no news today

… nor tomorrow.

Why is it that all news outlets spit out and repeat the same nothing­ness day in and day out, with only minor vari­a­tions in the pretty woolly com­ments they wrap every­thing in in their feeble attempts to make what is essen­ti­ally worth nothing, appear like some­thing worth paying atten­tion to?

Most of today's “news” seems to fall under the following nonsensical variants… “Be afraid, be very afraid.”
“Every­thing is twice as bad every­where as every­where else.”
“We have no idea, but we insist on tel­ling you what to think.” … with zero quali­fi­ca­tions for how and why any­thing is, or can be, what they tell us. God have mercy…

So, am I the only one who feels that what passes most of the world's news­desks these days, seems to have been tailored for our trash­cans rather than our screens, speakers, and in print? That hardly any of what is called “news” is worth turning on TVs, lap­tops, cell­phones and radios for, and most defi­ni­tely not worth buying or opening online or offline news­papers for?

Was it any better in days past? Not really … at least not as far back as I can re­mem­ber. But, back then we knew that (at least) ninety percent of every­thing was crap, and simply ignored the nonsense without mentioning it.

These days the most crappy ways to sort and serve news are pretty much oblig­atory – as “required by law” – across the board, and near impos­sible to avoid since most of the more trust­worthy alter­na­tives we had back in time are either prevented from getting through to us, or, they may have chosen to drop to the same low levels as the majority in order to survive, and have thereby made them­selves equally irrelevant.

distract and diverge

“When big names talk, they talk to _(insert news outlet(s) here)_”, and beyond varying amounts of hot air one can not expect much regard­less of names (and head-sizes), and chosen “news” outlet(s). They are just perfect examples of how to wrap loads of crappy nothing­ness and lies in even more of the same crappy nothing­ness and lies, in order to confuse and distract the masses.

The idea is to distract people with whatever is at hand, and diverge their atten­tion from what mat­ters in their lives, into blind support of what matters to the self-ap­pointed leaders in our societies.
This is easier to achieve than it sounds, as anything and everything can be used to distract when all the good and more real alter­na­tives are being blocked. All one needs is a little imagi­na­tion, and the ability to gather enough loyal, or just plain stupid, fol­lowers to create the illu­sions of trends.
Trends are power­ful tools for con­trol­ling masses, regard­less of how stupid those trends may be.

Once people with little to no under­standing of and inte­rest in relevant sub­jects, start gathering in masses to defend their right to stay igno­rant, the bases for self-perpe­tua­ting political and quasi-religious move­ments craving domi­nant leaders rather than know­ledge, are created.
Aspiring leaders depend on such move­ments of devoted, obedient and preferably totally igno­rant people, in order to ful­fill their plans of di­verg­ing from present courses onto (for them) more suit­able and pro­fit­able ones.

History has more than enough examples of how important it is for despots to dumb down news and infor­ma­tion to levels of the low­est com­mon de­no­mi­na­tors, in order to build and keep their bases of followers at those low levels.
Despots don't want intel­li­gent and know­ledge­able followers, as they won't fol­low for very long.

It is espe­ci­ally impor­tant to reach and con­vert those who most easily come to rely entirely on faith and trust in idols and trend setters, rather than facts about sub­jects. Such people are the easiest to mani­pu­late into doing all the dirty work, and to spread “the one true gospel” (what­ever it may be) with­out asking trouble­some ques­tions related to reality.

when big names talk…

… listen carefully to what they do not talk about, as what really mat­ters is guar­an­teed to be found some­where in between those spoken words. It always was, and always will be that way.

No trust in fellow humans? Sure I have, but for “big names” only when presented with verifiable data rooted in reality to back up what they talk about and stand for. Not to forget how strong proofs that are needed to assure me that what they keep silent about won't be used to hurt us.
All to avoid being pulled in by unre­al­istic beliefs in sweet and/​or bom­bastic lines of mean­ing­less words and phrases.

That most of what “big names” talk about isn't worth listening to, is one thing. How­ever, if one chooses to listen anyway, then one must listen care­fully and track every nuance, as other­wise too many of their lies, and what they leave out, may pass un­no­ticed.
This is where most mistakes are made by the audience, in that most people end up reacting to what they thought was being said, rather than to what was actually being said. Not very smart, IMO.

Reacting too quickly to news is in itself most often not a good idea either, as it is too easy to get it all wrong regard­less of the quality of the news and our under­standing of it.
Taking the time to reflect on what is brought to our atten­tion, and to compare it to other sources before deciding if any of it is worth reacting to and if so in what way, is nearly always the better way to collect and process news.

All that, while making up ones mind whether to pay atten­tion to any of it – “big names” and all, or to turn off and get rid of all offi­cial news gathering objects in our pos­ses­sion, including the mail-box.
Choices, choices…

sincerely 

Hageland 25.dec.2020
last rev: 22.sep.2023