This week, I found myself swirling within the natural disaster of the 24-hour news cyclone again. I’ve worked hard to seek refuge from this state, and have drastically limited my news intake over the past four years. Yet here I was swirling again.
Weather cyclones are hurricanes in the South Pacific and Indian Oceans. A cyclone is fed when air from high and low pressure storms combine to create a storm wall. Cyclones grow while these conditions exist.
News also operates like this cyclone. If we continue to add the fuel of debate from competing sides to the news cyclone, it will flourish.
Caught in the cyclone, I wondered feebly if there was any benefit to escaping or if I should take this ride as far as it would go – at least until November.
Luckily, there is a reason to escape from the storm.
The 24-hour news cyclone is the continued churning of news and events. It’s fueled by Twitter, cable news and other internet outlets. The cyclone never stops. With the vitriol level in our country, its closest cyclone competitor in the solar system is Jupiter’s red dot. However, Jupiter’s red dot is an anticyclone. So it might be against cyclones.
The cyclone has spun faster the last five years. I don’t think that happens to Jupiter’s red dot, but this knowledge is beyond my ability to make the analogy.
With my work in journalism, I’ve been on the inside of the cyclone. There’s adrenaline to the news. Trying to figure out what happens next and adding to the conversation is intoxicating—something similar to performers’ and athletes’ experiences.
Following news events hooked me on the twists and turns of the narrative. This obsession inspired my current work.
Of course, the problem with the news cyclone is that your brain never rests. It is stuck in the “doom scroll” of refreshing social media and waiting for the puzzle’s next piece.
The news cyclone’s goal is to keep people invested in the stories. The cyclone feeds on advertising money, subscriptions and insider status. By paying attention to the cyclone constantly, we are helping the cyclone.
To what ends does this high-intensity news following serve? It sure doesn’t lead to thriving mental health as we never get to reflect, and instead only react. It brings us no closer to being able to make change.
In 2016, I was a constant consumer of news. I would go on Twitter, listen to podcasts, scroll to every media site and watch cable news on my phone.
I knew intimately every single twist and turn of the 2016 Presidential Race—the false claims and the forgotten storylines. The cyclone spun faster the closer we got to the election, and my anxiety rose. It was terrible for my mental well-being. Worse, I had no more control over the outcome than if I had a healthy relationship with the news.
That’s the worst part of the 24-hour news cyclone—when we’re addicted to the next tweet and the BREAKING NEWS alert. We may know what’s going on, but we’re powerless to create change at the same pace as the cyclone.
Changing how our government functions is possible, but only from inside the cyclone. Change takes strategy and organization. The cyclone is too distracting and robs us of those abilities.
I know the fear that comes with taking a step back from the news and social media—won’t I be less informed?
No. This is a lie.
So I got out of the cyclone again yesterday.
We don’t need to follow the news constantly. We don’t need social media on our phones. The best-informed and most productive people are not caught in the news cyclone.