Commentary
In addition to whatever problems we are grappling with as individuals, news reports constantly remind us that there are serious problems in the larger world beyond our daily routines. It is proverbial in the news business that “no news is good news.” This refers to the tendency in human psychology to pay more attention to reports of dangerous, harmful, scary problems than to cheery reports that everything is OK.
In this era of 24-hour news (thank you, Ted Turner—or maybe not) it’s easy to overdose on bad news. Some people respond by tuning out the news entirely, or at least severely limiting their intake of news. Journalist Amanda Ripley wrote an opinion piece for The Washington Post last month that speaks for a huge number of Americans. Its title frames the issue well: “I stopped reading the news. Is the problem me—or the product?” Reading (or watching) the news left her feeling “drained,” “depressed,” paralyz[ed].” She even went to a therapist. Then she discovered that other journalists were shunning or cutting way back on news consumption, too. Indeed, a Reuters study found that 42 percent of Americans “sometimes or often actively avoid the news.”…