I do not know where to begin this train of thoughts, but I chose to start by summing it up for those of you who won’t read the whole text just by looking at its length. 😋
I’m the kind of person who likes to think that having an opinion is very important and I’m also aware that my opinion will differ from most others and that doesn’t mean they are wrong. I believe it is important to enter a debate with an open mind in order to get anything constructive out of it. If not, why debate at all? I mean, if we all leave an argument without considering what we’ve heard why did we bother to talk about it.
The reason I start by stating something that seems obvious is because as soon as we talk about certain topics this “obvious” thing is very soon forgotten.
We are all going through a tough period of time right now and we should be very careful to judge people because the truth is that we don’t know how current events are affecting everybody.
I normally don’t feel the need to write about these things, but lately there are two things that are bothering me every single day without exception and I’m feeling very frustrated about it. It’s not really affecting me personally directly, but it bothers me and in the long run it affects us all because politics is driven by this nonsense.
The first thing that bothers me is our media. The journalism I’m seeing is getting worse by the minute and it’s horrible. I know they make a living out of getting people to read and “click baiting” is an almost necessary way to get that. I stopped complaining about those headers as long as they actually had something to do with the actual article. When they don’t it still bothers me a lot. But in these times of international crisis on several levels I find it disgusting that news are so polarized, politicalized, and selective that they are not intended to inform us of what is happening but rather to shape our opinion about it.
Before the lot of you say that media has always been like that, I am aware. I just get physically ill when I see it gets so much worse when what we really need is neutral genuinely good journalism. I can’t for the life of me find that anywhere. That being said, I don’t read all newspapers in the whole world, but what I have read (Norwegian news, Spanish news, some British and some US news…) is about what the politics are doing right or wrong, about the calamities where things are the worst and about creating/speculating in the scenarios we are going to get. And of course, news about how bad the economy is and how worse it is than when it was at its worst.
Why can’t we promote real statistics from the neutral or positive perspective? There is no need to focus only on how many are sick, how many are intubated and how many died. What about focusing on the survival rate, on the people that made it, on the work that is being put into solving this and for crying out loud… make news about other than this as well! And yes, I am aware that there are news about this too, but it’s on the lower end and it gets pushed down the page really fast.
Have you noticed that the pictures of the people the journalist talk about are normally a sign about whether you are supposed to sympathize with the person or not? It’s been like that always, but it’s still fascinating to see how we are supposed to be manipulated by the media at all times.
Now, let’s talk about part two. This is the worst part of it and it’s been like this for a while now. Social media allows something that wasn’t there before. News are shared on platforms that allow for public debate. It’s not only those who read the news that talk, but also everyone else because they don’t actually have to read to comment. I’m not going to go into depth about “net trolls” because they are actually not the worst problem, they are just a part of it.
Internet allows for people to speak their mind (like I’m doing right now) almost without repercussion at all and they don’t have to face the person they are talking to. This makes people say things they wouldn’t elsewhere. In these Covid-19 times we also have a growing “judgmental attitude” that infuriates me.
Here in Norway we have had a partial lockdown and daycare and elementary schools have been deemed to open soon. I’m not going to talk about my thoughts on this because I don’t want that to become a topic. I want to talk about peoples attitude towards this news. And now I’m talking specifically about all these Facebook “knowitall” people. Comments like “I’m not sending my kid to school! Are we all mad? They are risking the life of the youngest, how crazy do they think we are?” with answers like “You are not experts, the government after careful assessment have decided this and that’s what we have to do.”
I might have an opinion, but when an opinion is expressed like that you might as well shout “anybody that disagrees with me is STUPID!” and that’s a horrible attitude to have. Why can’t we have different opinions but still respect each other? Not to talk about how social media seems to affect decisions in politics, but social media only reflect those who speak the “loudest”, not a majority. I am sometimes tempted to comment, but then I think about the shitstorm it might create and the fact that people for the most part don’t use arguments, the ridicule instead… and I don’t.
I feel so sorry for those parents who feel like BAD PARENTS because the don’t do as everybody (represented by the loud Facebook “knowitalls”) say you should. You get looked at if you go to the store with your kid because you shouldn’t bring kids. You get criticized if you choose to let your kid play with a friend or two because that’s disrespectful to the rest of society. You get shamed for posting on social media asking for help on how to make your kids understand the importance of social distancing because if you can’t get through to your kid you are a bad parent. What the f****** hell is wrong with you!!!????
I read an article in the local news some weeks ago, after Norway banned the use of second residence, that actually said a lot of the same things that I think. When that ban was enforced there was a lot of trash talking ,on social media as well as in person, between those who felt like they were being treated unfairly for not being allowed this and those who called them self centered because this was a sacrifice they shouldn’t mind making. There was nothing wrong with the topic at all, but the ways people were talking to each other and even vandalizing others property, it’s just wrong. This article talked about this and tried to remind people about the fact that we actually have to live in the same community even after all this is over so we should really think about how we want our relationship with our neighbor to be in a year or two. We don’t have to agree, but keep things civilized and respectful.
And all the comments on this article were about whether people should use second residence or not in a rather hostile tone. Because who needed to read any of what the poor girl had to say? 😔
I go to bed feeling like I’m loosing faith in humanity every day, but I wake up to the hope that there are probably a lot of people out there like me… that don’t want to be part of the shitstorm online, but that might realize that if we don’t start speaking up our democracy is getting lead (mislead) by the loud part of stupid masses.
I don’t mind peoples opinions, but I DO MIND THEIR ATTITUDE! 😡
