2c,

1) Don’t read the news. It IS optional. Personally, if there were a good reason to read it, it would be based on curiosity and interest in knowing about humanity at large.

2) someone should be reading the news, because of economics, politics, and voting.

In the current global economy - your fate is dependent on the fate and actions of others.

The actions of Russia have hampered economies in the EU. This has currently obscured the strength of the underlying EU economy, making the US economy appear stronger.

Simultaneously, Italy, which had a lower dependency on Russian energy, is doing better and hopefully reducing some of its loan burden.

That’s just… fun to know?

Sheikh Hasina’s government in Bangladesh collapsed, the interim / caretaker government which has come in is headed by a Nobel Laureate. Their mandate is to prepare for another round of elections.

They don’t call themselves ministers, but advisors (iirc). I thought that was an interesting wrinkle and potential counter example for discussions on government, which happen regularly.

I don’t know how to frame my point better, but it does feel that this comment thread presupposes only a few narrow options.

Perhaps breaking from news is good when it’s just overwhelmingly negative, and designed to harm you?

But perhaps its great when its a way to address your interest and curiosity ?

Then funny part “stronger US economy” has stock crash not related in any way to events in Ukraine or Middle East. It crashed because finance guys had scheme borrowing Japanese currency and buying stocks with it.

So it is always that you might have illusion of knowing what is going on.

I love talking heads “experts” making assumptions but it is just talking and real stuff is always deeper.

So I rather people voting on their core values whatever those are than “perceived wisdom they are so informed”.

I mean, there isnt any illusion, because the stock market != economy. The statement was about economies.

Secondly - that was an incredibly short paragraph, so talking about illusions, and depth is *really* assuming a lot from under 250 words.

Plus your addition of current events, only underscored the point of needing to be aware of the news. So... thanks?

> So I rather people voting on their core values whatever those are than “perceived wisdom they are so informed”.

I think this assertion was not supported (and potentially undermined) by your supporting anecdotes.

Edit: if anything, your sharing more News to .. argue (?) against the position, supports the point that aware of current affairs is needed.

Hey we are discussing things so I am not about scoring points here ;)

I might write in confrontational tone and I like to write opposing view just for discussion sake.

I do agree market != economy. I think “perceived wisdom they are so informed” is still quite a good statement.

Ah, thanks for highlighting that. Tone can be quite a painn

> … That’s just… fun to know?

I agree, I like to read these analyses too but I don’t think they’re “news”, they’re usually in a wonky blog I follow.

On average it’s not, at least not for the average person.

But not everyone is average, and for some of those who do invest the time in going beyond superficial headlines, the payoff is considerable in terms of power, prestige, influence, and wealth.

There is also the fact that if everyone disregarded the news, society would quickly disintegrate as bad actors leveraged people’s ignorance for the own personal ends. Thus, there is a social responsibility aspect to keeping abreast of current events.

The solution may be to go back when news wasn't some action filled adventure to be consumed every hour. Social responsible news should inform the public and provide the necessary background so people can form their own views and conclusions, rather than current system of news companies that carves an audience to whom they can provide entertainment and engagement.

To make a second reference, Yes, Minister has an excellent sketch over UK news papers, beautifully illustrating how each paper has carved up their own piece of the population and provide entertainment to serve those readers. It almost 40 years old and still fairly accurate description.

It not an uncommon sentiment to hear people saying that Wikipedia is a better platform for news than news organizations, since the content will stabilize fairly fast on that which everyone agrees on, and contentions over facts becomes noticeable. The general resistance to emotional loaded words also helps combat some of the worst aspects of news.

PM: What about the people who read The Sun?

Bernard: Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as she's got big tits.

Best comedy series.

> There is also the fact that if everyone disregarded the news, society would quickly disintegrate as bad actors leveraged people’s ignorance for the own personal ends. Thus, there is a social responsibility aspect to keeping abreast of current events.

Can you provide an example of this? I honestly can't think of a single time when I learned something in the news that fit this description.

There are lots of examples of politicians resigning from press reports about them. Just recently a senator from NJ stepped done because his court case caused tons of negative publicity.

Public shaming has been less of an issue the past 10 years but it’s still kind of a thing.

> society would quickly disintegrate as bad actors leveraged people’s ignorance for the own personal ends

There is an argument that the media is that bad actor, and a contributor to society's disintegration

You can read up on what is happening like once per quarter in like a couple of hours. Following 'this just in' with 'developing stories' is a waste of time.

E.g. I read the wiki entry for Trump's assassination attempt after like a week and saved myself hours of rumours and guesses.

I think https://www.slow-journalism.com/ is trying to do what you describe.