Why Is Liberty Island ‘Ideological’?
By Tom Weiss
ide·ol·o·gy | \ ˌī-dē-ˈä-lə-jē: a manner or the content of thinking characteristic of an individual, group, or culture.
All stories are, on some level, ideological. Countless assumptions about how people should act are hard-wired into every narrative. They have to be, otherwise the story would fail to resonate.
To illustrate the concept, picture an emaciated cat, helpless and stranded on a tree limb high above the ground. Our radiant heroine hears plaintive yowling outside her house, flies out of the front door and, suppressing her innate fear of heights, climbs the tree and saves the cat. You feel good about our heroine, right?
Now reset the scene. This time, our annoyed heroine stomps into the living room, plucks her trusty shotgun from its prominent position above the fireplace, strolls outside, and unloads both barrels into the animal, which drops to the ground with a wet, sickening thud.
How do you feel about her now?
