Some people are obsessed with sports and can tell you the batting average of half the players in the MLB or the number of assists a random player from the Cavaliers got in one game back in December 2014. Some people follow celebrities like it's their job, knowing the moment it's posted when Kylie Jenner will release a new makeup line or the names of the top film critics at the Tribeca Film festival. Other people drown themselves in fantasy, knowing everything about characters from their favorite show or book series down to their blood type. Why do people get caught up in these things and allow them to consume their lives? Because they love them and they make them happy.
I am a self proclaimed news junkie. I follow the news. I know who Trump puts on his cabinet from day to day, I follow the bombings and terror attacks that are claimed or attributed to ISIS or another group or set of people. I keep tabs on Brexit and Turkey and I followed the Presidential Election like it was the World Series. But why? The news is so depressing, and it rarely gives me a warm feeling inside or makes me smile (unless it's sarcastic). In my experience, many people use sports or entertainment or arts or other forms of media to distract them from the atrocities being committed everyday by foreign governments, terror groups, or someone's neighbor. To be honest, I cannot blame them: the news is depressing more times than not.
Abroad and domestic, events seem to just keep happening that destroy people's faith in humanity. From the warehouse fire in Oakland, California that killed 36 people at a party earlier this month, to the two suicide bombers at a stadium in Turkey on Sunday, which killed 38 people, 36 of them police officers, which the Turkish deputy prime minister told the Guardian he believes the attack was executed by Kurdish fighters; the world seems to be in turmoil.
The first question that tends to get asked is why do news organizations, broadcast and print, run these bloody, fatality driven stories? On reason is the classic rule of newsworthiness: if it bleeds it leads. A story that is gory will get more views and interest; it has been proven time and time again. A murder will get a higher placement in paper or an earlier time slot on a newscast than an event giving food and clean water to the people of Flint. The other reason is that a lot of what is happening in the world currently is not uplifting. Children are fleeing their homes because of civil war and "jihad" in Syria, and a far right, nationalistic movement is sweeping Europe and coming to America, blocking those children from finding safety.
The truth is: we live in a dangerous world. People are becoming more radical on a whole and more self centered. This ideology drives world events, which drive the news.
The next question is why should we follow the news if it is only going to incite negativity and helplessness is a news-world driven by terror attacks? Because it will become history.
The former Washington Post President and Publisher, Phillip L. Graham, said one of my favorite quotes: "Journalism is the rough draft of history." What happens in the news today will be in the history books of tomorrow.
This is part of why I follow the news as aggressively as I do: because I think it is important. I do indulge myself in crazy fantasy worlds more often and more intently than I probably should, but to look at only news all day every day, as I have stated, would probably produce a fairly negative person.
I can understand why people lose themselves in sports or entertainment. It's a lot easier to stomach the loss of a game than the loss of 38 lives.
