Bad News 24/7

In the early part of the 20th Century, it was the newspapers - the morning paper, the evening paper and extra editions - that kept us abreast of what was happening in the world. And the news was often bad, often exaggerated by the muckrakers of that period to sell more papers. By the mid-20th Century, we were getting most of our news from the radio or television. Vietnam has the distinction of being the first war that was fought in our living rooms. Listening to Walter Cronkite or Huntley and Brinkley gave us the body count for the day.

With the advent of social media and cable television, we can have the news 24/7. And with the intense competition between these different news sources, modern-day muckraking is very much in vogue. Every source seems to be doing whatever it can to increase market share. “If it bleeds, it leads” is the motto. And as the public becomes more desensitized to this type of journalism, if you can call it that, the stories and the pictures have to become even more graphic. In this race to the bottom, all seem intent upon being the new National Enquirer.

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to do some training with a group of journalists, many of whom had covered 9/11. They all agreed that much of the coverage was focused on being sensational and that seeing the planes crash into the Towers for the umpteenth time was, in general, not very helpful to the public. Research has shown it was indeed harmful. But it did its job, they agreed. It assured them a “share of the market.”

As I have discussed in this blog a number of times over the last couple of years, there are three factors that seem to encourage pessimism. The first is a belief that the events that have occurred are permanent. In other words, if things are bad, things will stay bad. The second is a belief that what has happened will have a pervasive effect on our lives. And the third is the issue of blame, finding someone, not just someone who is accountable, but someone who can be blamed with all the emotion that goes along with that process.

Unfortunately, if we watch the evening news or tune into social media, we can see all three of these factors at play in most of the coverage. Instead of pointing out that most things are temporary and that this, too, will pass, the media often seems intent upon convincing people that what has occurred will never end and that things may never change for the good. The media also seems intent upon convincing people that what has happened will have a pervasive effect upon their lives, instead of printing out that whatever the events were, they may have a specific impact, positive or negative, but that few events change everything. And, of course, media seems hell-bent upon determining who was at blame, locating that person, and making sure that they pay the consequences for their terrible behavior. This is different than holding people accountable. It is stirring up emotion and anger that has contributed to such things as the recent riots that occurred in Missouri.

So what is to be done about all of this? These factors undoubtedly undermine the resilience of each of us and of our country as a whole. I will discuss in the next blog some very concrete things that you can do to maintain your and your family’s resilience in the face of this negativity.

Dr. Ron Breazeale