WL#3: Everyone's Story is Different- the Problem with Assumption
No two people are the same, that seems like a given. As writers, have you ever let this basic truth slide? I know that there are tropes in television writing where there is demonstrably some slide. For example, something I have seen written into show upon show, in all media across the board actually, serial killers had abusive childhoods or, as the trope tends to suggest, in about 98% of all cases, they are abused and they are foster kids. Double the whammy.
If they’re foster kids, they don’t even necessarily have to have experienced abuse, just being a foster kid means you’re probably a serial killer. I can say as a child who had all of that wonder growing up, I never became a serial killer, but I can kill some cereal, a nice berry granola with some almond milk and I’m good. There is the fact that I’m a bit cynical and too honest for the likes of some, but I’m no killer, I’m not even a mean person in a general way. I have literally given someone the shoes off my feet, and that was only a few months ago.
That example gets me in a twist though, what if, in the case of serial killers, because kids who are abused or fostered are usually from a lower income status they simply don’t have the resources and money to get away with it? What if most serial killers just haven’t been caught because they have those resources? Just a thought. The point is, No two stories are alike. Take two serial killers, just because they like to kill, doesn’t mean they’re alike. Charles Manson was nothing at all like Jeffrey Dahmer and neither were like John Wayne Gacey.
When I was in boot camp in Parris Island South Carolina none of us were alike but we had all made this really big decision to join the USMC. At the tail end of the 80’s, it wasn’t nearly as popular a choice as it is now, especially for girls. In a situation where the goal of the DI’s is to break you down, it’s really fascinating what people will do to adhere to what must be done while still being themselves. If you do it right, at the end of boot camp, the old you has been broken down and replaced by a better version of you. Still you, just better, and if you’ve done it really, really right, the pattern continues throughout life.
It’s a fact that people can be in or grow up in the same circumstances, go through the same challenges, and still react differently to said challenges and become totally different people. One person might learn from a thing that you attack first and ask questions later, another person in the exact same place and time going through the same thing might learn that it’s best to just watch and listen. One person, just one, represents tens of thousands of variables, add in other elements and there are too many variables in any given situation to create people who are all the same, other than in a group that has achieved mob mentality.
Think about your siblings, if you have any, are they just like you? Do you share the same views on everything? I mean, you grew up in the same house, same parents, same school, same family and yet, vastly different, right? I see in actual culture, real life, not fiction, how people make the mistake of judging entire groups of people based on one commonality. All Americans are fat and happy and ignorant of struggle, for example, simply not true. Everyone in Africa is starving and uneducated, also not true. Everyone from England is a condescending snob with a superiority complex, again, not true. Those are the macrocosm; it’s the microcosmic manifestation of this habit, with people hurting one another as individuals, that’s made it sad.
Snap judgments, lack of communications that could otherwise create clarity and not accepting accountability, those are the current habits of culture. Most people have had someone take an innocent comment they made online totally out of context and overreact to it at this point. What’s sad about it is that it’s usually done by someone who is limiting their own experience in the doing of it. The only way to really know what motivates a person is to ask them and usually the actual story is far more interesting than the assumptions, unfortunately, they’ll never know.
It’s been said by many famous writers in one way or another, that the purpose of the writer is to improve lives and change the world, macro or micro, for the better. Wouldn’t it be great if we could write out some of the bad habits culture has picked up? Maybe as writers, we can change things for the better by writing characters who can overcome similarities and bond over differences just as easily as they can overcome differences and bond over similarities, balance is a key factor here. One big first step is going to be to come to an understanding that no two people have the same motivations.
As writers we get to decide what the motivations of our characters are, that makes it a lot easier than in the real world where people either don’t ask and don’t assume or worse, go straight to assumption. I just want to reiterate here how much that limits ones experience. Then again, I was in the USMC and when I got out I went on dead tour. I was also with the carnival, among other things. Had I been the assumptive type, I may have never met some of the most fascinating characters in my life.
If they’re foster kids, they don’t even necessarily have to have experienced abuse, just being a foster kid means you’re probably a serial killer. I can say as a child who had all of that wonder growing up, I never became a serial killer, but I can kill some cereal, a nice berry granola with some almond milk and I’m good. There is the fact that I’m a bit cynical and too honest for the likes of some, but I’m no killer, I’m not even a mean person in a general way. I have literally given someone the shoes off my feet, and that was only a few months ago.
That example gets me in a twist though, what if, in the case of serial killers, because kids who are abused or fostered are usually from a lower income status they simply don’t have the resources and money to get away with it? What if most serial killers just haven’t been caught because they have those resources? Just a thought. The point is, No two stories are alike. Take two serial killers, just because they like to kill, doesn’t mean they’re alike. Charles Manson was nothing at all like Jeffrey Dahmer and neither were like John Wayne Gacey.
When I was in boot camp in Parris Island South Carolina none of us were alike but we had all made this really big decision to join the USMC. At the tail end of the 80’s, it wasn’t nearly as popular a choice as it is now, especially for girls. In a situation where the goal of the DI’s is to break you down, it’s really fascinating what people will do to adhere to what must be done while still being themselves. If you do it right, at the end of boot camp, the old you has been broken down and replaced by a better version of you. Still you, just better, and if you’ve done it really, really right, the pattern continues throughout life.
It’s a fact that people can be in or grow up in the same circumstances, go through the same challenges, and still react differently to said challenges and become totally different people. One person might learn from a thing that you attack first and ask questions later, another person in the exact same place and time going through the same thing might learn that it’s best to just watch and listen. One person, just one, represents tens of thousands of variables, add in other elements and there are too many variables in any given situation to create people who are all the same, other than in a group that has achieved mob mentality.
Think about your siblings, if you have any, are they just like you? Do you share the same views on everything? I mean, you grew up in the same house, same parents, same school, same family and yet, vastly different, right? I see in actual culture, real life, not fiction, how people make the mistake of judging entire groups of people based on one commonality. All Americans are fat and happy and ignorant of struggle, for example, simply not true. Everyone in Africa is starving and uneducated, also not true. Everyone from England is a condescending snob with a superiority complex, again, not true. Those are the macrocosm; it’s the microcosmic manifestation of this habit, with people hurting one another as individuals, that’s made it sad.
Snap judgments, lack of communications that could otherwise create clarity and not accepting accountability, those are the current habits of culture. Most people have had someone take an innocent comment they made online totally out of context and overreact to it at this point. What’s sad about it is that it’s usually done by someone who is limiting their own experience in the doing of it. The only way to really know what motivates a person is to ask them and usually the actual story is far more interesting than the assumptions, unfortunately, they’ll never know.
It’s been said by many famous writers in one way or another, that the purpose of the writer is to improve lives and change the world, macro or micro, for the better. Wouldn’t it be great if we could write out some of the bad habits culture has picked up? Maybe as writers, we can change things for the better by writing characters who can overcome similarities and bond over differences just as easily as they can overcome differences and bond over similarities, balance is a key factor here. One big first step is going to be to come to an understanding that no two people have the same motivations.
As writers we get to decide what the motivations of our characters are, that makes it a lot easier than in the real world where people either don’t ask and don’t assume or worse, go straight to assumption. I just want to reiterate here how much that limits ones experience. Then again, I was in the USMC and when I got out I went on dead tour. I was also with the carnival, among other things. Had I been the assumptive type, I may have never met some of the most fascinating characters in my life.