Commentary

Can Stories Make Us Better?

In writing this column, I often put ideas on the shelf for a while. Sometimes, world events conspire to make one of these shelved ideas suddenly relevant. That happened this past weekend.

The idea that caught my eye some months ago was an article that explored whether robots could learn morality by reading stories. On the face of it, it was mildly intriguing. But early Sunday morning, as the heartbreaking news filtered to me from Orlando, a deeper connection emerged.

We've discussed unintended consequence before. Among such consequences: the media amplification of acts of terror. The staggeringly sad fact is that shocking casualty numbers have their own media value. And that's a new reality we have to come to terms with, according to one analyst who was commenting on ways to deal with terrorism.

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When we in the media business make stories newsworthy, we assign worth not just for news consumers, but also to newsmakers: those troubled individuals who have the motivation and the means to blow apart the daily news cycle.

This same analyst made the point that you can’t prevent lone acts of terrorism. The only answer is to leverage that same network of cultural connections we use to amplify catastrophic events to create an environment that dampens rather than intensifies violent impulse.

We in the media and advertising industries have to use our considerable skills in setting cultural contexts to create an environment that reduces the odds of a violent outcome. Sadly, this is a game of odds. There are no absolute answers here; there is just a statistical lowering of the curve. Sometimes, despite our best efforts, the unimaginable still happens.

But how do we use the tools at our disposal to amplify morality? Here, perhaps, the story I shelved some months ago can provide some clues.

In a study from Georgia Tech, Mark Riedl and Brent Harrison used stories as models of acceptable morality. For most of human history, popular culture included at least an element of moral code. We encoded the values we held most dear into our stories. It provided a base for acceptable behavior, either through positive reinforcement of commonly understood virtues (prudence, justice, temperance, courage, faith, hope and charity) or warnings about universal vices (lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride). Sometimes these stories had religious foundations, sometimes they were secular morality fables, but they all served the same purpose: They taught us what was acceptable behavior.

Stories were never originally intended to entertain. They were created to pass along knowledge and cultural wisdom. Entertainment came when we discovered the more entertaining the story, the more effective it was at its primary purpose: education.

And this is how the researchers used stories. Robots can’t be entertained, but they can be educated.

At some point in the last century, we focused on the entertainment value of stories over education and, in doing so, rotated our moral compass 180 degrees. If you look at what is most likely to titillate, sin almost always trumps sainthood. Review that list of virtues and vices and you’ll see that the stories of our current popular culture focus on vice. That list could be the programming handbook for any Hollywood producer. 

I don’t intend this as a sermon. I enjoy "Game of Thrones" as much as the next person. I simply state it as a fact. Our popular culture -- and the amplification that comes from it -- is focused almost exclusively on the worst aspects of human nature. If robots were receiving their behavioral instruction through these stories, they would be programmed to be psychopathic, amoral degenerates.

For most of us, we can absorb this continual stream of antisocial programming and not be affected by it. We still know what's right and wrong. But in a world where it’s the “black swan” outliers that grab the news headlines, we have to think about the consequences that reach beyond the mainstream.  When we abandon the moral purpose of stories and focus just on their entertainment aspect, are we also abandoning a commonly understood value landscape?

If you’re looking for absolute answers, you won’t find them here. That’s just not the world we live in. And am I naïve when I say the stories we chose to tell may have an influence on isolated violent events like what happened in Orlando? Perhaps. Despite all our best intentions, Omar Mateen might still have gone horribly offside.

But all things and all people are, to some extent, products of their environment. And because we in media and advertising are storytellers, we set that cultural environment. That’s our job. Because of this, I believe we have a moral obligation. We have to start paying more attention to the stories we tell.

2 comments about "Can Stories Make Us Better?".
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  1. Ken Kurtz from creative license, June 14, 2016 at 12:16 p.m.

    Hah. Kind of funny, really.

    You write...

    But all things and all people are, to some extent, products of their environment. And because we in media and advertising are storytellers, we set that cultural environment. That’s our job. Because of this, I believe we have a moral obligation. We have to start paying more attention to the stories we tell.

    I've spent many years in media/advertising. Hearst, Washinton Post/Newsweek, Time Inc. Clear as a bell that "moral obligation" ends where "loss of eyeballs" and profits begins.

  2. Kenneth Hittel from Ken Hittel, June 14, 2016 at 2:52 p.m.

    As always, a thoughtful piece. Thank you for: "you can’t prevent lone acts of terrorism. The only answer is to leverage that same network of cultural connections we use to amplify catastrophic events to create an environment that dampens rather than intensifies violent impulse."
    And, do we all are, regardless of occupation, share a "moral obligation?" when we speak publicly? Yes, pray that we recognize such.
    [As for robots? Well, Isaac Asimov spelled that out out decently- (morally well-enough) years ago. That he should have done it in a nine-page page essay rather than in a turgid novel is another story.]

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