CW: *gestures expansively*
I turned off the New York Times news alerts on my phone a while ago. For one thing, I was never seeing the update I wanted (Trump impeached, Trump run out of town on rail, In bizarre twist, Trump chased into Acme™ black hole by Road Runner) and for another, the news headlines took on a sort of dystopian Mad Libs quality where a pandemic, the dismantling of democracy, and climate disaster all came together in a full meal deal of all bad news, all the time.
This was as good a week as any to ignore the news. It’s impossible not to be aware of it, of course, but I do what I can. We don’t watch any news channels at home; however quickly a steady diet of Real Housewives and The Bachelor can warp American brains, they aren’t a patch on Fox and CNN. Yes, they are different but both bad. It’s like how there are History Channel shows titled Nazis: Empire of Evil and then shows that run on the off-brand cable channels titled Hitler: Misunderstood Genius? One is obviously worse! Like just what exactly are we all pouring into our grey matter, here. The rent comes due eventually.
So we don’t watch cable news. I can’t understand – when I’m in an airport or a waiting room somewhere – how people can listen to it all day by choice. It is bad enough when you are trapped in some liminal space with little to do but stare at a TV bolted to the wall. When my dad had bypass surgery in 2019 the waiting room TVs were turned to CNN playing an endless loop of Roger Stone’s arrest. When the then-President appeared on-screen someone in the waiting room booed loudly and suddenly we were watching HGTV instead. HGTV is also pablum, of course, but I would rather be annoyed by the overuse of barn doors than get the sneaking feeling I’m being recruited into a white supremacist death cult, somehow?
Anyway, you shouldn’t watch so much news, and we really all should stop shitposting online (this is directed at an audience of one: me). Do something else instead, above all else be persistent to the point of annoyance. If we can’t sleep at night they shouldn’t either.