REFUSING THE SCRIPT # 3
REFUSING THE SCRIPT # 1 > Even when a message is persuasive or popular, we should think twice about buying in. Politicians, sociologists, and marketing executives all know this fact: We're taught to live by scripts__stories we are fed that seek to prescribe the truth about our lives. For example, a global telecommunications company has engineered an entire advertising campaign around the prevailing myth that "bigger is always better." And certain versions of the American Dream provide a prevalent narrative: To be content, we must secure a house, car, and lucrative job . . . and then secure a large house, a shinier car, and even more lucrative job. Another common script insists we must exert great energy, under threat of calamity, to hold on to our life. # 2 > This storyline conveys that it's necessary to secure our own happiness and vigilantly protect our well-being against anyone we view as a threat. We fear those of a different ethnicity, political p...