Oh dear.

The depressed people were far more accurate in estimating how much influence their actions had on the outcome of the game compared to their nondepressed counterparts, who consistently overestimated the effects of their own choices on their chances of winning.

Then I remember this other study (CW animal testing) where they put rats in a bucket of water that they couldn’t get out of, so they’d have to swim. There was a fairly consistent point at which the swimming rat would falter, and stop swimming, fated to drown.

Except that that’s when the researchers would pull the rat out of the bucket, give it a nice rest warmth and a meal.

When those SAME rats who had been rescued before were put in the same situation again, they swam much LONGER than they had before.

Why? The risk was the same either way- drowning. You’d have thought that the fear of drowning would keep them swimming to their maximum length no matter what.

The researchers conclusion was that the rescued rats had something they hadn’t had the first time- they had more hope. A miraculous rescue could come, and that let them swim for longer, just in case.

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

"They're not the same at all!"

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET—Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.

"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point—"

MY POINT EXACTLY.”

No parts of it extended beyond the lines, and the paper ticket was clearly displayed, impaled on a horn.

(ID in alt text)

Okay, so, I have some things I'm looking for regarding Bill Willingham for the little article I'm making bit by bit: back in the day, sometime before the infamous (to me) incident with him saying he wanted to shoot Steph fans, I recall there was reports about him berating a male fan who said Stephanie's death made him cry at a con. I don't seem to be misremembering, because I reference it in my livejournal post about the incident:

I knew from interviews and shit that Willingham was an asshole- and I'm sorry, he is, for mocking people at panels, and mocking men for daring to cry over a comic book death--

So it was a thing. But it's hard to find sources now obviously. Does anyone remember this in more detail, and especially does anyone remember the sources? I think it's good to have them to give context to just how bad his behavior was and the Steph's death thing is obviously pretty relevant.

(Of course, there were a lot of bad ideas happening there. Like the all male panelists thing. lmao in the comments to the Mary Sue you have the usual guy being like 'well what if it was an all woman panel on male comics!!" Yes, I do think it would be weird and stupid if there was no man on that panel, especially in this hypothetical scenario where male-friendly comics is a thing that isn't just 'the majority of comics' and men as a gender are marginalized, thanks for the useless thought exercise)