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Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

theatlantic.com

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Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#241

Post by baron816 »

fma wrote: post #145
baron816 wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think more should adopt The Economist model. Yes, they definitely have an opinion, and they push it, but they're open about it and are fair to other sides. It's much better than feigning impartiality, or doing a half-hearted "both sides"ing.

I love the Economist. I used to pay for it but then ended up having a stack of unread magazines because I tried to read every page. I really should renew my subscription as their articles are in depth and I'm often amazed how can they crank out so many great articles within a week. Having said that - I see many tech people complain about pay walls even though many of us make $100k+. Pay walls on websites aren't that…

I just get the digital versions. Their app includes high quality audio recordings of all their articles, which makes it much easier for me to listen to all I’m interested in.

I also got my subscription through discountmags and locked in the price, so it’s only $50/yr in perpetuity for me.

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#242

Post by hevelvarik »

Well then that’s bad news because boy have things changed. Growing up in Cali in 80s with a robust social life, I cannot remember having or hearing a single political discussion at all.

Now I think it’s the norm for kids to have deeply felt political views.

I wish I knew how that changed. Maybe it’s the teachers because I also cannot recall any political discussion in me elementary or high school classrooms.

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#244

Post by mhneu »

The author, Arthur Brooks, is the past president of a Republican thinktank, AEI.

Republicans have a strong incentive to encourage citizens to ignore the political news, because their policies are deeply unpopular. Republicans rely on a non-engaged citizenry for votes.

Brooks is one of the Republican elites who shapes Republican political strategy. He has a deep conflict of interest when he tells you to stop reading about politics.

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#245

Post by miked85 »

gridlockd wrote: post #143
bazeblackwood wrote: post #66

> They found that those watching the most partisan television news sources—on both the left and the right—were often less knowledgeable about world events than those who consumed no news at all. This is some very fancy footwork to leave out some key information. The study found that those watching only Fox News and MSNBC answered worse than people who watch no news programs at all. As far as I can tell, this latter g…

> MSNBC at least seems to be informing their viewers on domestic issues better than that baseline. The difference is only about 5% to the "no news" crowd. Also, people that are better-educated tend to lean liberal and therefore might prefer to consume liberal outlets, but that doesn't mean liberal outlets are better at informing people. Looking at the frontpage of MSNBC, it's almost exclusively political opinion piec…

> Also, people that are better-educated tend to lean liberal

better educated, or indoctrinated?

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#246

Post by imperfectcats »

yashap wrote: post #65

This point rings strongly true to me. I have a number of members of friends/family who have become very difficult to be around, because they’ve become so intense/constantly outraged about politics, even if they are on the same end of the political spectrum as me: > The research doesn’t reveal precisely why we tend to dislike overly political people, but it doesn’t take too much imagination to guess that constant foam…

I like to call that "violently agreeing". "You all seem to be having a violent agreement" usually defuses the situation with some humour ... the first time anyway.

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#247

Post by ignoramous »

caseysoftware wrote: post #148

As I've noted here a few times: Just over 10 years ago, I conducted an experiment. I watched an hour of CNN every night but it was never that night's coverage. It was from exactly two weeks ago. It was amazing how much "breaking news!" was irrelevant or just outright wrong, how many large trend predictions were wrong, and how many "[person] will do X" were wrong. While the predictions could have been portrayed as opi…

I stopped religiously reading news after I stumbled upon Aaron Swartz's blog post on the topic [0] way back when!

I'd say I have been insulated from the depressiveness of it all ever since but also that I've lost the ability to meaningfully participate or contribute to socio/economical/political discussions that seem to dominate any gathering of modest size [1].

[0] http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews

[1] This quote particularly hits home: The worst illiterate is the political illiterate, he doesn’t hear, doesn’t speak, nor participates in the political events. He doesn’t know the cost of life, the price of the bean, of the fish, of the flour, of the rent, of the shoes and of the medicine, all depends on political decisions. The political illiterate is so stupid that he is proud and swells his chest saying that he hates politics. The imbecile doesn’t know that, from his political ignorance is born the prostitute, the abandoned child, and the worst thieves of all, the bad politician, corrupted and flunky of the national and multinational companies. --Bretolt Brecht (https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/541442-the-worst-illiterate...)

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#248

Post by powersnail »

bigbubba wrote: post #174
hef19898 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always surprises me to what degree US cable news, as opposed to print, seems to treat politics like entertainment and sports coverage. At least from an outsider's perspective. Maybe no surprise a reality TV star became President.

Commercial television news is very manipulative and the intent of the manipulation is to keep eyeballs glued to the screen to sell ads. They use lots of elaborately animated transitions with bright colors, swooshing sound effects and musical cues to mesmerize viewers, just as slot machines in Vegas use such things to mesmerize gamblers. It's the same sort of graphical bullshit they pad out televized American football…

I was living with a host family when I first saw American TV.

I just couldn't tell when the actual show is on. The shows, the news, the ads, and whatever else there was, they all had the same "air". The same kind of music, the same kind of cadence, the same kind of tone, the same kind of fake laugh.

TV is pretty shit everywhere; but I can't understand it in US.

Confusingly, some of the greatest TV shows are US shows. But I have to watch them on Netflix/DVD, because the actual TV breaks apart the show into tiny pieces that take away the enjoyment entirely.

I consider myself lucky that I never get sucked into the habit of watching TV.

Re: Reading too much political news is bad for your well-being

#249

Post by bobthepanda »

ignoramous wrote: post #247
caseysoftware wrote: post #148

As I've noted here a few times: Just over 10 years ago, I conducted an experiment. I watched an hour of CNN every night but it was never that night's coverage. It was from exactly two weeks ago. It was amazing how much "breaking news!" was irrelevant or just outright wrong, how many large trend predictions were wrong, and how many "[person] will do X" were wrong. While the predictions could have been portrayed as opi…

I stopped religiously reading news after I stumbled upon Aaron Swartz's blog post on the topic [0] way back when! I'd say I have been insulated from the depressiveness of it all ever since but also that I've lost the ability to meaningfully participate or contribute to socio/economical/political discussions that seem to dominate any gathering of modest size [1]. [0] http://www.aaronsw.com/weblog/hatethenews [1] This…

There's a balance to be had. You probably shouldn't be waiting for CNN's push notifications with bated breath, but I find that weekly is a good enough cadence to follow along with what's happening without getting too stressed out.

I also try not to read sensationalist news that is unlikely to move the needle on how I feel about something (e.g. the 9000th variation on "Trump said X")

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