Not Following the News

[meierlde]

If you know a foreign language, in some countries, it would be interesting to see how the lack of the freedom of the press biases their reporting. People in the truly free world never understand this. When the government controls the media, people keep hearing and reading the same thing day in day out, and it soaks into them.

Actually my parents observed this in the late 1960s and early 1970s when living near Detroit and listening to the CBC (Canadian) news, it appeared at the time there was a Vietnam war reported in the US and a very different war reported by the CBC.
Of course back then the BBC nd others took a short wave radio to listen to today its on the web. Interestingly Radio Moscow at the time had one of the best shortwave signals.
I do miss Al Jazeera on TV as it had a non us centric view of the news, but can still get it on the web.

 

[travelover]

I guess you also hang out on Facebook with people who agree with you.

Of course, I want to hang out with smart people - like the ER.org crowd, here.

 

[NW-Bound]

Oh boy, now we together are in a heap of trouble. Everybody wants to retire, old and young. Nobody wants to work. What kind of world will that be?

We will just sell stocks and bonds back and forth between ourselves. Nobody has to produce anything. Great!

We've got to limit membership, and keep this secret between ourselves.

 

[euro]

While I understand the reflex to ignore the news (especially after the last 18 months of election coverage) to some extent, this thread makes me very sad. How is our democracy, our country, our world going to function if a well-educated and experienced group of people like the members of this board collectively sticks their heads in the sand?

I know it's not EVERYONE here, but geez, you have to read through to about post #20 for someone to confess that they actually make an effort to inform themselves of what is going on around them. Please, our society needs everyone to be informed and contribute!

Off my soap box now and apologies if the cage is rattling too much

 

[Car-Guy]

I had been watching the news (mostly FOX, CNBC and the local news) until mid summer when it got to be to much BS for me. Now that the elections are over I'm slowly getting back to watching again. Still some BS to "sort through" but not as bad as before Nov 8.

 

[Just_Steve]

Local news mostly.

 

[bclover]

I've always detoxed from media. I think it's a holdover from my childhood. My parents were uber Christian and took the "sunday, day of rest" line really serious. So Sunday was no tv, no news etc etc.

Now I still do it because I have to agree that it helps me rejuvenate, especially when I was working.

I watch 30 minutes of local news, lol mainly to get the weather and football scores.

 

[NW-Bound]

While I understand the reflex to ignore the news (especially after the last 18 months of election coverage) to some extent, this thread makes me very sad. How is our democracy, our country, our world going to function if a well-educated and experienced group of people like the members of this board collectively sticks their heads in the sand?

I know it's not EVERYONE here, but geez, you have to read through to about post #20 for someone to confess that they actually make an effort to inform themselves of what is going on around them. Please, our society needs everyone to be informed and contribute!

Off my soap box now and apologies if the cage is rattling too much

You made me go back through the thread to see where my 1st post stands with respect to that post #20.

Hey, I do want to be informed. But it does not mean I have to stay glued to the TV or the Web. There's no point in reading the same things over and over again.

And then, I don't think I stick my head in the sand. It's more like I have to close my eyes when people start to kick sand in my face.

 

[AllDone]

I lived a television free life for 23 years, but multiple idiot boxes arrived with the spouse. I still don't watch TV news, though. I just have no interest in Brangelina or nearly continuous ads.

I read a couple of the national newspapers, but the local papers seem to have shriveled into almost nothing. I find myself very ill-informed about local matters. I also read a couple of foreign papers, but since my reading speed there is so much slower, I just pick out a few stories.

 

[FUEGO]

A problem with the way I get the news is that I get almost no local news and only things of national or world-wide interests. And so, I am detached from the town I live in, and that's not good.
.

We have a neighborhood facebook page and a city council district facebook page so any hyper-local news makes its way to me very quickly. Crime in my 'hood, redistricting, new developments, new policies, etc.

 

[antmary]

For news, I want just the facts - online I check Reuters; Most of what there is out there, I think, is "Faux News," paid for by the advertisers. I do think I need a news/facebook diet....

 

[Lake161]

I've created a news feed with stories from my local newspaper, Reuters, the Economist, ProPublica, Politifact, Slate, and Wired. I generally just skim the headlines and read maybe 5-10 stories. Longer stories I save to Pocket for reading when stuck in line somewhere without wifi.

When I want a news break, I just skip a few days. I avoid TV news broadcasts altogether.

I also add special searches when there's a topic of interest. Right now, I have a Google search in my feed tracking the press on the ACA, since I am RE at 50 and health care costs are a big risk factor for me.

 

[Another Reader]

We have Nextdoor for the hyper-local news. Whenever the neighborhood pre-teens set off fireworks or some drunk misses a curve on the two lane road leading to the subdivision, we hear about it almost immediately. Also every ill-conceived local development project, such as a gas station adjacent to a creek that runs to the Bay, gets discussed. Nextdoor was instrumental in stopping that one.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

I started a similar thread a couple of months ago when I decided to start reducing the time I spent reading the news. Now...I will check the local paper every couple of days for local stuff and I get a weekly email from my local commisioner and that keeps me plenty up to date.

I have also done a complete purge of Facebook (a couple of months now) and I think that has done more for my quality of life than anything else recently. I only regret that I didn't do it earlier.

 

[RobbieB]

My girlfriend loves the news, especially the "election" news. It's been fun.

Me, I dunno what's going on or went down or might happen or did happen...

Yeah, retired -

 

[FUEGO]

We have Nextdoor for the hyper-local news. Whenever the neighborhood pre-teens set off fireworks or some drunk misses a curve on the two lane road leading to the subdivision, we hear about it almost immediately.

Holy crap! Do you live in my neighborhood?! I live on that two lane road and they crash into my neighbor's yard across the street every six months. Always at 3 am right?

 

[Another Reader]

Your neighbor needs to build a wall. I remember someone in my old neighborhood whose house sided to a busy street. He woke up to find a drunk and his car in bed with him and his wife. He built a reinforced block wall along the side and corner of the lot to the legal height of two feet and backfilled with dirt. No more late night visitors...

We are in Silly Valley. The behavior is everywhere and Nextdoor reports it.

 

[Music Lover]

Holy crap! Do you live in my neighborhood?! I live on that two lane road and they crash into my neighbor's yard across the street every six months. Always at 3 am right?

Tell your neighbor to protect their house with some large landscape rocks...they look nice and are far more solid than a fence or wall.

 

[Mdlerth]

I grew up in the nation's capital, an area obsessed with news. Eventually I could take no more. It felt like every broadcast was the same: about a third devoted to posturing politicians, another third devoted to commentary about same by self-appointed interpreters, and the remainder spent on celebrities I didn't recognize. Sound and fury signifying nothing. So I turned it off.

When the stories never change, does it really qualify as news anymore?

 

[easysurfer]

I grew up in the nation's capital, an area obsessed with news. Eventually I could take no more. It felt like every broadcast was the same: about a third devoted to posturing politicians, another third devoted to commentary about same by self-appointed interpreters, and the remainder spent on celebrities I didn't recognize. Sound and fury signifying nothing. So I turned it off.

When the stories never change, does it really qualify as news anymore?

With the internet and so many was to get information, "Breaking News" today is not the "Breaking News" of the past. Seems the old days was more reserved real news.

 

[dixonge]

While I understand the reflex to ignore the news (especially after the last 18 months of election coverage) to some extent, this thread makes me very sad. How is our democracy, our country, our world going to function if a well-educated and experienced group of people like the members of this board collectively sticks their heads in the sand?

I know it's not EVERYONE here, but geez, you have to read through to about post #20 for someone to confess that they actually make an effort to inform themselves of what is going on around them. Please, our society needs everyone to be informed and contribute!

Off my soap box now and apologies if the cage is rattling too much

You should not be equating 'no news' with 'heads in the sand' because they are not correlated. No News can mean enlightenment, because the major media outlets are in the business of Manufacturing Consent via propaganda (see Chomsky). Avoiding them allows the fog of indoctrination to lift and the eyes to truly see. Besides, there are *many* sources of information (long-form reading for example) that do not involve 'news' per se. I would argue that one can be *more* informed by avoiding the news, not counting those who wander off into a monastery somewhere...

 

[dixonge]

I forgot to mention. Today is the first time I have visited this forum in one solid week. During that time I also deactivated my Facebook account. I can easily log back in, which is all that is required to RE-activate it, but have so far not felt any particular urge to do so. I still have Facebook Messenger if anyone needs to reach me.

I have enjoyed the calmer week and have started to become much more productive in certain areas. My brain really needed the extra silence and room to recover.

 

[kcowan]

We just arrived in Mexico and my quota for internet is way down. Mostly FB as well but all are getting trimmed back. Glad to see you even if it is infrequent.

 

[neihn]

I get my news from Alexa - Amazon Echo - every morning while changing for works and evening. That is pretty news that I can handle, no TV news.

 

[Bestwifeever]

Data and news are different imo. Newscasters select the data someone thinks we need to know and then "explain" and "interpret" it (I know data is plural but it sounds better to me ) from a point of view. I'm trying to follow just data now and not even that very much.