For the Culture

stories help establish new cultural frames that change the way we (and others like us) see others and how we, collectively, behave in the world.

Imagine if we told stories that helped delegitimate the parts of society that tend to disproportionately impact marginalized communities, like police brutality on Black bodies, equal pay for women, ending Asian hate, fairer voting policies, and so on, and so on, and so on. The impact would be significant.

To navigate the nebulousness of ethics, which is inherently gray, I try to consider three factors: (1) my intentions, (2) the perspective of others, and (3) the potential outcomes.

It’s through stories that we preach the gospel to the congregation—the collection of people who see the world the way we do. For this reason alone, we bear a great responsibility when we use storytelling as a vessel to preach the gospel.

The stories we tell—that is, the folklore we propagate—frame the way we see the world and how we show up in the world.

the more we hear a story, the more we accept it, the more we prefer it, and the more likely it is to get people to move.

In many ways, the act of storytelling is really an act of community building, a vehicle for sharing the social facts of the community—the shared beliefs, meaningful artifacts, behavioral norms, and coded language.

Stories are the way we interpret and socialize the cultural facts of the community.

Before I decide to purchase a product on Amazon, I look to see what other people (complete strangers, by the way) think about the product to make sure I’m making the right choice. We rely on people.