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Manipulation can result in a short term gain–you do what I want you to do. The problem with manipulation is the long-term effects. People aren’t stupid, not forever. If I manipulate you, you end up trusting me less. If we are in an important relationship, this lack of trust is costly. That’s the utilitarian argument against manipulation–it’s too expensive. An additional cost of manipulation is the personal cost–make a habit of manipulation and you come to see other people as objects instead of people. Since they stubbornly remain people, the gap between perception and reality is a significant overhead. Or you can rely on morality, that manipulation is simply wrong. This has the advantage that when you are tempted to manipulate, there is no short-/long-term tradeoff to tempt you.