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Original poster

What the hell is going on with the world??

98 replies

Mummytotwonow · 07/02/2023 22:49

So far this week:

  • Poor lady missing in the woods
  • Mob gang beat up the school girl
  • Headteacher and daughter killed
  • Over 7000 people killed in Turkey earthquake
  • Continuing cost of living crisis
  • wars going on
  • so on and so on

Has it always been this bad or am I being over sensitive? I feel so depressed my children are growing up in this world.

I know there are good things going on and good people out there but all I see is doom and gloom and awful events happening. It’s easy to say step away from the news but is that just turning a blind eye?

I just don’t know anymore… feel like either the world has gone mad or I have. It’s so overwhelming 😢

OP posts:
IClaudine · 07/02/2023 22:51

It has always been this bad, but 24/7 news and social media makes everything seem worse.

RJnomore1 · 07/02/2023 22:52

Statistically it’s as good as it’s ever been in human history but we have 24/7 and pretty instant news flows focused on it so it feels constant.

it’s a shame good news doesn’t sell.

AnneLovesGilbert · 07/02/2023 22:54

It’s always been like this. The world feels a lot smaller than it ever has before and we know more about awful things happening further afield.

Our ancestors would have been aware of major wars abroad and local tragedies but not the sheer number of things going on at any one time.

It’s okay to protect yourself and choose to be less informed. The 24 hour news cycle needs filling and natural disasters, war, atrocities, murders etc make for dramatic viewing. It’s not a bad thing to detach from it when it’s all too much.

DuplicateUserName · 07/02/2023 22:57

I imagine it was far worse during WW1 and WW2 but as others have said, nowhere near as much access to news.

Jellykat · 07/02/2023 22:58

I think the monumental stuff we've had to deal with over the last 3 years, means bad news is heaping on more bad news..
The majority of people i know are struggling in one way or another, i think we're all overwhelmed tbh

ThomasWaghornsConeHat · 07/02/2023 22:58

It's the non stop news machine. The earthquake is sadly just nature ( ie not our doing - except for building on fault lines). But the male violence just seems never ending. Its easy to think there's no limit to amount of men that wish serious harm to women and kids. Dh was shocked that the husband killed the ht. I asked him how many women shot their husband's then kill their kids?

HeavenIsAHalfpipe · 07/02/2023 23:00

I'm sorry you're feeling so blue @Mummytotwonow but as a pp said, things are no worse now than they have always been. We have been through similar stuff, and worse, in the past, and we have got through it.

Original poster
Mummytotwonow · 07/02/2023 23:02

How do people manage to stay informed and not get overwhelmed?

Just seems like there is so much bad stuff going on. How do people not get effected by it all and carryon? Makes me question why I’m finding it so difficult but it’s not that I’m imagining it, these things are happening.

OP posts:
MadameDe · 07/02/2023 23:02

Always been wars just that this time it's closer to home. There have always earthquakes.

The missing woman and murdered headteacher - if they weren't middle class would anyone be giving a damn.

The cost of living crisis will get better with time. It always does.

Can't comment on the girl being beaten up but I'm sure that if all the above hadn't happened it wouldn't even be included in the equation.

Paturday · 07/02/2023 23:05

Just don’t listen/watch the news. I still know what is going on in the world every day from other means - talking to people, seeing headlines on papers in shops, mumsnet etc. I don’t know, it just trickles down to me. Much easier to ignore the awful things I can’t do anything about that way. Anything I want to hear more about I can seek out.

Greyfelt · 07/02/2023 23:05

What's new is global warming. That dwarfs everything else. And nuclear weapons are very recent too. We are doing untold damage to each other, and are threatening to do even more (Putin). So yes, the world is getting much worse.

Paturday · 07/02/2023 23:06

Oh, news on the radio if I’m in the car I guess. But that’s rare and very brief.

coffeecupsandwaxmelts · 07/02/2023 23:06

It's always been like this.

I haven't watched the news since the first lockdown and my mental health is a million times better for it.

I still know what's happening via social media and places like MN or Reddit, but I can choose what to read and it's not so in your face or draining.

itsnote · 07/02/2023 23:07

I mean, you've included "so on and so on" to make your list longer 😅.

Cantwait4summer94 · 07/02/2023 23:07

Unfortunately bad things happen all the time, even when you don’t hear about it. It’s the news that makes it feel like everything is getting worse when in reality bad stuff has always happened but we don’t hear the half of it.
Everything you mentioned above is not new, it’s happened at some point before. It’s hard not to watch or read the news, but it is so much better for your mental health to not obsess over what is being reported.

Jellykat · 07/02/2023 23:08

I disagree with those saying its always been thus... i'm 60 this year, never experienced anything like Covid sweeping across the world/ seasons changing due to climate change/ nurses going to food banks/ so many animals becoming extinct etc etc, have you?

BamBamBilla · 07/02/2023 23:08

www.goodnewsnetwork.org/

Thatsshallot1967 · 07/02/2023 23:11

I said the exact same thing to DH when he came in from work tonight, OP. So very depressing everything at the moment. I don't think it being winter helps much either with the gloomy days.

Cantwait4summer94 · 07/02/2023 23:12

Jellykat · 07/02/2023 23:08

I disagree with those saying its always been thus... i'm 60 this year, never experienced anything like Covid sweeping across the world/ seasons changing due to climate change/ nurses going to food banks/ so many animals becoming extinct etc etc, have you?

it has actually always been this bad. In the past people died from diseases that would wipe out their whole family, poverty is not not new, animals becoming extinct is not new.

Explodingatomickittens · 07/02/2023 23:12

You're not wrong... Doomsday clock closer to midnight than its ever been.

Also 8 killed in Austria last week. Skiers caught in an avalanche in a ski resort...

Celinia · 07/02/2023 23:15

When you feel overwhelmed with bad news, it’s time to stop reading and watching the news for a while. You’ll feel a lot calmer. Historically we’ve been in much darker places without the benefits of advanced medicine etc - 1914-18 WW1, followed by the flu pandemic - the death toll from both was huge.

poisonoak · 07/02/2023 23:18

I don't want to believe this but every celestial event the world gets more hostile.

MysteriesOfTheOrganism · 07/02/2023 23:24

There may have been the occasional lull, but realistically it's always been this way. Until recently we'd had 75 years without a war in Europe - an unprecedented time of peace. But wars still happened in Korea, Vietnam and Cyprus. Independence wars against the old colonial powers. Genocides in Africa, Cambodia and elsewhere. Arab-Israeli conflicts ongoing. Soviet oppression of Eastern Europe. Mao killing millions in China. Endemic racism in the USA. COVID has been bad, but the Black Death killed a third of Europe's population. Nope, there never has been a golden age.

magicthree · 07/02/2023 23:24

Cantwait4summer94 · 07/02/2023 23:12

it has actually always been this bad. In the past people died from diseases that would wipe out their whole family, poverty is not not new, animals becoming extinct is not new.

Show quote history

I agree. I'm 63 and while I might not have experienced the things that are happening now I know that very similar things have happened in the past - the Spanish 'flu, the depression years etc, and there are many, many animals which have become extinct. Earthquakes and wars have been happening forever.

It is, as people have already said, the fact that the world has become so much smaller and we are exposed to so much more than we used to be. There are still a lot of good and great things happening, just as there always have been.

APoppyLicks · 07/02/2023 23:25

Paturday · 07/02/2023 23:05

Just don’t listen/watch the news. I still know what is going on in the world every day from other means - talking to people, seeing headlines on papers in shops, mumsnet etc. I don’t know, it just trickles down to me. Much easier to ignore the awful things I can’t do anything about that way. Anything I want to hear more about I can seek out.

Same here. I'm 'current' but I don't go searching for it.

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