The recent mass shooting in Buffalo was awful. As was every other example of this type of behaviour. But, America seems to have accepted them as the price it pays for its "freedoms". Until that changes, there really isn't anything else to worth saying.
But...
When talking about writing the five minute dialogues, I suggested looking to the news for inspiration.
Reading up on Buffalo, I saw a word used over and over again. It's a word I've seen in accounts of other shootings. It has become a bogeyman of sorts in the culture, like "communist" used to be and "socialist" currently is.
Loner.
The loner has become a label that some aspects of society use to mean "scary", "dangerous", and now "deadly".
As someone who has been a loner for large chunks of my life, I object.
And I wondered how to have that conversation
So, I have a scenario in my head, and I am working on it.
But, the point I am making here is writing the news doesn't mean writing about the shooting, doesn't mean writing about the war in Ukraine, or the rising interest rates. I means finding an aspect of those things that you - or your character - can talk about; finding a point that you - or your character - think has been overlooked.
Or imagining what it would be like to be someone affected by those things, but not in the obvious ways.
Write the news, from a human perspective. But make it off-message if you can. Something your audience might not have thought of as they read the news for themselves.
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