Not Watching/Reading The News
 

I imagine most people watch/read the news. Mainly because it's rammed down our throats. Also because it gives us something to talk about. And maybe it's easier to think about what needs to be done about Islamic fundamentalism, or the economy, or Iran, rather than concentrating about how to solve our own personal issues. But have you ever considered not watching it?

I stopped watching/reading the news maybe six or seven years ago now, and I feel better for it. Much happier. More focused on the here and now. Not a care about things happening thousands of miles away.

It's not without it's downside, mind. Whenever someone mentions the news, I have absolutely nothing to say. And when asked my opinion on the news, I have to tell them I don't watch it, and then their face screws up and they look at me funny. :laughing:

The philosopher, Alain De Botton, puts it well:



Does anyone else not watch/read the news? Do you feel better for it?

Does anyone love the news? Wish they could watch more of it?

I manage to focus on personal issues and issues going on outside of my immediate sphere quite well.

Good.

This ain't no 'people who don't watch the news are better than those who do' thread. Nobody think that! :laughing:

I don't watch TV or read newspapers.
I am generally aware of what is going on in the world through headlines on the internet though.

With the shooting today in Virginia, I hope nobody tunes into the news when they plaster this psychos picture all over the TV for the next five days. It glorifies violence and gives future psychos reason to carry out their bullsh*t cause they know they'll be the talk of the world.

That's one of the things that turned me off watching it. Images of people about to be beheaded, videos of hostages pleading, videos of bombs being dropped, all that kinda stuff. I don't like or want that stuff in my head.

usually the news is covering **** that is more interesting than the crap that happens in the life of your average person/MBer

think about it this way... if you were visiting the statue of liberty on a trip to ny with a bunch of other tourists, and suddenly you saw a 747 crash into a skyscraper across the river in manhattan.. would you be like "oh ****!" and turn your attention toward the burning building, or would you go right back to looking at some boring ass statue with your boring ass family?

Plot twist: you're also related to the person manning the plane.

I'd watch the 747 because it's happening right in front of me.

so then the only reason you wouldn't watch it on tv is cause it's on tv?

what if you lived in the bronx and heard about it on tv? would you then go outside on the roof of your building and try to see it from there, or would you say "nah i didn't see it happen right in front of me so who cares?"

It's not about it being on TV. I watch TV. But not the news.

As to the second question; I'd probably go up on the roof for a look because it's happening in the city I live in.

so if it's not happening in the city you live in then you don't care? what if you lived across the river in nj instead?

what about history? do you think it's worth studying or should we just be like well it already happened and it wasn't even in the same city as me so who cares?

I've seen some ****ed up stuff on the internet but this is the worst thing I've seen. It's disturbing as **** and totally sinister.

Surprised we don't have a thread for it.

@JWB

Maybe it's about not caring, about being selfish. Maybe it's about not needing to know. I really don't know. All I know is I'm happier not watching it. Maybe ignorance really is bliss? Again, I don't know.

History worth studying? Not to my mind, no. What was it Confucius said, "to divine the future, study the past", and maybe he has a point. Maybe history is scattered with valuable lessons and warnings. And in all truth, I used to love history, and so it's value isn't entirely lost on me. But these days I don't give it much thought.

Don't invade Russia. That's pretty much the best advice history has to offer.

Nope. I hate to face the fact that the world is a place where bad things happen, and would prefer to pretend that the people who those bad things happen to don't exist, so that I can get on with my turgid upper middle class existence in peace. That's right, canada is the only country and BC is the only province and the few square miles outside my front door encapsulate the entirety of everything.

When I worked I of course watched and read the news, as who wants to be the only one who doesn't know what everyone's talking about when you go in the next morning (happened with the Challenger disaster; happened on a weekend, I didn't watch the news so had no clue it had happened). Also if you're in an office the conversation is often going to revolve around what's happening in politics, sport, world affairs etc.

Now I'm at home, I still make sure to catch the news, because otherwise are you not just burying your head? Oh, there's always bad news! Yeah, but not watching it won't make it go away. Surely you would rather keep up to date with what's happening than just close your eyes? There are a lot of injustices going on and if nobody watched the news (on whatever format) and knew of them, nothing would or could be done to change them. We'd all become selfish, insular people who only cared about ourselves and **** everyone else. I'm all right Jack, keep your hands off my stack? Not how I want to be, personally.

I don't watch the news on TV or read about it in newspapers or magazines anymore but that's because I have an internet connection now which I didn't have 12+ years ago.
At least now I no longer get newsprint on my hands or have to sift through 40 to 50 minutes of TV news BS each day to find something that might actually affect and/or interest me during the nightly broadcast.

@ Trollheart

It could be interpreted as burying your head in the sand. Or it could be interpreted as not looking over your neighbour's fence.

But you can still be kind, compassionate, caring, loving, to those around you without actively seeking injustices or watching the news. Just look at me! ;) Haha. But, no, you really can.

I don't think anybody's saying you can't, dude.

Wait, what happened in Virginia?

Are you joking or are you actually uninformed?

tbh i love history and **** like that just cause it's interesting more than anything else. maybe there's a lesson to be learned here and there but that's certainly not the only reason it's interesting. maybe ignorance is your personal preference. as for me, i like to observe the world around me and will use any possible medium to do so.

I know there was a shooting, but I haven't watched a second of news in... a while, so if there wasn't a TV in the Burger King dining room that played Fox News all day, I wouldn't even know about it.

A disgruntled reporter shot two of his former coworkers (cameraman and reporters) and injured an interviewee on live television. Then he posted a pov video of the incident on Twitter and Facebook. He shot and killed himself after being pursued by the police. He's got some manifesto saying it was based off of the Charleston shooting and his coworkers' comments after that shooting.

Here's Tom with the weather.

Crazy story, but my life isn't really changed for better or worse just by knowing this. I checked out the pov video out of morbid curiosity, but I'm ready to move on and not watch the news again.

It could also be interpreted as willful ignorance. Or narcissism.

The point is that if people stick their heads in the ground, nothing ever gets better.

I'm with Charlie on this one. I was a complete news junkie when I was younger. But, after awhile, particularly after 2008, I got sick of reading about every petty crime, heavier crimes and all the continuous lies of public figures and politicians. There comes a point where you realize what's being sold to you as news is not really news at all, but sensationalism at best, other people's depressions/delusions/paranoia as a middle point, or as a way to simply make money at worst. You are what you eat, and if you consume a ton of negative news, then it's going to affect you if nothing more than subliminally.

I don't completely shut it off, but I've learned when to say no mas.

Yeah, but do they even have television in The Shire? :rofl:

A fucking mental story.

Had I kept up with the news I be aware of this hurricane coming....

There's a hurricane?

As it is with most things in life, both extremes are flawed and selfish. You could argue that keeping up with the news too often equates to sticking your head in the sand, as you basically let yourself get swept away with whatever the news channels tell you to care about. You end up becoming afraid (as violent crime is seriously over reported, resulting in many people believing that violent crime in America is on the rise, when in fact it has been declining for awhile) and obsessed with sensationalism, as media outlets constantly report whatever seems most shocking, relying on scaring people to boost the number of viewers ("Someone was shot in a city yesterday, and if you don't tune in to our interview with someone who wrote a book about getting mugged once, YOU'LL BE NEXT!"). Not only that, but you also become susceptible to each media outlet's bias, as they try to pander to the political leanings of whoever produces them. And half of the time, the sources aren't even checked with any serious scrutiny, as each outlet races to be the first to print whatever crazy stuff is thrown their way, which means a lot of the "information" is completely false and useless.

And yet it's necessary for most people to find some avenue of keeping up with current events, to find the information that you should know about (a nasty earthquake is predicted to happen in the near future, the area that your friend lives in is being ravaged by a forest fire, etc.).

So I would say that rather than decide to always or never watch the news, it's best to try to find the middle ground. Check multiple outlets every now and then, and try to not rely solely on one.

I've never watched the news deliberately or longer than 5-10 minutes except the live footage during 9/11. I don't care about anything they have to say. Some event like a horse being rescued from a river might grab my attention but I'm certainly not gonna tune in to find out. I hardly even watch tv.

What if it's a horse being rescued from a lake?

I can definitely understand that point of view. Plenty of people have been disillusioned/disinterested with the media for quite some time now, and they have good reason to feel that way. But keep in mind that 'the news' isn't always just watching a channel on TV; it's literally any avenue of information that provides you with what's 'new' in the world. Anything from reading stories posted online, to simply talking with people about current events, is a way of learning about local and world events. You could even say that JWB's monthly "How do you guys feel about ____?" threads count as news sources. So it's possible to find information that you care about without turning on the TV and having pundits yell at you. :laughing:

And now, it's time for the obligatory posting of Dirty Laundry...

Coming soon. Had I watched the news my friend and I would have known, that some ******* shot up a news anchor on live t.v. this morning. Why this pertains to me, it is eerily similar to the Mr Robot finale which was why the **** my friend came over. Now due to the amount of grass smoked prior to the finale party we watched 10 minutes of last week's episode before they kindly put 10 pt white type across the screen saying postponed until 9.2. 15. Hats off to you Mr. Robot for the decency not to air the episode out of respect for the victims familes. What's creepy is the finale was prerecorded and just happens to contain the same thing. **** you disgruntled ex news caster, and I love the fact that Mr.Robot practices what the **** it preaches, I'll be buying a shirt, hat, mug, whatever the **** else you've just sold my tiny consumer mind.

i dont watch news on tv or anything like that

i go on youtube and find crazy **** that way

What if it's a horse rescuing another horse from a river?

Over here we don't really have too much in the way of media bias, as our national news stations are mostly semi-state. I do like the way that, even when there's a bad news story about itself, our national channel, RTE, will report it, ie "RTE has been fined for misreporting a story", or "The wages of RTE presenters came under fire today in the Dail" (our House of Commons/Congress). One guy even had to read out that his OWN wages were seen as too high: that must have been embarrassing, but they didn't shy from it. They're also well able to take govt figures on, no matter which side of the fence they are, as well as opposition ones. They're pretty balanced as a whole I feel.