Adults should actually know what’s going on in the world?

[Dailywalk]

Is it important to keep up to date on ‘current affairs’. What would you think if someone said they’d rather be unaware of what is going on in the news. If it’s something that’s really important and will affect them then they will find out eventually. It doesn’t change to know al the ‘details’

Interested to know what people think. Is it important to be aware of what’s going on in the news?

I agree Raven. That's the point I made in my first post here. The posts I was agreeing to and commenting on was more about smug people who think they do know everything because they have a broad overview of popular events. They're many other 'major' events not reported.

You have to watch with a critical eye. Many many don’t so you get the people who think they are informed but really they’ve just consumed a load of nonsense which is more dangerous than anyone who doesn’t watch it at all.

What can I do about Boris until he's kicked out or the next election rolls round? Nothing except maybe complain to friends or rant online. Ukraine, even less of a chance. But knowing the local council have decided to sell off parkland, or the bus company are stopping late night travel leaving shift workers stranded, or any matter of minor local events that have a massive impact on people's day to day lives - that I could do something about but sadly my local paper died a death before I even moved to the area.

This is the real issue. No one seems to know anything about what goes on right on their doorstep. No one turns out for local counsellor elections. When in fact they have significant power and the reason your town centre looks like a shit hole, there’s no buses and there’s rampant crime is more to do with decisions at a local level. So we get local councillors with immense power, who don’t really know what they are doing at best and no one checks. They vote in policies they haven’t bothered to read or understand and then complain to staff who follow the policies when they get complaints from the public it’s absurd. Local councils are made bankrupt because of absolutely atrocious decisions yet people are happy with the excuse they’ve not got enough funding. And start going on about bloody Brexit.

People don’t notice when a local councillors extended family manage to bag social housing faster than anyone else. It’s so corrupt but no one cares.

The only time the general public notice anything is when their bin isn’t picked up. That is literally the only thing they seem to care about, hands down the only thing. Oh and pot holes.

If you disagree, then who is your local councillor and what do they stand for? Are you looking at what they are doing? Do they understand what they are doing? That’s a good point to start from to be informed in any meaningful way.

Agree then, Sliding. You can't know everything. But I would like to think i'm in the broad middle ground between claiming I know everything, and revelling in ignorance of it all.

And Djokovic - so dodgy. That thing with numbers being out of sequence was like an Agatha Christie reveal.

I grew up under a fascist regime. Had I not actively sought out news of the wider world as well as what was going on in my own country to inform myself I would have had a very incomplete understanding of what was actually going on and how wrong it was. It is important to be aware of what is happening in the world. And, there is a difference between reading about "celebrities" doing inconsequential things and staying informed in order to make choices and form opinions.

It's very insular and privileged to be totally unaware of and uninterested in what is going on in the world. Surely it's part of your personal ongoing education to understand what is happening in world politics, cultural tensions in other countries, etc. What about genocides, famines, etc? If you only ever click on Facebook or Instagram or the Daily Mail you get a very skewed view.

@Motherhubbardscupboard

It's very insular and privileged to be totally unaware of and uninterested in what is going on in the world. Surely it's part of your personal ongoing education to understand what is happening in world politics, cultural tensions in other countries, etc. What about genocides, famines, etc? If you only ever click on Facebook or Instagram or the Daily Mail you get a very skewed view.

It's actually really privileged to able to

If you're working all hours and have caring duties, a a tight budget, quite likely no paid sick leave, why does it matter the reason bills are going up? They are just are and you have to find a way to pay them.

@EmmaH2022 the reason matters if you live in a democracy and have a vote. It doesn't if you don't.

I don't watch the news every day or read a paper. I check on online news sites when I have the time and occasionally hear the news on local radio when I'm in the car. However, I am well-informed on news pertaining to education as that's the area I work in. I'd love to be better informed, but I work full time, have to do 8/10 school runs, take DD to clubs and am doing professional qualifications, so there's a limit on what I can do. It's not a lack of interest, it's a lack of time.

I have on two occasions in my life moved to a different country because of "the news", ie politics.

@Motherhubbardscupboard

It's very insular and privileged to be totally unaware of and uninterested in what is going on in the world. Surely it's part of your personal ongoing education to understand what is happening in world politics, cultural tensions in other countries, etc. What about genocides, famines, etc? If you only ever click on Facebook or Instagram or the Daily Mail you get a very skewed view.

Totally agree with this. My sister deliberately avoids news as she says it's "toxic" for her and she'd rather live in a bubble. Another local acquaintance does the same as "the universe has her back". Just completely irritating really.

[quote theDudesmummy]@EmmaH2022 the reason matters if you live in a democracy and have a vote. It doesn't if you don't.[/quote]
I'm not saying it doesn't matter

I'm saying that those who might not do news much or often are not "privileged".

You have to define how informed you think people should be and about how much of the world they should be informed about.

There are atrocities on small and large scales every day. Natural disasters, political upheaval, the threat of war. The news we see in the UK is a small snapshot of just some of these. The media filters what gets to us, by and large. Not necessarily through any sort of sinister intent, but they're working with limited space / time and need to pick the stories they think are most important or of interest to their audience. We don't even have the capacity to hear about all the news in our own country!

There is so much news every day. No-one can be informed about all of it. You'd spend your life doing nothing else and you still wouldn't cover it all.

I like to keep up to date with the headlines, but unless I'm out there scouring the internet for several hours a day (which I don't have time for), I accept there will be many, many things I don't hear about.

It's ironic that the people who are so pro-news on here seem to think that:

Don't watch news = stupid, vote brexit, vote Tory, only read the Mail and social media.

Seems watching the news doesn't give you great critical thinking skills?

A few people I work with dont follow the news and have no interest in current affairs. I acknowledge that this is their right but then they are the ones who are not vaccinated because they think its Bill Gates' chip, believe the 5G conspiracies, succumb to concerning right-wing groups on Facebook and follow strange religious cults.

Where there's a vacuum ...

The problem is imbalance in mainstream news. I don't necessarily mean the outlets themselves (although there are obvious biases in most) but the fact that what is reported is so relentlessly negative. You have to work really hard to find anything positive being reported, and a relentless diet of negative information most of which we can do nothing about is really bad for personal mental wellbeing.

@astorsback but your work friends aren't a representative sample of anything.

I work with lots of people who don't engage much with the news, they are all scientists (including people who worked to develop one of the Covid vaccines) who are at the forefront of scientific research and breakthroughs I'd venture the vast majority of people in this thread have absolutely no awareness of, yet I don't imply they are stupid or uninformed for that.

I do get it that no-one has the time to keep up with all "the news". I don't either but certain aspects of the news and types of current events are very important to me. On many real news sites you can curate what topics you see at the top or at all. In the news media I consume, unless I look for it, I won't routinely see celebrity chat, sport etc. I even limit cultural content (film and book reviews etc) to my weekends as I don't have time the rest of the week. It is possible to keep abreast of the things that matter to you (whether personally or professionally), whatever they are, without spending time on those that don't.

I used to try to watch the news at least once per day. But then something happens and it is dragged out for a few weeks/month.
It has got to the point where I see the headline and turn the tv off. It just seems the same thing day in and day out, week after week. It’s like watching the same episode of Eastenders over and over and even when they have moved on to a different subject in the same programme it is brought back to discussing the same thing over and over till something huge happens and then they concentrate on that.

Realistically you only have to watch the news a few times per year to get the gist of what is happening in the world

Not knowing what us going on in the world does not make you stupid. It does make you uninformed. It is a different handicap, but still a handicap.

@Pedalpushers

It's ironic that the people who are so pro-news on here seem to think that:

Don't watch news = stupid, vote brexit, vote Tory, only read the Mail and social media.

Seems watching the news doesn't give you great critical thinking skills?

I wouldn’t put it in such crude terms, but I do know that if you’re a nefarious leader you’ll prefer a disengaged population to an attentive one.

It goes without saying news curation has its own problems. A crisis, arguably. But all the more reason to stay switched on.

I agree news curation has its own problems. In my case I don't see the curating WITHIN the app/website etc as a problem, as I am simply choosing to filter out (during the week) what I would see as nonessential content (eg sport, celebrity culture, cooking, whatever, I do know that these are my personal nonessentials, may be very different for others). I stay abreast of politics, national (both in UK and Ireland, where I now live) and international, major cultural events, and news related to my job. So far so good. BUT of course I am also curating my experience by choosing which outlets to look at. No news outlet is unbiased. So I am getting the Guardian's choice of words, the Economist's decisions on which stories to run, the BBC's agenda etc etc I know this, of course, but if there is not enough time to read all the news there from one outlet, there is certainly not enough time to read widely across all of them. You have to make a choice somewhere.

I read the news a lot and am interested in what is happening around the world. I do have a low opinion of those who aren’t interested. I think knowledge is power.

But if I find myself feeling anxious, particularly around covid, the best antidote is to step away from the need for a while.

My news intake is via whatever is trending on twitter and what makes it in the news sidebar on my phone. I don’t watch news broadcasts and don’t buy a paper. That’s plenty. I do read local news stories. That matters more to me than what is happening thousands of miles away.

I can't pretend that I'm up to date with all world news but I was a bit shocked by the poster who asked 'what report?' on a thread about BJ's parties.

Everyone is different when it comes to feeling what they need to know about the world and what is happening. Some people cant take a lot in for various reasons.
The really important stuff will reach you in one way or another if you are in at least contact with people. You dont need to follow the news.