Minichan

Topic: Is the world accelerating toward something big?

Catherine !TGirlYJKXM started this discussion 11 years ago #41,789

Every time I turn on ABC World News Today there is always an abundance of tragic stories from across the globe. Now it appears that the Islamic State has support within the borders of the United States and I'm willing to be the United Kingdom too. It was reported that they have orders to kill Americans. The Vatican received terror threats. During the past decade it felt like there has been an influx of tragic events or events leading up to tragic events all leading up to some major event. When is that major event just going to get here so we can be done with it?

Broseph !!fxnDb+Ve4 joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 1 minute later[^] [v] #555,241

It's the same crazy shit that's been going on in the world for the past century.

Anonymous C joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 1 minute later, 3 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,242

ok

they said the same exact thing about al qaeda years ago. hurr durr terrorists in our own back yard.
every time you turn on Insert X Media Here, there will be tragic shit accross the globe because a) tragic shit happens always and forever and b) it gets them views

Anonymous D joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 51 seconds later, 3 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,243

Fucking idiot.

Catherine !TGirlYJKXM (OP) replied with this 11 years ago, 52 seconds later, 4 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,244

@555,242 (C)
But isn't there always more gentle stories to break them up?
Most of the news sources today seem to be non-stop tragedies with the rare occurrence of more gentler ones.

Did the news people figured that nobody cares about these gentle stories?

Anonymous C replied with this 11 years ago, 1 minute later, 6 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,245

@previous (Catherine !TGirlYJKXM)
Gentle stories don't sell so of course there wouldn't be any gentle stories

Catherine !TGirlYJKXM (OP) replied with this 11 years ago, 3 minutes later, 9 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,246

@previous (C)
Actually, there usually are gentle stories as they provide relief to the viewers or readers in-between the more tragic ones, just seems like the tragic ones are outnumbering them nowadays.

Anonymous E joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 28 minutes later, 38 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,247

Stop watching television news. That help your world view.

squeegee joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 17 minutes later, 55 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,256

@555,246 (Catherine !TGirlYJKXM)

> Actually, there usually are gentle stories as they provide relief to the viewers or readers in-between the more tragic ones, just seems like the tragic ones are outnumbering them nowadays.

literally people have been saying this since forever. in fact it used to be called "blood and guts media." ever hear of Christine Chubbuck? she was a news anchor who was depressed and got fed up with the media only focusing on violence and tragedy, so she blew her brains out on television.
On the morning of July 15, 1974, Chubbuck confused co-workers by claiming she had to read a newscast to open her program, Suncoast Digest, something she had never done before. That morning's talk show guest waited across the studio while Chubbuck sat at the news anchor's desk. During the first eight minutes of her program, Chubbuck covered three national news stories and then a shooting from the previous day at local restaurant Beef & Bottle, at the Sarasota-Bradenton Airport. The film reel of the restaurant shooting had jammed and would not run, so Chubbuck shrugged it off and said on-camera, "In keeping with Channel 40's policy of bringing you the latest in 'blood and guts', and in living color, you are going to see another first — attempted suicide." She drew the revolver and shot herself behind her right ear. Chubbuck fell forward violently and the technical director faded rapidly to black.


i remember my parents even not watching the news always because of the growing focus on turning local tragedies into national headlines. that shit has just continued all the way to today where the main focus of the "news media" is to place a spotlight ON small local "issues" and turn them into huge national debates. It actually undermines the political process when in local elections (arguably the elections that impact you the most) are often ignored because they make it look like it's only important if it's national news.

as i see it the 24 hour news cycle has such a large content requirement that the only way they can fill all their time is to take any story they can find and talk about it in hyperbolic language and encourage polarizing debates. they manufacture controversy and turn every little fucking thing into a god damned critical emergency.

so cool your tits, it's all a fucking TV show and the vast VAST majority of it will not impact YOU in any way whatsoever. but, they WANT you to feel that something could happen, any second now so that you'll KEEP WATCHING AND COMING BACK FOR MORE. They got really good at this whole "creating a sense of news urgency" right after september 11th. for months they made people feel like watching the news was going to save their life, as if a BIOWEAPON ALERT was going to give you fair warning to duct tape plastic seals around doors, and Learn how to protect your family from radiological DIRTY BOMBS, tonight at 8 on FOXNEWS!@ (play electric guitar national anthem theme)

just stop watching the news directly, and i promise you, the important stuff will make its way to you. If it's important, you'll hear about it fast.

think of most modern "news" like radio shock jocks. They started their shock schtick and people thought they were super serious and got really pissed off at them. Nowadays most people understand it's a performance. So look at most news as, like, Shock-News, news that's meant to elicit an emotional response rather than just inform you.

Glen Beck is a perfect example of someone "doing a character" and providing "shock-news" and he shamelessly uses the same techniques of a shock-jock to engage his audience in an emotional way. positive OR negative.

read any discussion where he delves into science issues and you'll see how he manipulates his own understanding of things in order to set a certain tone about an issue. he willfully takes things out of context, misinterprets things, gives his own "summation based on his understanding of the article" (which is usually wrong, by the way) and then proceeds to tear the article up over his misinterpretation of it and he calls that PROOF that [science idea] is a hoax.

he basically said global warming is a hoax because a couple of scientists developed a hypothetical mathematical model that eliminates the need for a singularity to exist prior to the big bang. Beck said, "oh, so they're saying the big bang didn't happen? This is like undisputable proof now that the Big Bang is a farce, and if science can't get that right then global warming is fake too."

like fucking seriously, his understanding of what was being said was beneath that of a 16 year old (my nephew)
he also had guests explaining it to him, presumably so that his understanding was based on their incorrect explanation of something completely unrelated to Global Warming. it's a fucking troll!@ he's trolling with paid sock puppets, i fucking swear. some people eat it up, some people eat it up to throw it up. but shit sells.

anyway, stop paying attention to Shock Media. every bit of it isn't news! every. bit. of it.

(Edited 4 minutes later.)

hamfist !t5TYQ9eJPs joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 3 minutes later, 58 minutes after the original post[^] [v] #555,257

shut up

FuckAlms !vX8K53rFBI joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 23 minutes later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #555,265

@555,256 (squeegee)
> just stop watching the news directly, and i promise you, the important stuff will make its way to you. If it's important, you'll hear about it fast.
The scope of my regular internet browsing is mostly limited to tc/mc, otk, bulbapedia and wikipedia articles that I navigate to by name, and tinychan IRC. Even with such a limited sampling, I usually have heard something about newsworthy stuff when my mom mentions it at dinner. Basically, as someone who doesn't really even try to stay in the loop, I can confirm that what squeegee says is true.

squeegee replied with this 11 years ago, 2 minutes later, 1 hour after the original post[^] [v] #555,266

@previous (FuckAlms !vX8K53rFBI)
oh yeah, absolutely. i mean, WW3 breaks out you'll hear about it.

Anonymous E replied with this 11 years ago, 1 hour later, 3 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,280

@555,256 (squeegee)
> anyway, stop paying attention to Shock Media. every bit of it isn't news! every. bit. of it.
Well said.

@OP
Just stop watching things that base ratings on how many "doom is happening" stories they can cram into their timeslot. Seriously, television news is one reason old people develop agoraphobia. All they see of the outside world is the violence and accidents that happen near them, and they misjudge the danger of going outside. Then they become shut-ins watching the television for all their information about what is happening outside their homes... which just feeds them more violence and chaos. Local news and television news in general make ratings by up-playing crazy stories and acting like they're reporting something important or some end-of-the-world scenario rather than some mundane occurrence. Read the news for a while. (either via Internet or buy a fucking newspaper) It's still a load of crappy violence, but take comfort in the fact the middle east has really never been anything but a load of crappy violence for 4,500 years and people argue about rights all the time - we've been doing it as a nation since before we were a nation.

Anonymous I joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 6 hours later, 9 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,347

lolno, just more media hype in 'merikkka specifically and the world getting more interconnected

fear sells

calm down catherine

(Edited 20 seconds later.)

Anonymous J joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 1 hour later, 11 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,372

bomb mecca, problem solved

FuckAlms !vX8K53rFBI replied with this 11 years ago, 59 minutes later, 12 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,386

@previous (J)
*Euthanize all humans, problem solved.

Syntax joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 5 minutes later, 12 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,390

1500 years b4 the Crusades Rag Heads and Christians were at each others throats. Then the Crusades up to present, the more things change the more they remain the same.

If Earth survives pollution then 1500 years from now Rag Heads vs Muslims until the very last person is burned to the stake.

Anonymous L joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 1 hour later, 13 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,410

@555,243 (D)

> Fucking idiot.
shh she doesn't know

Anonymous M joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 4 hours later, 18 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,499

@555,256 (squeegee)
I love the weird floaty wandering camerawork on Glenn Beck's show.

Anonymous N joined in and replied with this 11 years ago, 7 minutes later, 18 hours after the original post[^] [v] #555,504

Yes, the sun.
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