We're definitely living in an age of media manipulation and sensationalism. Although I tend to avoid news and opinion channels, the few times I drop in on any of them are loaded with messages of outrage and doom, regardless which "side" is expressing them. The default position seems to be that the world is falling apart and it's those bad guys over there who keep saying and doing bad things, and we're so good because we vehemently react to them. Whether it's mass media or a social media site like Facebook or YouTube, the lead into the featured story, is often (if not usually) captioned by some enticement at the viewer's emotions instead of a reasonable representation of what's to come if they keep watching or decide to click on the post or video. I don't think this is going to get any better in the future. I do think that when someone around me starts to rant and rave about something political or in the news, my first response...regardless whether I agree or not with their opinions...is to question where they receive their information from and how was it presented. In the meantime, for people's general mental health I recommend a drastic tapering down of news and opinion input from mass and social media...regardless of the source...and to focus more on what good they can, in their individual daily living and decisions, do for the betterment of themselves, their loved ones, and community. When it's time to vote, sure, inform yourself and do your civic duty...but you can't live on this crap 24/7...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment