In 2014, media outlets deemed political satirist John Oliver's show the best of the year. Described as “the online water-cooler,” his show has become a talking point for many on social media. In this study, we tested the effects of such political comedy and the influence of social pressure in a simulated Facebook environment (N 1⁄4 189). Participants in this experiment were asked to view a vide...

This paper proposes a journey through some of the many novels written by Honoré de Balzac, through the mythic constitution of his world, his epic, which summons up the same recurrent circle of figures: his “human comedy” will offer surprising insights for a better understanding of the crimes of the powerful.