Every time we turn on the news, we’re faced with pain, suffering and violence. We subscribe to the belief that we are a self-destructive race, made ever more so by the advances in science and technology, providing bigger, more effective weaponry. Whenever we turn on the TV – or access the internet – there’s news of another act of terrorism, a murder, violent protests or an act of war.
If it’s not an act of man it’s an act of nature, tearing countries and lives apart, becoming more and more common. It seems that we can not get through a few months without another volcano, flood, earthquake or devastating storm somewhere in the world. Many people – myself included – believe in the Gaya Shrug theory: Gaya simply ‘shrugs’ off the entities that upset her and cause pain. It must be said that, although lives are lost and man-made structures destroyed when a natural disaster occurs, the earth remains fairly unscathed.
But is that all it is? Are we flooded with news of death, destruction and violence more than years gone by because science and technology has improved so much and because mother nature has had enough of our destructive ways? Maybe. But can I suggest an alternative? We have greater access to news media than ever before. For example, on Monday afternoon, a suicide bomber attacked Domodedovo airport in Russia. Less than an hour after the explosion, I received a ‘breaking news’ email. 20 or 30 years ago, news agencies didn’t have the technology to hear about something that happened 1560miles away the moment it happened and cascade it down to readers and viewers immediately. Incidents are immediately fed back to us, the viewer, regardless of where (or when) it happens.
Please don’t get me wrong, I’m sure that the rate of acts of terrorism, war, violence and destruction is higher now than it was in my mother’s day, for example, but are we not also victims of information saturation? Maybe a little bit of ignorance is, indeed, bliss?
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Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Absolutely right! We’re not fed the news – just the bad news. It often seems that life is hard enough (though not as hard as it is for an unacceptably vast number of the world’s population), but to this we add a burden of worry, guilt and angst deriving from an unending tide of news feed – usually of the negative variety. Whilst it is right that we should care about out fellow travellers on Spaceship Earth and do our best to ‘love our neighbours as ourselves’, and thankfully true that news coverage occasionally prompts popular demand for action that improves the world and that would not necessarily have occured without open news channels, I’m afraid that for every example of such a positive outcome there are many thousands of instances of people being driven to states of depression and worry by the constant crashing gale of ill tidings. My own mother-in-law – a perceptive octogenarian – was scared silly by a report of an plane crash in Greece, even though she has never flown in her life. Twenty-four-seven news feed is fine, but it should not be thrust at us. And of course if we are going to pay lip-service to being concerned about what happens to others, we have to match our stance with genuine and effective action in the world. Otherwise we are morally no different from the person who, from their house or car window, sees an accident or a crime or some other misfortune befall a passer-by, and does not stir themselves to help but simply sits back impotently to watch it all unfold…