Common Assumptions in Western Stories

Stories matter quite a bit. I think the many people, myself included growing up, get more training data from the stories we watch than from life itself. TV shows. Movies. Books. Etc… See the same pattern repeated a hundred times and it starts to seep into your unconscious and become a kind of grounding belief about the world.

What are some common underlying assumptions/tropes of fiction in the west? A few interesting ones.

1: Populism/average-joe-ism Our culture is a democratic one. This is true of government and many of the deep ideological beliefs most people hold. It’s also true of the market. Stories are successful if lots of people watch them. A story which paints the majority in a bad light is one the majority is unlikely to enjoy and hence watch.

Most stories do a few things.

• They portray the public/majority as fundamentally good anting the right thing. They may be misled by demagogues, lied to or overwhelmed by emotion but ultimately the people either are or would be on the side of the protagonist if fully informed. They never portray self-interested, immoral or ignorant mass movements.
• They portray heroes/protagonists/elites as fundamentally similar to average people. In reality the average hero, especially the ones who make a real difference (e.g: Vannevar Bush), are a cut above the rest. Much smarter. Much more conscientious. Etc… In films heroes are often relatable.

2: Tradeoff Denial Tradeoffs don’t exist. The heroes are good because they refuse to do bad things. If there is a trade-off, then doing the deontically right thing will magically lead to the best consequential outcome too.

3: Systems thinking They ignore systems and incentives and instead tell stories of individual triumph. Looking at movies about WW2 you would have no idea why the allies won or lost. The hero is always the low-level soldier, not the bureaucrat.

4: Individualism/childlessness Most main characters don’t have families or children. Most are single.

Another thought. Most books are written by individuals, although authors always tap into the collective zeitgeist of their time. Most shows are made by large groups and many writers. I think this is one reason why shows tend to vary much less in their presentation of the world, and in the range of moral and empirical skews they’re likely to exhibit, than books. If 1% of authors have strange views, or are brave enough to challenge society, then roughly 1% of books are likely to be strange or unconventional. If a show is made by 10 writers, even assuming an equal % of outside-box writers the change of a show having a majority of writers being outside-of-box is miniscule. (All of this is speculation, likely that teams of writers are not randomly selected)