to preempt debate.

Enemy anointing

Names the opponent as spiritually corrupt to disqualify their argument.

Scriptural weaponization

Uses selected passages to justify what the whole text does not require.

Pattern Mastery Sequence

8 tactics

The exit path. Not a tactic to detect — a practice to run.

See

Notice that something is happening at all.

Recognize

Name the specific mechanism operating.

Understand

Grasp why it works on human minds, including yours.

Separate

Create distance between the mechanism and your response to it.

Interrupt

Refuse to complete the loop the mechanism is asking you to complete.

Choose

Select a response that comes from you, not from the frame.

Repattern

Replace the reflex with a practice.

Embody

Live the new pattern until it becomes the default.