How to write when the world feels dark and cold and sad

Some are harnessing storytelling for evil. We can't let them win.

Decades ago, a loved one sent out one of those chain-letter mass forwards about asylum-seekers somewhere doing something that made them the “bad” kind of immigrants, unwilling to “Americanize” themselves.

I don’t remember the details now, but at the time, I fact-checked the story and replied with the Snopes.com article debunking the claim. I thought that would be the end of it: Lie, meet truth.

Instead, the loved one was undeterred: “I don’t care about the specifics of this one group in this one city,” they replied. “The point remains.” I was flabbergasted. The bogus story felt true, so they bought into it even though they knew it was false. Wow, I thought—the power of vibes.

Not sure why this came up when I searched for “telling lies,” but this cat’s human is probably upset about the state of the world too. (Photo by Cong H)

Now, my expectation that facts would trump BS feels quaint. Steam poured out of my ears when JD Vance said, “If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do.” People are coming into our storytelling sandbox to push narratives that hurt people. The world feels stressful, cruel, absurd. How can creators like ourselves be expected to write under those conditions?

This week, though, I came across the exact answer I needed to see.