Dancing With Absurdity

Pioneering Stories from the Edge of Reality

People who grew up in the 90s remember how our media seemed fake by today’s standards, but our lives felt more real. Perhaps the confluence of artificial conveniences and the proliferation of information, which exposed so much cloak-and-dagger propaganda, scandals, and outright fantasies disguised as truth, has driven us to demand honesty in our media, given how fake our lives feel right now. That’s why, as a writer, the most important thing you can do is offer raw authenticity—something fresh, meaningful, and memorable.

Duh. That’s kinda the whole point of being a writer. But, if it’s obvious, why are we still oversaturated with formulaic content? Yes, yes, I know. Many great movies and books exist, but junk often outweighs the gold across the market. So why is that?

Well, it’s easier to make the stuff that works and can net you a return on your investment. Most movies need funding, and big studios are obsessed with minimizing risk, which leads to more “junk food” than “real food".

But there’s good news. Everything’s imploding! Okay, that’s bad news. But there’s a hidden opportunity here. While others scramble to predict the future, you should tap into the noise and shape something that stands out. Now is the perfect opportunity to experiment and write completely different stories from your usual work. But to do it well, it needs to resonate with others, and that comes from the truth.

However, the truth is messy, multifaceted, and contradictory. That’s why academics rarely agree and why navigating through it is difficult. But this is the source of all the changes we see around us. You can consume it through non-fiction. Scientific discoveries, historical books, real-time media, personal accounts, and cutting-edge studies shape how we understand and navigate the world. So if you’re really trying to get a pulse on things to heighten how your story resonates with others, you gotta immerse yourself in that stuff, even if some of it is total bullshit.

The point isn’t to gain one singular truth. It’s about understanding reality in both its logic and absurdity. So yes, it will take you down rabbit holes. And no, you should not live by everything you read about that claims to be true. That’s how you wind up drinking silver and turning your skin blue. However, as a writer, it is important to get a sense of the cultural zeitgeist of this moment, which includes the “really out there” stuff.

That should be explored and conveyed in our storytelling, too. So, I’d like to dedicate this blog to highlighting some of the things I’ve come across while exploring the absurdity. These areas provide rich material for fresh takes on old genres.

Fair warning. In no way have I validated any of these claims, nor am I trying to convey them as facts. These are merely topics that I’d consider to be unconfirmed non-fiction. Take this as inspiration to guide you to places few have explored—either because they didn’t read the literature or started to, rolled their eyes, and walked away before finishing. Well, right now…We’re gonna try to go the whole way. So as Samuel Jackson once said in Jurassic Park, “Hold onto your butts.”

UFOs

Remember Independence Day with Will Smith? Or what about the classic War of the Worlds story? Yeah, those aren’t accurate reflections of how an alien encounter would unfold. Consider an advanced species visiting our planet in a universe they’ve mastered. They’d already have everything they need, making our planet more of a curiosity than a necessity. Trying to wipe us out would be both cruel and nonsensical. If they were here, it would likely be to study us…And possibly influence us covertly so that we could be used for their agenda, now and/or in the future. Here’s my reasoning.

The universe is huge, and even if advanced civilizations could zap over here, it would still take time and energy. To think that they’d come to selflessly shepherd us into a Galactic Federation like we’re equals…Eh. Maybe it’s because my understanding of nature comes from being human, but that’s a hard pill to swallow.

If aliens were here, they’d be here for selfish reasons, which means we’d likely be a zoo for their scientists. Or perhaps we’d be part of a long-term cultivation project meant to steer us in a direction that benefits them. Either way, they’d stay hidden rather than land on the White House lawn. If they showed up like Christopher Columbus, well…We all know how that turned out. And if we know that, then so would they, which means there wouldn't be any direct visitation.

But it would make sense to slowly reveal themselves if we advanced far enough intellectually to detect traces of their presence. With nowhere to hide, they’d want to try to control our perception of the situation and their purpose. Look, I know these are massive assumptions, but this is the 'real' UFO lore, and it sounds far more believable than most movie depictions. The whistleblower testimonies actually unfold more like a Cold War spy thriller than a sci-fi narrative.

Now, this will get wacky, but I’m just the messenger—so don’t shoot me! Apparently, there’s a secret network operating within private aerospace, defense contractors, and the national security state. They've been running a highly compartmentalized effort to retrieve crashed UFOs and reverse engineer the technology to harness gravitic propulsion—and possibly other advanced systems. And within that world, there’s a whole lot of espionage, blackmail, murder, kidnapping, drug running, and God knows what else.

Oh, and I forgot the best part. They have psionic specialists who can psychically get these egg-shaped UFOs to land. But they also have technology to bring them down. This is insane, and I haven’t even gotten to the craziest parts. The real juicy stuff is on the forums where people talk about factions of aliens all vying to influence and drive our future.

In fact, these aliens aren’t from another universe. They’re 5th-dimensional beings creating avatars and biological androids to interact in our space. And as such, they can see everything and gain access to all aspects of the fourth-dimensional space, including our thoughts, which they could use to inspire us to form a global hive mind through a quantum internet, which conveniently would make us easier to control. They can also make us hallucinate.

So all those angels, demons, trolls, goblins, and fairies from history might have been alien encounters inducing hallucinations to disguise their true appearances. One lesser-known story from history involves George Washington at Valley Forge, where he and his men were starving, freezing, and nearly hopeless. Washington was on the verge of giving up when, one night, while wandering the woods, he encountered a glowing ball of light. He described it as an angel who told him to charge forward because he would win. Now, was it an angel or one of those plasma balls of light seen online?

Or was it totally made up to romanticize the war well after it happened? I don’t know, but it’s interesting to see alien lore weave into religion to explain the impossible through a scientific lens. Saying an angel appeared and told him he’d win the war is ridiculous. Saying a 5th-dimensional being appeared is still far-fetched, but it makes slightly more sense from a scientific view.

And that feeds into the mother of all conspiracies. If we assume this is real, then one possibility is that we’re being herded by them. Some of these aliens may live among us, acting as agents to shepherd humanity toward their desired future. And who do you think would be the best candidate for that job? The elites, of course. They’re the ones who influence the narrative, right? They’re the powerbrokers who make it all happen. So, what if some among the wealthy and powerful are actually biologically engineered agents working for an advanced alien race?

Granted, I don’t believe that. But wow, that would be insane, especially in a story, which is why it shocks me that most of the alien flicks don’t do justice to this subject. Yes, there was V and the recent Three-Body Problem, which is amazing! Then there are some of the classics that touched on the real lore like Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind or Communion. Of course, I can’t forget to mention The 4th Kind and The Arrival with Charlie Sheen, which ultimately proved that he does, in fact, have tiger blood coursing through his veins.

But far too many alien movies depict big, scary monsters invading. This seems odd for an advanced species. So why are they portrayed as violent primitives? Wouldn’t it be more compelling to depict them as calculated explorers or colonizers, similar to figures like Christopher Columbus? The European invasion and conquests were horrific but also complicated and deep.

That’s what we should be seeing in our alien content, right? I’m not a UFO fanatic calling my Congressmen demanding they expose the truth—though I would like to know more about the origins and legitimacy of these sightings and reports. That said, I’m agnostic and unsure what to believe. I’m just trying to point out that when you attempt something without looking into the nonfictional component, you create dull content.

Most UFO stories could be far better if writers took the time to explore the extensive body of research, government reports, and firsthand accounts that already exist—fascinating material in its own right, like the Phoenix Lights Incident or the Rendlesham Air Force Base incursion. Then, there are the strange cattle mutilations that can't be explained. We’re also seeing growing concern from Congress, who appear to be taking this seriously. Additionally, many credible people are coming forward, including Karl Knell, the former VP and GM of UNSCO—a major defense contracting firm—and Dr. Gary Nolan, a Harvard doctor who is researching side effects reported by individuals who claim to have had close encounters with unidentified aerial phenomena.

It’s wild how this topic is slowly shifting into the mainstream, and the lore I’ve been reading has clearly evolved to a point where it’s ripe for someone to create a truly memorable alien movie that could reinvent the genre—just saying. You don’t have to believe in the stuff to use it in storytelling, as it would make you stand out with a fresh, thought-provoking angle that grabs attention.

Repurposed Ideas About Reality

I touched on this in a previous blog, but a prevailing idea is gaining renewed attention in academic and philosophical circles: the possibility that our universe is a simulation. And before you dismiss it, know there are compelling arguments to support this.

Let’s look at Nick Bostrom’s simulation argument. He posits that if we can create realistic virtual environments, then it’s probable that we are already living in one. Consider the implications. If future civilizations develop the technology to run countless simulations of their ancestors, the number of simulated realities would vastly outnumber the one original world. So, the likelihood of being an original human drops significantly.

Given today’s simulations and video games, it’s easy to imagine we’ll get there. But, it’s also easy to assume this will be impossible, given the sheer amount of energy needed to run such a simulation. That is, until you consider the double-slit experiment.

This experiment involves firing electrons or other subatomic particles at a barrier with two slits and observing how they behave on a screen behind it. When not observed, the electrons create an interference pattern, acting like waves. But when observed, they act like distinct particles, hitting specific points. This baffling change based on observation has fascinated scientists for decades and mirrors how video games save power by rendering only what's visible, leaving everything else in background data until needed.

The double-slit experiment shows that particles display both wavelike and particle-like behavior when not under observation. But the moment it is, the wave/particle collapses into a particle. So it exists in a superimposed state of all possible outcomes until it’s observed, at which point it collapses into a single outcome. It’s hard to wrap your mind around it until you entertain the idea that we’re in a simulation. Perhaps the particle behaves this way because it’s part of the underlying “game world” data that only renders itself when observed.

The simulation theory could also explain physical law constants that define our existence. Like a game, certain mathematical values define how our universe functions. They determine fundamental properties such as the strength of gravity, the speed of light, the electron charge, and the Planck Constant.

But what’s important to note is how fine-tuned those values are. Even a slight variation in them could render the universe uninhabitable. In a way, this is like code in a video game. If the code is off, the game won’t run or will act differently. Are these physical constants essential parts of the code that make up our Universe?

And what about The Big Bang and Cosmic Inflation? One day, what we understand as 'everything'—all matter, energy, space, and time—was compressed into a single, infinitely dense point. Then, everything expanded, forming the universe. One can’t help but compare that to a simulation booting up.

If reality is a simulation, that’s pretty trippy. But it also sheds a new light on things like religion or apparitions, which I find most fascinating and advantageous for storytellers. If we’re in a simulation, it implies a higher reality and a potential afterlife, even if it’s not what we expect. Unless, of course, we’re merely NPCs—non-player characters—functioning within a programmed environment. For the afterlife to be real for us, assuming we’re in a simulation, we would need to be surrogates, attached to a more advanced and real version of ourselves.

There are many compelling arguments for this, though most people view them through a religious lens. Perhaps consciousness and creativity stem from a higher version of ourselves, one with greater access to knowledge given to us in limited ways.

If that’s true, why don’t we have access to the same knowledge as our higher counterparts? Maybe that’s a feature of the simulation. After all, a game becomes far more thrilling when you genuinely believe it’s real. And perhaps reality itself is so perfect that it becomes boring for us. So we immerse ourselves in simulated realities—worlds that feel real enough to evoke true emotion and challenge.

Okay, let’s refocus on the main point. What does all of this mean for writers? These ideas help ground common fantasy elements—such as telekinesis, time travel, or ghosts—in the framework of a simulated reality. If the simulation can be altered or hacked, then phenomena traditionally viewed as supernatural could be interpreted as glitches, hidden features, or deliberate programming within the system. If we are living in a simulation, these phenomena may merge science and religious elements.

I mean, take your average time travel movie. They almost always use machines like Back to the Future or Primer. Great movies, of course. But what if they used chemical-inducing agents instead? If our brains and bodies are surrogates housing our consciousness, then could there be a way to use some kind of drug (or code) to traverse your consciousness through a 5th-dimensional space (the backend code) and into another surrogate in another place and time?

Or what about ghost stories? They’re usually about the dead haunting characters, though some stories like The Sixth Sense offer unique twists. But it would be interesting to see a new angle that marries itself to the simulation hypothesis.

For instance, maybe the ghosts aren’t dead people but entities from a higher-dimensional or external reality—outside the simulation—trying to communicate with the characters. And perhaps the characters aren’t hapless victims but people who went out of their way to communicate with them. Instead of haunting the characters, the ghosts might be persuading them with good intentions. They might want to help humanity by decoding symbols, building a portal device, or spreading a philosophy. But maybe, just maybe, these “ghosts” or beings in another dimension aren’t as innocent as they claim to be and are leading the characters into a horrible tragedy.

Don’t get me wrong. Many great stories are playing with new ideas to explain ghosts or the paranormal, like the movie Moth Man. But too many stories fall in line with clichés like the vengeful spirit, the haunted house, or the cursed object—tropes that often go unexplored beyond their surface-level scares. This is because few writers explore non-fictional content about the paranormal and other phenomena. That’s why you can’t shy away from the crazy stuff; that’s where the best information lies for writers.

New Views on How the Government Works

There was an old movie from the ‘90s called My Fellow Americans. It starred James Garner and Jack Lemmon, who played two feuding former presidents swept into a comedic cat-and-mouse chase after being framed by the corrupt sitting president, played by Dan Aykroyd, for committing financial improprieties. Ultimately, they uncover evidence, confront those responsible, and clear their names by revealing the President’s corrupt dealings to the public. He gets impeached, and everyone lives happily ever after.

Yeeeah, that’s not how it would work. First, no one would bat an eye these days at financial improprieties if you’re in a high position, so there wouldn't be a public outcry (at least a long-standing one that holds water). Second, there’s no way a sitting president would get impeached today for something like that. Granted, it was a hilarious movie, but it no longer reflects the public perception of government.

House of Cards did a MUUUCH better job conveying the darker side of politics. But sadly, it was confined to the Presidency and didn’t offer a more global or interconnected perspective that explored broader systemic issues, like harmful incentives fueled by mixed motives and hubris at the top. It never showed the whole rotting system and how the banality of evil acts on these ill-conceived motives.

Today’s audiences want that holistic complexity to help them understand how we end up in situations like the ones we’re seeing unfold. How can an empire be so blind to its march towards death? That’s the question lingering at the forefront of everyone’s minds.

It’s tempting to blame a group or the face of a political group, but the world isn’t black and white like that. There are varying factions, some good, others selfish, hubristic, and even heroic, all tangled into institutions and interest groups.

These days, most people have a basic understanding of the corruption in this country, such as the “Iron Triangle” relationship between the government and agencies, lobbying groups, and industries. We call it the revolving door in the news headlines, now exploited by factions using media ownership to discredit opponents. Regardless of which side is doing what, too many are engaged in that behavior.

But it’s worse than that. Consider what Tristan Harris brought awareness to a while back regarding this race to the bottom of the brainstem incentives formed within these large social media companies while working at Google as a design ethicist to help pioneer the technology he’s criticizing.

For those who aren’t familiar, his basic message is that platforms use algorithms to provoke fear, anger, and social craving for profit because these tap into our primal emotions, which leads to addiction. And that means more money for them. But without any regulations or oversight surrounding this, who's to say they’re not doing things to shape our perspectives and understanding of the World to drive behavior for other things? Is it more than just trying to make a quick buck? See, what’s frightening isn’t that they are doing this. It’s that they could, and we would never know.

And if we consider the damning revelations brought forth by whistleblowers like Edward Snowden amid widespread fear during this sweeping tech and cultural upheaval, it wouldn’t be all that surprising to find that our government and private technology companies are colluding in some way to shape our behaviors, which provides a lot of clarity on what we’ve been experiencing these past few years.

As soon as Donald Trump got into office back in 2016, the World turned upside down. I’m not a fan or someone who trusts him. But I also found it wildly strange that as soon as that happened, the legacy news media changed overnight, and online platforms that I frequented kept pushing terrifying stories about Trump devastating the U.S.

Online communities that once fostered thoughtful discussions began to devolve, overwhelmed by rage-bait posts meant to derail meaningful conversation. Maybe everyone simply panicked over a reality show host entering the White House. And while, yes, that was certainly shocking, when I look back at everything that’s happened. I don’t know. I can’t help but feel as if that hate was more cultivated than organic.

It was strange that radical groups on opposing extremes burned cities to the ground over grievances they couldn’t fully articulate. Groups of men proud of traditional masculinity clashing with kids steeped in deconstructivist ideology? That was basically what we went through.

And then there was the craziness during the pandemic, where once highly respected doctors were getting completely censored for questioning and criticizing the production of the MRNA vaccines. Yes, they’re a scientific miracle, but did fast-tracking introduce contaminants that triggered a spike in myocarditis and long COVID?

I don’t know, but to me, that’s not what was most concerning. What really threw me for a loop were the ravaging outbursts online whenever you talked about the possibility that the vaccines may have caused side effects. Yes, I get it. We were all on edge back then (and still are). But it didn’t quite add up, especially given the clean pattern I noticed while reflecting on that moment.

When the outbreak occurred, we saw a wave of coverage centered on the fearful elements of the pandemic. It was all real, of course. But most of us witnessed the worst of it online rather than in our everyday lives. So, for most, the fears stemmed from the dread of seeing all that horror rather than experiencing it first hand. And that really shaped our behaviors.

But then, after the dust settled and the vaccines were gearing up to be distributed, the flood of content shifted away from fear and onto anger. It festered into resentment toward one side or the other, blaming them for spreading the disease or undermining our constitution.

The same thing happened when the War in Ukraine broke out. At first, the media was flooded with horrific images of bombings and suffering. Then came the blame, pointing fingers and stoking outrage. It’s almost like someone was deliberately inducing fear and anguish to later channel that into anger toward a particular person or group. It’s as though someone was weaponizing us. I guess Yoda was right when he said, “Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering,” because boy, did we experience a lot of that. We still are.

This seems to work effectively because we’re a herd species, which means we tend to think and act like others around us, and that also applies to online activities. When you go to your favorite spots, all you see are posts and comments that claim x,y,z. Well. Over time, you begin to believe that as well.

So how much of what we believe is our own organically created idea? How many of them are fed to us through these discrete “facts” all over the web? See, that’s how you cultivate a message people will follow. You funnel out various facts and lead the reader to form conclusions on their own. It’s the readers who form the message you want, creating the illusion that the ideas were grown from the bottom. It’s layering deception.

I guess that’s why it drives me a little nuts when I watch political movies and shows that paint an overly optimistic portrayal of our country. You always get the leaders who are charismatic but flawed, and maybe they have to violate the Constitution here and there, but it’s all for noble reasons. Well, here’s the thing about all of that. They’ve been steamrolling over so many laws over the decades that it’s basically common practice as long as the optics are good and you don’t get caught.

This is why I think it’s important that we see more authentic depictions of the political landscape in movies. Show us the real faults. Show us how these types of people can come in and make decisions that take the lives of millions just to scratch the backs of their friends at cocktail parties, all the while pretending none of that ever happened. Tell us how they go about shaping public opinion to effectively render our votes useless. Or how they destroy any politician who becomes too popular with the voters while fully elevating the ones they really want in power.

To me, that’s where the real opportunity in storytelling lies: by listening to the countless whistleblowers and experts within the government explain the mechanisms for how all this can come to pass. I mean, take Civil War, the recent movie about a second American Civil War. It was a really cool movie, but if you notice, they never explained how this unfolded and who was at fault. They just showed the war and focused on the horrors of it, almost like a warning to all of us during a moment when the Country is infuriated and ready to burn the whole place down.

That’s a great message because I don’t know about you, but I don’t want my backyard to be a war zone. And to be fair, they likely did it because it was the safest way to approach this piece during such heated times. But man…It would have been great to see exactly how the situation unfolded, from the power structures at play to the influence and psychological manipulation that convinced enough people to pick up a rifle and shoot someone. I think we would have gotten more out of that.

But, you know. That’s politics. It’s a thing that deliberately tries to make itself elusive so that it never changes. So maybe a little clarity in our stories is exactly what we need, for better and for worse.

Conclusion

Okay, I need to stop, or this will go all over the place. But I hope you get my point: As writers, we shouldn’t box ourselves into “mainstream facts” or “what works.” We shouldn’t just fixate on telling a good story or what will maximize our profits, either. We should be actively driven by curiosity to places we never thought we’d find ourselves in because that is where we will find our greatest work. And the more you immerse yourself in different ideas, the more pronounced and unique your sense of creativity becomes.

Yes, there is a time and place for writing, so don’t get lost in books, media, and experiences for too long. But when you’re not writing, you should be out of your comfort zone, learning new things and sharing new moments with new and familiar people. Without that…Well. All you have is a story. You can write thousands of them, but none will matter if they can’t touch the heart and say something true. Otherwise, it’s just pages.

Anywho, I hope you got a lot out of this, and as always, best of luck in your creative endeavors.

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Story Prism,

storyprism.io