News is bad for your health. It leads to fear and aggression, and hinders your creativity and ability to think deeply. The solution? Stop consuming it altogether
Rolf Dobelli
Friday 12 April 2013 15.00 EDT
http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/apr/12/news-is-bad-rolf-dobelli
In the past few decades, the fortunate among us have recognised the hazards of living with an overabundance of food (obesity, diabetes) and have started to change our diets. But most of us do not yet understand that news is to the mind what sugar is to the body. News is easy to digest. The media feeds us small bites of trivial matter, tidbits that don't really concern our lives and don't require thinking. That's why we experience almost no saturation. Unlike reading books and long magazine articles (which require thinking), we can swallow limitless quantities of news flashes, which are bright-coloured candies for the mind. Today, we have reached the same point in relation to information that we faced 20 years ago in regard to food. We are beginning to recognise how toxic news can be.
I quit television altogether, and I only read the local paper. I've been much happier, and I don't feel disconnected at all.
Seeing the television and mass media generated storms blowing through DU gives me a greater awareness of how much news is pure propaganda, fog, and utter bullshit.
Hillary's emails? Please...