Being Informed.

I don't watch the news. I've learned that watching the news leaves me feeling:
angry
horrified
disgusted
depressed.

I'm well aware of man's inhumanity to man, and to his fellow creatures on the earth, I don't need a daily reminder via my tv. I've pretty much stopped admitting to this non-watching of the news, because I decided years ago that if one more person asked in amazement, "Don't you want to be informed?" I'd start screaming.

No, I don't want to be informed of the latest rapes, murders, thefts, muggings, beatings, deadly car crashes, wars, abuses, or any of the other millions of horrific actions people choose to take on a daily basis. I can't do a damn thing about any of it, so I don't want to hear about it. It's all completely beyond my control; a steady diet of the terrible things people do only depresses me, and triggers my negative thinking. I start to view the world, and mankind, as hopelessly evil and corrupt. If that's the case, then what's the use of any of my small effort? It's a teaspoon to an ocean. Etc, etc, until I'm in such a state of gloom, that it takes concerted effort to climb back out of the pit.

Now and then, I will have a conversation with someone who is determined to talk about some horror from the news, and who wants to describe it to me in full gory detail. I've learned to say -politely - that I don't want to hear about it, please.

I've moved far and away past the point of caring if others think I'm wierd for not watching the news, or reading the paper. I had a conversation with someone last night, who said that I should watch the news "so I knew what people are capable of."
I learned that in my childhood; it's not a lesson one is likely to forget. Daily reminders of it aren't good for me, they take me down a road I do not wish to travel.

I've worked to develop a more positive attitude about life. Watching the news makes this positive attitude impossible for me to sustain, so I don't watch the news. It's a simple fix.  Sometimes life really is that easy, but I complicate it unnecessarily, because I just cannot accept that the solution has been sitting there in front of me the entire time.