Why We Should Watch Less News
<i>&quot;...But the question we need to ask ourselves here is not whether such behaviors (or the cover-ups of such behaviors) are outrageous, but rather why we have become such insatiable consumers of these outrages? What does it cost us?...&quot;</i><p>Exactly. There are four billion people on the planet. We are all connected instantaneously. If there isn&#x27;t something happening every minute that&#x27;s completely disgusting and outrageous, the species isn&#x27;t diverse enough. The question is why we want it delivered into our day-to-day emotional lives -- and who is benefiting from having that kind of transfer happen.<p>No matter how bad something is, we can accept that it&#x27;s bad, decide on measures to take (sometimes drastic measures) and continue on with our lives. Humans have lived their entire evolutionary existence like this. War over in Europe? Bombing of Pearl Harbor? I guess we may have to send millions off to war. A lot of people we know are going to die.<p>It&#x27;s only when we get the direct, back-and-forth, highly-charged emotional interaction that we become more-and-more angry, make irrational choices. We try to up one another with displays of our outrage and pain. Become unhappy and emotionally unstable. Then, guess what? We can share that emotional state with millions of others through the net!<p>My advice to people who are beginning to wake up to this, but still want to know what the current political discussions are? Read well-constructed opinion columns. Good ones are required to have thesis and supporting arguments. So you get bias, facts, and a look at somebody&#x27;s reasoning. I scan opinion columns from all sides of the political debates. I find I lose about 24 hours on learning what current events are. And I&#x27;m okay with that trade-off. A serial killer 1500 miles away doesn&#x27;t require me to gear up and go out with a SWAT team. It can wait. 99% of this can wait.