Tag: Storytelling
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Prisoners Of The Box
TV must’ve seen us coming. There were people who thought – as TV first sparked into being – that TV could never replace radio. That was shortsighted to be kind. And it was said by people who’d been alive while movies were invented and then spread across the planet as the most successful way to […]
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The News Media’s Failure Of Imagination Is Killing Our Democracy
How long did it take the news media – a profession built in theory upon the collection of facts – to decide that a man who lied to them every single day was a liar? By lie number three, any reasonable person would have begun to see a pattern. By lie number ten, that pattern […]
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The Terrible Truth Is: Donald Trump Knows Us Better Than We Know Ourselves
Let me be clear first: with one profound exception, Donald J Trump doesn’t “know” anything! His bloated, orange treason-head is utterly devoid of coherent thought beyond how to keep filling his greedy maw. All that cobwebby space between Trump’s ears and beneath that awful haircut is filled nearly to bursting with one piece of absolute […]
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The Reason All Republican Arguments Sound Like Bullsh*t Is Because That’s What They Are
No one ever does anything “just because”. Trust me on this. It’s something storytellers know about human nature because we have to draw on human nature to create believable characters that ring true both inside and out. What’s worse than a character you’ve come to love who suddenly acts “out of character” — not because […]
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January 6 Is What Happens When People Believe “Made Up Stories” Are True
According to an Ipsos Poll taken at the end of December 2020, (based on a “knowledge test” where respondents were given 10 true or false statements about historical events), 83% of Americans do not believe that “a group of Satan-worshipping elites who run a child sex ring are trying to control our politics and media”. […]
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Bad Things Often Happen When People Show Up Because They Believed “A Story”
Storytelling can be like a super power. Take Donald Trump telling a mob of racist, bigoted followers that the election was stolen from them. That’s a story. Pure fiction. And yet, a fiction propelled that mob into deadly action. Seditionist, treasonous action. If Trump — after setting the mob in motion — had suddenly chuckled […]
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If You Want To Know What Donald Trump Will Do Next, You Have To Think Like A Criminal
Here’s a basic storytelling rule of thumb: good people behave like good people and criminals behave like criminals. That’s how storytellers signal to their audience that the story they’re telling takes place in a world we all recognize. Now — if it’s a good story, the good people may turn out to be criminals and […]
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Scrunch Or Fold: Is How You Wipe Who You Are? If So, I Bet Donald Trump Scrunches
I hope it’s not too personal a question. Or too political a question. Scrunching v folding is like body language. It’s you inadvertently giving away too much information. Bad for you, good for anyone who wants to know what you’re really thinking. Each unintended grimace, grin or smirk tells us something — And then there’s […]
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Dear American News Media: YOU Will Be The Problem Until YOU Stop Being It
When your job is to tell our story in real time, as it’s happening, it’s vital that you know how to frame that story — in real time. If you screw up the framing, you’ll end up telling the wrong story. Our news media can’t ever get the Donald Trump story right because they insist […]
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