I stopped following the news
mertbulan.com
I stopped following the news
1–10 of 205 posts
Re: I stopped following the news
#2My entire existence is politically controversial. I pretty much have to at least be aware of recent political developments since they could affect my ability to live as myself
Re: I stopped following the news
#3The news is what's new, uncommon, strange, interesting. Shiny, attractive, shocking, raging: dopamine raising and cortisol antagonising. The news doesn't describe our actual lives. But the news does sometimes contain information relevant to our lives!
I find I will hear about the relevant things from people and events around me, whether or not I follow the news. The news doesn't have any actual bearing on my life but the news does have a few stories that do have bearing.
So theres no downside of not following the news. I will hear what I need to and want to hear about from people around me or other sources.
Some think that in not consuming what they think I should consume, that this is a morally wrong thing to do. They will be personally offended, how can they ignore my story? There is a case that if we all stopped following the news then how can the other sources inform us, so there would still be a benefit to reporting...
Consider two anthropologists examining a culture. One only has remote access to every news source the culture produces for itself, the other can only talk face to face with people. Which one will understand the people more?
Re: I stopped following the news
#4I think it's important to keep reading the news occasionally.
Personally, I, as a programmer, read the news in the same way as my grandad who was a farmer. I read a printed weekly publication (in my case The Economist) on Sunday morning. Outside of Sunday morning I don't read the news at all.
I prefer printed news to media-supported news, because I think the imagery (I acknowledge The Economist still has images) and presentation of news, especially on TV detracts from the message it's trying to convey a lot of the time. After reading some of Neil Postman's books (notably Amusing Ourselves to Death), I find it strange to watch televised news whereby one minute I'm watching footage of a disaster, then the next minute I'm seeing sports news updates or an advert. Just like normal learning, I think news demands longer form content for proper understanding.
Reading the news on a low frequency basis also gives time for news stories to properly develop. Breaking news can be filled with speculation and incorrect details, which even if you keep up with, you can miss later corrections or crucial details. Not to mention the stress involved in it. Chances are if some real breaking news happens, like a natural disaster or war, I'll hear somebody else tell me.
Re: I stopped following the news
#5This is a reasonable choice, but of course also one that is only people who can be pretty confident of not being personally affected by newsworthy events.
Re: I stopped following the news
#6I've recently been trying to avoid news. Particularly US political news. Sadly for some reason blocking sites on my Eero router doesn't seem to work. Thankfully Facebook recently put up a modal dialog asking me to subscribe or accept personalised ads (pretty sure the GDPR explicitly forbids that but whatever, everyone is doing it), it's doing a good job of preventing me seeing the usual feed of news there. At some point I'll put PiHole on my NAS and take care of Reddit etc.
Re: I stopped following the news
#7Don't worry about things you can't change.
That said, you do notice it when the currency crashes.
Re: I stopped following the news
#8Aaron Swartz has a nice blog post about it[1].
It's been discussed several times on HN[2]. I had periods I go through without news. It's been harder to do that lately.
Re: I stopped following the news
#9I completely understand why, but on the other hand democracy relies on citizens being informed about what's happening. The risk is that one day, you wake up and there is no democracy any more.
Re: I stopped following the news
#10I think it's important to keep reading the news occasionally. Personally, I, as a programmer, read the news in the same way as my grandad who was a farmer. I read a printed weekly publication (in my case The Economist) on Sunday morning. Outside of Sunday morning I don't read the news at all. I prefer printed news to media-supported news, because I think the imagery (I acknowledge The Economist still has images) and…
Wouldn’t print newspapers also show you disaster on one page and sports on the next?
I just began reading amusing ourselves to death.