BAD NEWS IS GOOD NEWS?

It seems like it. Are we really so pathetically excited, so disturbingly interested in the negative sides of life? It seems to be, for the simple reason that we are constantly fed fatalities, crashing cars, airplanes, ships, mudslides, wars, terrorist attacks and the list is very long. We lick it up from newspapers (remember those?), television and Internet news programs; and they wouldn’t give us all this bad news if we were not reading, listening or watching. So they keep bombarding us with a dominating percentage of news that is bad – and that is not good news.

I do not watch television news-programs. The simple reason is that I do not trust the information they give me. There is so much obvious fluff and glorification, the eagerness of making their station and program more so entertaining than informative; film at eleven. The way the so-called anchor-people interact for the most part seems scripted, fake and tried; to me it is simply embarrassing, disrespectful and a blatant insult to the news they are supposed to cover, what really happened, the true information we could be interested in and from which we no doubt would learn something from.

Television news programs must obviously do well, meaning that enough people are watching – otherwise these programs would not be around; only the best, perhaps truest, would survive. So with the multitude of stations (here in the USA), there is this innate “competition” to be the most popular, so they all turn up the fluff to out-do their competitors. The news is being padded and inflated; the graphics and the pictures are getting more graphic – really. Under it all, the real news is buried, the news that might actually have had a bigger impact on us, if communicated in a straight line.

But obviously bad news is good business, and that is something the consumer (that would be you and I) obviously enjoy communicated. Or is that really so? I mean, what is it we can learn from bad news, from so MUCH bad news? You see, when we are being bombarded with endless fatalities, accidents, murders, etc. we become numb to that kind of stimulation. One person murdered is traumatic; a bus-load runs off the road and six people die – and that is of course terrible; a plane disappears and we go: “oh well…”? And when it’s hundreds or thousands of people vanishing due to war or terrorist attacks, famine and so far away from us, we do become ignorantly numb, like it’s too many and too much for us to comprehend – to care about? So where did our emotional judgment go?

Movies, television shows and most certainly video-games, underline the underbelly of society. There are too many guns and knives, so much shooting and blood, way many explicit and violent deaths, multitude of body parts flying all over the place. Yes, we (try to) acknowledge that this is just a movie, a show or a video-game - it is not real. But the gruesome fact is that we are still deeply affected by all this ‘not real’ stuff, so when it’s a ‘real’ local murder, the bus off the road, the wars and all that death, we do not react like we really should – with a much deeper compassion and concern and a much stronger urge to ‘get it fixed’, one way or another.

Sure I’m no Sigmund Freud (luckily, I don’t even look like him), but common sense dictates that our emotions with respect to the violent side of society, the way we might find ourselves ignorant more so than concerned, is a way to ‘protect’ ourselves for not going crazy; the “I’m glad it wasn’t me” syndrome. And I’m (disturbingly) okay with that, feeling “protected” that way to some extent.

But at times I am thoroughly influenced by some of this sad bad news. Several years ago I read about a young woman driving along a highway. She was reaching for a CD in the back-seat, for a split second not seeing where she was going. The car veered to the right and unto the side of the road, where four bicyclists were hit, mowed down and killed. Something we cannot and must not be flippant about – and news sources shouldn’t either.

I often think about this horrific accident, these two couples and best of friends, in their 50’s or so, enjoying a day together, getting exercise and fresh air – then brutally having their lives ended – while doing absolutely nothing wrong. Many times when I pass bicyclists on the side of the road, I see those four friends, and also think of the young woman who has to think about that moment, those people over and over the rest of her life – as well as so many other people who suffered and keep suffering; children, grandchildren, brothers and sisters, family and friends – on both sides; just so horrific. So I drive with more care – I really do.

In our everyday lives, are we more inclined to think ‘negative’ than ‘positive’? Do we more so dwell on other people’s bad luck than on their good fortune? Concerning good fortune for others, is the mixture of envy, jealousy and ‘why didn’t I win the lottery’ dominant? We do not voluntarily admit to such thoughts; instead we underline our full support and rejoice in somebody’s good fortune and luck (winning the bloody lottery) – and I really trust that we mean it; the good part.

When we hear of other peoples bad luck, I don’t think we feel good about it. I think that what is happening with us, is more so the feeling of momentary relief. Somebody is getting a divorce, got their car smashed up, and the list is long – bad stuff happening to other people, so we are simply relieved that it is not us – and then, for the most part, we do sympathize.

  

So it’s not that we are gloating when bad things happen to people around us, but it’s that brief relief, acknowledging that it didn’t happen to us; and I find that very okay and rather human, actually.

When real bad news hit close to home and disasters far away, I fully trust and believe that we are truly very compassionate as we really do care for people around us, even those we didn’t particularly care for before whatever happened; I see this again and again, and that is very encouraging – has always been. 

As much as ‘bad news’ seekers we might be, the good thing is that when it really counts, we do stand up and acknowledge the true sadness, the sorrow and unfortunate reasons; and then we do become understanding, caring and supportive – all in the name of the human spirit, and we might even have learned a thing or two; I think that is certainly good news – for all of us… Don’t you agree?