I remember as a kid and teenager that I was watching the six o’clock news religiously. I always wanted to stay up to date and know everything that went on in the world.  I can’t say that the news made me feel good; there was so much bad stuff going on in the world. It made me feel helpless… Helpless because I did not know how to help these people other than donating my pocket money to charity and writing letters for Amnesty International.

One night they showed on the news how Pakistanis were beating up Israeli’s with rocks. I saw how they beat the life out of them. I could literally feel the pain those tortured people must have felt. It made me sick to my stomach, it made me cry and I was getting bad nightmares about it. I don’t know why this particular news item got to me so badly. Maybe it was for the first time I truly realized that some things in the world were not only not fair, but some people were downright cruel. For the first time in years I did not want to watch the news any more.

I still have a love-hate relationship with the news on TV. I am curious and I do want to be aware of what is going on, but I hate being confronted with only bad news. Why can’t they have a little ‘Good news” section? Why are we only shown the bad things that are going on in the world? Yes, I realize that awareness is important, but how about focusing a bit more on how you can help or on the good or inspirational things in the world?

So lately I am getting my news updates mainly from an online newspaper. Why? Because I can just skim through the headlines and choose what I want to read. I don’t want to read articles about how many more soldiers died in a war, I don’t want to read about another case of massive mesothelioma victims, I don’t want to read about how a father killed his whole family and then committed suicide, etc. I want to read about how the Dutch swim team got a new world record, I want to read about all the blunders Clinton & Obama are making, I want to read about things that put a smile on my face or that inspire me.

I do not want to hear or read about things that make me feel sick and helpless because I can’t change a thing about the situation. Does that make me ignorant? It probably does, but you know what? I donate as much money as I can to charities even though I can’t really miss the money. And I sign petitions to make a statement. But watching the news? No thank you!

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