After my rather diverse experiences from psychotherapy and with some distance to those experiences I find much of the psychodynamic therapy to be manipulative.

I foremost talk about the "blank slate" therapists whose basis for therapy is to foster transference. The transference concept, when the therapist specifically constructs therapy around it, is nothing but manipulative. Transference can happen in any relationship and spontaneously and a client could fall in love or hate with a therapist even if the therapist don´t foster the concept.

But that´s not what I talk about. I talk about those therapists who in a conscious way act differently from what´s seen as "normal" courtesy and "normal" interaction between two people.

I talk about those therapists, I´ve met those myself, who for example

Never smile when greeting a client
Starts and stops sessions at the very minute
Don´t answer to any kind of questions about themselves
Refuse to share simple things about the weather or similar

Then they defend all this by telling the client it means "good boundaries" or that it´s for the client´s own good. They wait for their client´s reaction just to be able to "interpret" it. Well if it was just "good boundaries", then so many clients hadn´t went to forums like PC and others and talked about all those "problems" with transference.

I feel sorry for clients who "feel in love" with their therapist and long for validation but that validation won´t be there as that would be to act contrary to their theoretic belief. To put a kind word to something would for them be like "ripping the earth".

I see so much harm in therapy after reading about it for years and I can´t see this type of therapy is anything but manipulative to the client. I hate everyone of them who caused me harm and I´m sad when reading about others who experience similar things.