Story #1: It has been a dark and fearful season in exile, but one hero has the guts to fight back against the forces of evil. This noble warrior now addresses his adoring followers before what may be his last battle ever. While the guards are enthralled by the warrior’s speech, an enemy spy sneaks past them and climbs the tall tower overlooking the gathering. Shots ring out, and the warrior falls to his knees. Vengeful supporters slay the spy. A breathless moment passes. Thankfully, our hero is only wounded. He stands bloody but defiant, wrapped in the flag, his giant gonads flapping in the wind. He raises a fist to the sky in triumph.
Story #2: There has been peace in the land for years, but now a powerful villain has risen again. He addresses his followers, a gamy barbarian horde, to announce his plans to invade and usurp power. A lone, scruffy outcast with nothing to lose uses trickery to get past the villain’s scowling guards, and climbs to the top of a tall tower overlooking the seething, monstrous mass. He has one shot, and one shot only, at stopping the forces of evil before it’s too late. He misses. The villain’s cackling followers overtake him and mash him into a sticky pink goo.
If you’re reading this, the wet meatball between your ears has likely already selected one of the two stories above, or something like it, to explain the attempted assassination of Donald Trump. In the book The Science of Storytelling, author Will Storr explains:
We experience our day-to-day lives in story mode. The…
