The Danger of Making Stuff Up

Posted by Unknown

So I'm sort of at a loss for today's post. I had this really witty witticism all witted up and ready to go, and now I can't use it. What I was going to say was that today's small cleaning task was knocking down cobwebs. I started in one room and then moved one by one, twirling up all kinds of webs and watching daddy longlegs try to flee by zip-lining away from the brush only to find that I was twirling the rod that said brush was attached to, pulling them in like a wench.  

Most would try to cut their line, choosing instead to take their chances with a fall to the ground. With the brush swinging back and forth over my head I found myself worrying about one of them going kamikaze and falling on me instead. But I remembered something. Even though daddy longlegs are the most venomous spider on the planet, they don't have the proper mouth with witch to bite us. What a wonderful correlation with a character's fatal flaw. What better way to explain how someone's strength can also be their weakness.

Now, why can't I use that example? Because Daddy Longlegs aren't the most venomous spider on the planet. They (the scientists) don't even know how venomous they are. It's never been tested. This is just another lie spread by the disinformation era where any idiot with access to the net can pretend to be a scientist and send out senseless drivel. That's how elections are won, folks.

And that's my short thought for the day: FACT CHECK EVERYTHING. Don't do it just because we want to stop the spread of disinformation, do it because when your reader gets to something like that and knows otherwise, they're going to stop and say, “This joker doesn't know what the hell he's talking about.”

Granted, in my case that might be true, but don't flat out tell people about it. As a writer you want to be sure that the only time your reader pauses to think about things is when you want them to, and you especially don't want them to pause because they're questioning you. It stops the story, pulls them out of the scene, reminds them that “hey, this is all made up.” I should know, because I just made this all up.

Kidding. It's true. Really. No, honestly, it is.