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News Boycot

I cant take it anymore..

Im very "well read" when it comes to current events..
I get the newspaper delivered 7 days a week..
It take it into work with me and read it at lunch..
then read Sat and Sun editions at home..

Driving to and from work, I listen to a local news/talk radio station.

Then most days I usually watch the 6:00 local news and/or the 6:30 national news..
I know what is going on in the world every day!

lately..its just WAY too much constant constant constant bad news..
yes, I know the economy sucks..do I really need to hear about it ten thousand times a day every day for months on end?

then yesterday, yet MORE endless layoffs at Kodak announced..
my wife was laid off 3 years ago, she still hasnt found a job..just a few temp jobs.
If I lose my job we are royally screwed..both of us out of work, no health insurance, and even my "backup, temporary" job prospects, at 1/3 the salary, (Home depot and starbucks..I have worked at both before) are laying off thousands and closing stores..they wont be hiring either...there are literally NO job prospects for either of us..

So..ive had it with the news..I am going on an all-out news boycott for 2 weeks, maybe a month..if something REALLY big happens, im sure I will still hear about it...but other than that, I dont WANT to know what is happening in the world for awhile...because..why bother? why do I need to hear this news ten thousand times a day??
its just way too depressing..

so im dropping out for a few weeks..im going to bring in a book to work to read during lunch..

Let me know if China plans to invade..apart from that, I simply dont care any more..

Scot
 
I don't blame you Scotty. Sorry about your wife's current unemployment. I went thru a bout of that myself about ten years ago here in this great blue state of Michigan.

Big Media in this country is designed to keep us churned up and unsettled. Bad news sells, so they say. Fear and despair allows us to be manipulated. Manipulated by Media, Madison Avenue, the Entertainment Industry and Big-Brother government.

Big Media are called the "drive-bys" for a reason: They zoom by us firing blasts of doom & gloom into the crowd and then they speed away and onto the next incident without any concern of the damage that they've roht.

Overall the national economy isn't near as bad as reported by the drive-bys. We're no where near the Jimmy Carter years of high interest rates and stagflation, yet they repeatedly tell us that it's 1930 Depression all over again! Things have been better but we are not dead yet..........

You're doing right Scotty. Get out of the bad-news loop. Read an uplifting and inspirational book. Check out other news sources on the Net or talk-radio. Enjoy your plants and look forward to a new and glorious Spring & Summer.

Hang in there buddy. We're with ya. We'll whip this economic rut if we all hang together.
 
Thanks Fryster

Big Media in this country is designed to keep us churned up and unsettled. Bad news sells, so they say. Fear and despair allows us to be manipulated. Manipulated by Media, Madison Avenue, the Entertainment Industry and Big-Brother government.

Big Media are called the "drive-bys" for a reason: They zoom by us firing blasts of doom & gloom into the crowd and then they speed away and onto the next incident without any concern of the damage that they've roht.

I totally agree with you there!
the added problem is that people begin to believe things are much worse than they are, because of the media, then start to react to the media's distorted view.."we better cut WAY back on spending!" which then makes things worse in reality..
its a self-fulfilling prophecy..
thinking things are worse than they are makes things worse than they need to be..
so I seriously believe the media is helping to make the economy worse..

Scot
 
For the most part, I stopped watching the news & reading the newspaper years ago. I found that it was 1) really depressing (since they go for the most sensational 'news' items) & 2) not really representative of what is/was happening (since they go for the most sensational 'news' items). I've found that I hear about the 'big' things that I might actually care about anyway & I periodically do 'my' version of a drive-by with some of the internet new sites - at least this way, I'm in control & can skim/skip articles.
Then most days I usually watch the 6:00 local news and/or the 6:30 national news..
The local news is the absolute worst! When my wife & I occasionally watch a show which ends at 11, the local news inserts a 5-10 second ultra-sensational 'teaser' for their upcoming news. When this happens, I feel like I've been smashed in the face with a baseball bat. Ex: the show we're watching just finishes and a newscaster appears and hollers "SCHOOLBUS CRASHES IN THE BRONX - DETAILS @ 11" or "GUNMAN KILLS 3 CHILDREN IN ROBBERY - DETAILS @ 11". There isn't even enough time to switch channels. By the time you hit the remote, their little 'splat in your face' is done. If we watch anything now, we quickly change channels just before the credits...
 
You might go further by even quitting TV cold turkey. I quit smoking in Sept. and quit watching TV back before Xmas and it's wonderful. I don't miss either of them at all. I still watch the Daily Show / Colbert Report (taped) every night after work but that has cut my viewing down from who-knows-how-much, to an hour a day at 5 am when I get home from work. And I'm usually checkin' the email and forums during that "viewing" hour.

It's amazing how much time you "discover" you actually have when you're not a slave to the tube or the radio. You find that you suddenly have a very active mind (more so than before) and it's not an angry or disheveled mind but all that influence from TV is what put you in the fluctuating states we've all been in, spending most of our lives under it's sway. We hate to think we can be controlled that way but it's all very subversive and quite a bit like a bad drug.

TV - Just say no! :D
 
The whole no TV thing is really intersetting. I have failed to get cable here when moved and honestly havent missed it since. Infact I find this qoute by Kurt Vonnegut even more enlightening with out TV. "Future generations will look back on TV as the lead in the water pipes that slowly drove the Romans mad." I am supprised at how much time tv does kill for you and you get nothing done or accomplished. I still read the news but I do it online so I have more control over what garbage I am being fed.
 
Television ain't called "the one-eyed monster" for nuthin'.......... ;) ;)

I mostly use my TV set for viewing taped movies (yeah, I still use S-VHS tapes sometimes) and/or watching my favorite films or classic TV shows on DVD.

I'm not even sure why I'm still paying these outrageous monthly cable bills. (???)
 
The news is all about getting ratings. And I honestly feel there's a reason it's called 'news' and not 'facts'. There are so many horrendous errors in everyday news pieces, both printed and broadcast. I've notice this especially with scientific, technical or industry specific pieces, such as aviation related news - they ALWAYS have horribly inaccurate and wrong information. IMO its main purpose is to generate money, with accuracy taking a very a distant place on the list of priorities.

My TV serves two main purposes now: Play Xbox 360 on, and watch "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia".

As an aside, I wish you luck with your job situation and hope it works out for the better. I hope things look up for your wife also. I've been laid off or furloughed 3 times in the past 8 years, with the last occurring in July. Just last week I found a job after much searching! It's extremely stressful! Each time caused huge setbacks for us financially that we just start to recover from only to have it happen again. I'm hoping I've finally found some stability.
 
Definitely You Tube has replaced TV for me if I feel like sitting back and watching something I can watch / hear lectures, poetry readings, interviews, documentaries, performances, etc on anything I can imagine. Stuff that you'd never get to see on TV - on even the most channel laden cable setups. Sites like You Tube could replace TV for a lot of people once they discover it's not just for teenagers posting "beat downs" filmed with their cell phones.

I don't think the mainstream media really cares whether they give anything resembling facts or correct information. It's not uncommon for anyone with a special education on any topic to get irritated when they see their topic represented on TV with inaccuracies and misrepresentations, sometimes they do seem purposefully misleading. But that's not really a good channel slogan... "Live at five - the most inaccurate news team on the planet!"
 
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TV is bad for people in general and the local news is the crystal meth of the TV world. I was worried about you when I heard of the Kodak layoffs and hope you do OK. I wish everyone could.
 
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