OK, I get it: SARS-CoV-2. It's dangerous. It can cause COVID-19, a dangerous and potentially lethal disease for which the few available treatments are less than powerful, and also less available than could be hoped. But the methods people are using are successfully flattening the curve in numerous locations world wide. So: keep up the good work, self-isolating, physical distancing, hand washing...You know the drill.
And I get that all new information is news by definition. And I get that people want to keep abreast of current events, especially in turbulent times. But I also understand that in any list of finite positive length (such as the list of items a news carrier includes in a day's offering or even the list of posts I leave on Facebook from day to day) item selection has a profound influence on overall tone, both intellectually and emotionally.
Imagine a listing of every piece of new socially-relevant information happening in a 24 hour day everywhere in the world. Long list, isn't it? A person or group of persons sharing news through the media is going to have to select a subset of those items. Even if the newscast were an uninterrupted 24 hours in length it could never be consumed in its entirety by any audience and it could never include every item. Whatever is included in the newscast is perforce a subset of our imaginary list that includes every last piece of socially relevant information. Probably a small subset.
Anyone who has studied science at all will understand this: In order to capture the general sense of all that is happening in the world that is socially relevant, the items included in a newscast ought to be selected through an unbiased process. Presenting a random sample would arguably be the best practice.
Anyone of at least normal intelligence who has ever carefully consumed a newscast will understand why I now assert that there does not appear to be any popular newscast that comes even close to presenting an unbiased or random sample. No, to be included, items must meet certain criteria. Among these are the possession of characteristics that evoke in today's audience members a tendency to return for more tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. The media comprise an industry that is ratings-driven; as a result, getting the audience to tune in again is a primary goal.
Anyone who remembers Saturday afternoon movie serials (and most anyone who doesn't remember them but who understands what they were) understands that one way to get the audience to return is to leave them in an emotional state of anxious suspense. Cliff-hanging. News media items are understandably selected so that they evoke this kind of a state in the audience. It's entertaining to be frightened a little. That's why roller coasters make money. If the ride is in good repair and properly run, it's harmless.
A problem arises when the frightening entertainment has the ring of truth to it. As if it were a representation of "the way things really are," or touted and/or believed to be so. One can present a recounting of a number of events that actually happened without truthfully reflecting what is actually happening in general. Tell you what I mean:
Say for example that for some reason (perhaps having a sponsor that manufactures fire extinguishers) that a news outlet published nothing but reports of fires from all around the world. A person watching might understandably come to think that what is really happening is that everything is about to go up in flames. Unfortunately, this is exactly why attending to the news of events that actually happened doesn't ensure anyone a balanced idea of what is actually happening. A balanced idea of what is actually happening depends to a large extent on their being a balanced selection of reported events. Please hear what I am saying: THE IDEA THAT THE NEWS IS WHAT IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING IS AT BEST GROSSLY INACCURATE. That this is so is NOT BECAUSE THE NEWS IS "FAKE" (although it certainly can be.) It is so because bringing a balanced product to the audience is at variance with the goal of maximizing ratings and often enough with the goal of satisfying sponsors as well.
In addition to biasing the news as a professional product, this also gives the audience a biased idea of what constitutes an interesting item to share. This leads to biased expectations. It so often causes people to post preferentially on social media items that are dark and foreboding in tone. Over the years I have been using social media (mainly Facebook,) I have taken and have seen more than a few friends take what all of us described as a needed “break” from it all…All the negativity, the sounding of alarms, the doom-posting, and the personal attacks, often from strangers, that intrude on our sharing ideas on pages we have liked. What starts out as one person’s reasonable sharing can morph into a morass of nasty comebacks and personal criticism/derision. It’s a good choice when, exhausted from the incessant risk of being attacked for sharing an honest opinion, people take a break. It certainly is superior to sinking into desperation and thence into depression and then becoming suicidal; we’ve all heard those stories. It would be far better if we’d quit trying to scare one another to death using social media, or to “win” where in reality there is no prize, there’s not even a contest going on, not really. It is so easy to get hooked into feeling and acting as if there is something important to achieve here, some goal to reach. I always respect it when people sign off for a while. I hope it helps people regain their footing.
I have no solution, no way to stop this comes easily to my mind. I do believe being aware of this normative bias in our expectations can be quite useful in maintaining personal emotional balance in one's world view. So, I'm just going to point it out. This is me doing that.