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The best and most effective remedy is to stop watching TV news.
IMO, one of the better ways to insulate yourself against the emotional devastation of news today is to immerse yourself in History books, and try and comprehend the theory of Karma.
I haven't watched televised news in years, only read the papers, and you can just be thankful the media doesn't dwell on the more unfortunate victims, (10 lucky? people died and and only? 40 injured), like those with their limbs blown off, those left blinded, living thru the hell of survival in a 3rd world country.
Or, a 1st or 2nd world country, for that matter!
The best and most effective remedy is to stop watching TV news.
I can't say this enough! I have had to stop watching the news and hell avoid most of the internet because it was really causing me to become depressed. I have to get out into nature and enjoy the beauty of it all and it has caused a very positive change in me!
I felt the same this morning.. in fact, despondent is the first word that popped into my mind. The world has always been a bit sh*tty, people have always killed each other, wars have always broken out over religion, power, race and other crap, but emotionally it's hit me hard because these things have happened in close proximity in a place close to home (France). I honestly felt like crying when the news from Nice broke.
I never look at videos of people being killed or dying, and generally avoid images of lifeless bodies or pools of blood.
I agree with someone else that social media and 24 hour news means we are much more exposed to all of this. Terrorism in Europe for example was at its highest in the 1970s and 1980s when there were literally hundreds of terrorist attacks, especially here in the UK (IRA and Basque Nationalists being the biggest culprits), they appeared on the news but it felt like we weren't bombarded with it like we are now, and obviously on social media you see some distressing images you wouldn't otherwise see.
It does feel like the world is in pieces right now but it's always been like this. In the West, we just seem a bit more exposed than we did before. 2016 has been a torrid year thus far but I genuinely believe we will get over it. I mean, you have to keep some hope otherwise you just end up wallowing around feeling sorry for yourself.. we've faced adversity before and we'll face it again.
Last edited by dunno what to put here; 07-19-2016 at 07:09 AM..
"The first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb, when it comes, find us doing sensible and human things — praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts — not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs." ~ C.S. Lewis, 1948
I suppose the decisions by the criminal (well, unethical/immoral) element in "power" affects me....at a minimum, I get the bill. I also see how their policies have destroyed the earth, and how their position on guns leads to multiple deaths of the most heinous sort day in and day out.
And there is no shortage of media happy to bring me this 'news' every minute of every day.
So, I ski, I hike, I read, I listen and play music. I engage on a local level with thoughtful, diverse people. I garden, I woodwork, and I do things which challenge my mind and skills at a level not contemplated by the people who, for their own financial benefit, bring us the worst of bad behaviors--mostly without giving it a second thought, or they are so engrossed in self aggrandizement that they don't even see that their behaviors, words and actions are destroying humanity.
Are they truly that stupid, or just that clever? It no longer matters to me. I know I make my mark in a manner consistent with my principles and they far extend past the perversely destructive actions that they would use to poison all of us for their self absorbed benefit.
Here's something interesting about what I read about it and the pictures I saw.
Attack lasted 30 minutes
Covered a stretch of 1 mile
Truck was speeding at 40 mph
(Is that the new math? How is the above scenario possible?
People had HALF HOUR to get out of the way, were they standing waiting to be run over for 25 minutes?)
Every photo showed bodies covered in CLEAN WHITE sheets/tarps.
No EMS personnel to be seen
no ambulances
no police
no taped off crime areas
Just bodies everywhere
No blood, clean asphalt
Front of truck was pristine, no blood there either
Read all news with a critical mind FIRST before becoming emotional.
Turn OFF the news. Stop watching. Spend time with your family and friends, do things that MATTER to you. Be happy, be healthy, be loved.
I obviously saw different footage than you did. I saw police chasing the truck, shooting at it. I saw PLENTY of blood and gore. I saw EMS. The front of the truck I saw was not pristine. And I saw coverings of all different colors over the bodies. People that spout crap like this need to go see those families in person and see if their grief is made up too.
I have stopped watching TV news channels and have pretty much gone back to print, albeit on reliable internet sites. I tried to watch one of the TV channels (CNN maybe?) on the Baton Rouge events and they just keep repeating the same stuff and showing film clips from six hours earlier like it was all happening then and there. I never listen to talk radio.
Buck up...Things are actually better than they seem if you disregard all the hysterical people trying to manipulate public opinion. There are also real problems that we need to pay attention to. If we could solve five or six problems in the world -- and I think that is possible to do -- we would have calmed things down a great deal. I see where the Gates Foundation is going to spend $5 billion in Africa. They are already working to eliminate polio in the last two places it exists. The Carter Foundation is wiping out river blindness. I'm sure there are other advances taking place. But we will still have the seemingly insurmountable problems of greed, power and religious fanaticism to confront along with natural and man made disasters...as always.
I can't say this enough! I have had to stop watching the news and hell avoid most of the internet because it was really causing me to become depressed. I have to get out into nature and enjoy the beauty of it all and it has caused a very positive change in me!
And above all I don't read the comments section from any media newspaper. People are like rabid animals- so full of hate and they basically say the same thing and they parrot what they read. It's like a contest for who cant get as mean and nasty as they can.
It is so easy to read the headlines and see the bias reporting, so I rarely even skim the headlines these days.
I gave up on TV news (especially local news) in about 1979. Twin girls, school children, were hit by lightning and killed right on a city sidewalk. As if it was not bad enough to show the sheet covering the children, the evening news had on film their father arriving at the scene and discovering that his daughters were dead. They repeatedly showed his shock and anguish on the evening news! I was just a student myself, but I could not understand the inhumanity of that news organization. And that's when I realized that they were not about keeping us informed and benefiting the community. They were purveyors of human agony, fear, and grief, and show us only those things sensational enough to draw a crowd. They appeal to the lowest instincts of humans, and are proud of it. They spoon feed us only the worst the world has to offer. Is it any wonder that we feel discouraged?
stop watching the news, reading the papers, listening to the radio or surfing the net. shut off the computer, shut off the tv, cancel the newspapers and toss the radio in the trash. walk outside your front door, look at the sun, the trees and the wildlife, smile, be happy, live life to its fullest, enjoy every moment.
History books will teach you: nothing is new in this world! Only in different forms! And, despite what's going on in the world, we'll never have it any better!
I also gain "comfort" from the fact that it takes 100 years to build up a civilization, and just one day to destroy it all! Civilization is merely paper-thin, and I celebrate every day this planet has escaped mass destruction.
My biggest reason for not watching the crime scenes on TV, or reading about them in a vastly edited form, is the why's. Why did the husband kill his wife and 3 kids? Why did the man kill his boss and co-workers? Why did this man crash his car into a concrete abutment? Why was this police officer shot? I want to know the underlying reasons that led up to! But the media only leaves you guessing!
Same with the obituary columns. You know all too well, if you're good at reading between the lines, any number of those in the obituary columns committed suicide, but they're prevented from revealing that. Wouldn't you like to know the reasons why?
My niece shocked me by saying there were 5 teen suicides, over the last 2 years, at a high school her son attended back in WI, and you can well-imagine how those obituaries were written! But then, that might leave the OP even more despondent!
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