Old news. Grauniad shoots - hist foot

[MajGenl.Meade]

News is bad for you – and giving up reading it will make you happier

News is bad for your health. It leads to fear and aggression, and hinders your creativity and ability to think deeply. The solution? Stop consuming it altogether

In the past few decades, the fortunate among us have recognised the hazards of living with an overabundance of food (obesity, diabetes) and have started to change our diets. But most of us do not yet understand that news is to the mind what sugar is to the body. News is easy to digest. The media feeds us small bites of trivial matter, tidbits that don't really concern our lives and don't require thinking. That's why we experience almost no saturation. Unlike reading books and long magazine articles (which require thinking), we can swallow limitless quantities of news flashes, which are bright-coloured candies for the mind. Today, we have reached the same point in relation to information that we faced 20 years ago in regard to food. We are beginning to recognise how toxic news can be.


News misleads. (each of these is explained in the article - headings only here)
News is irrelevant.
News has no explanatory power.
News is toxic to your body.
News increases cognitive errors.
News inhibits thinking.
News works like a drug.
News wastes time.
News makes us passive.
News kills creativity.

Society needs journalism – but in a different way. Investigative journalism is always relevant. We need reporting that polices our institutions and uncovers truth. But important findings don't have to arrive in the form of news. Long journal articles and in-depth books are good, too.

I have now gone without news for four years, so I can see, feel and report the effects of this freedom first-hand: less disruption, less anxiety, deeper thinking, more time, more insights. It's not easy, but it's worth it.

Rolf Dobelli

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/a ... lf-dobelli

[oldr_n_wsr]

News has been reduced ot sound bites and 15 second info-mercial type clips. And we wonder about the rise in ADHD cases.That's why I read the local newspaper even if it has a bias.

[Econoline]

He makes some valid points. I would agree that, at the very least, it's helpful to avoid the news on television.

[BoSoxGal]

I noticed on vacation last summer (2013) that I felt significantly less stressed during my 3 week hiatus from news of any kind. Since then I've limited my consumption to NPR 2-3x/week, plus what I get from Daily Show & Colbert Report. Occasionally I'll look up a story online I've seen mentioned there, but otherwise I try to stay away from news - except that I follow exoneration cases and police brutality cases.

On the rare occasion I see clips from Fox or CNN, it's very unsettling - I can see how people watching that insanity is the root of the incivility and craziness in American political discourse these days.

[Sue U]

When I was a newswriter (back in the last century, when there were "newspapers"), I covered cops, crime and criminal courts for several mid-size dailies; while the stories were widely read, they were of no actual value to anyone's life. The maxim of prioritization in the news biz is "if it bleeds it leads" -- sensationalism over substance. Frankly, people like the murder-and-mayhem dramas and man-bites-dog oddities. It's what they talk about at the water cooler.

I don't think people are going to be any more insightful, deeper-thinking or smarter in decision-making for not consuming news product. Most people simply don't care to know any more than the most superficial aspects of anything, and I daresay many are frankly incapable of any deeper comprehension.

There's a reason the phrase "bread and circuses" resonates so strongly through the millennia.

[Econoline]

According to that Guardian piece, what they published was "an edited extract from an essay first published at dobelli.com."

If anyone's interested in reading the whole essay, "Avoid News: Towards a Healthy News Diet" (11 pages, pdf), you can find it here:

http://www.dobelli.com/wp-content/uploa ... 1_TEXT.pdf

[BoSoxGal]

That's an excellent essay, Econo - thanks for sharing the source!