I read somewhere that the pleasure centres in our brains light up like a discotheque every time we learn something new. You can see the logic behind it from an evolutionary point of view. We were just another animal in a scary dark jungle and were sharing the house with a lot of scary and potentially fatal things. What you didn’t know could literally kill you. And I think news publications, TV channels and social media plays off on this very same base instinct of ours: the desire to know more things.
Most of us rationalise our news cravings as a need to be aware of the world around. But we end up viewing the world and others with a very cynical lens. It definitely works for the news networks and the people who own them because happy loving people don’t make up for a subservient bunch of voters. They’re usually not good and frequent consumers and they have this irritation habit of questioning things.
You can usually guess a person’s preferred news outlet by their opinions nowadays. Although, just like we can ponder on the classic question, ‘what came first- the chicken or the egg?’ there’s also the similar: Is someone a hateful bigot because they watch Republic TV or do they watch Republic TV because they’ve always been a hateful bigot?
The Covid-19 outbreak and the current situation has increased my scepticism of the news reporting industry and media outlets. I have been an anxious person for the past few years and the situation right now has definitely been an aggravating factor. Being a self-employed advertising professional dependent on the restaurant and event industry for income has made it inexplicably worse. But I am amazed to realise that the constant news updates and Corona-patient scoreboards were the worst.
Most news channels have these 100 headlines in 2 minutes kind of hourly telecasts. And I’ve noticed that almost 85+ news of these 100 are usually shitty news: rapes, murder, theft, corruption, mob stupidity and incompetent bureaucracy. But right now this ratio seems to have spread to all our communication. Most WhatsApp forwards these days are fear-inducing updates, fake news, heresy, bizarre immunity building ‘tips’ and a recent addition has been ‘our religion/ fitness regime is the best cure against the virus’ genre. Social media updates are no better, most of them fall into either of these categories: oh look the world is on fire, my favourite leader is the best, buy my products, the virus will be here till 2022 or the dalgona coffee challenge!
Full disclosure: I too have posted and will keep on posting things from the above categories. Some of my favourite people also do. And I am sure neither one of us is going to stop. But my problem is the fact that never before has this affected me so much. The fact that I’ve never written and published something online about other people’s posting habits is proof enough! Or maybe it was always affecting me negatively, but I had to-do lists to tick off, meetings to go to, products to sell, places to go to and other things to ignore the wounds.
I usually try to end most of my writings on a positive note. Lately, whenever I cannot find one, or even force one, I try my best not to publish it. Because I believe that any interaction with me online or offline, should be uplifting for others, else there is no use sharing, right? I know pain hurts less if we choose to share because we might hear back from someone who has gone through it too. Their tips on how to cope or relatability might make us feel less alone. If nothing else, then, we’ll have one less scar to hide and pretend about.
But here I cannot think of a positive note. Sure, if you’re like most of us and still cannot give up news and updates I’d suggest some happy-news outlets. (GoodGoodGood & The happy Broadcast)
My actual worry is our own behaviour and not the way these media outlets operate. They telecast what they do, because of demand and supply, right? So all of us, or at least a majority of us have made it possible for them to be profitably in business even when every primetime bulletin brings us nothing else, but more anxiety. As a copywriter one of my proudest moment was coming up with the line: ‘Everyone wants to change the world but they don’t even want to change the channel’. It has never felt more apt.
Do you think if the apocalypse comes, news-readers would come on screen and just say, ‘That’s it from us. Shit just got real. You’re on your own. You’ve always been’. Or would they try to sell their advertising minutes at jacked up prices while claiming that it was their channel that brought you the news of the apocalypse first? Do you think they’ll have sponsors for the chaos and its live telecast? Will our favourite Instagram influencers Livestream the end? And most importantly, will you like, share and subscribe if I guarantee to bring it to your screen before everyone else?
Imaginary Memory 