Emotional toll of constant negative news and unlimited access to ‘doomscrolling’ has led to record-high news avoidance
News has never been more accessible – but for some, that’s exactly the problem. Flooded with information and relentless updates, more and more people around the world are tuning out.
The reasons vary: for some it’s the sheer volume of news, for others the emotional toll of negative headlines or a distrust of the media itself. In online forums devoted to mindfulness and mental health, people discuss how to step back, from setting limits to cutting the news out entirely.
Seriously, the number of articles with wild headlines and text that describes a video or picture - WITHOUT SAID VIDEO OR PICTURE - is too damn high. Really the number of “news stories” that are just this is too damn high to say nothing of the fact that anything actually useful or critical just isn’t going to make the news in favor of whatever corporate BS they are shilling.
I mostly opted out a long time ago and while I’m often out of the loop on lots of things I generally can’t avoid hearing big news and have more room for other things that I actually care about.
Especially on the Internet, where hyperlinking is a thing. That I can see an article about Congress passing a bill by a vote total and have to do my own search to find the bill text and who voted for it is ridiculous. Usually the only links they include are links to themselves and even then they’re frequently topic links for the word rather than actual links to past reporting.