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How to get away from doomerism in my media feeds? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 day ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Looking through my media feeds, including Lemmy, YouTube, News Outlets (Reuters, Financial Times) as well as news related to my profession, I would estimate that 85% of what I see is doom and gloom, i.e. reports about something that's going wrong in the world or might go wrong in the future.

I try to limit what I follow to educational and unopininated sources (as far as that's possible anyways) and some satire or a meme here and there. I don't like suggestion algorithms and don't use social media, because I don't want to be trapped in a self-reinforcing bubble. On YouTube for example, I use third party apps which show me only videos from channels I explicitly follow.

Still, it's mostly depressing information: how bad the job market and economy is, geopolitical threats, AI risks, symptoms of late stage capitalism. I am aware, thanks. But I didn't ask to hear these things over and over and over again, and it's negatively affecting my outlook on life. I've given up on reading the news entirely because I just get triggered by the enshittification of society, politics, the environment and daily life where I live. At this point I'd rather not hear about it anymore.

What I want to ask is whether you are having the same experience? Am I doing something fundamentally wrong? I don't want to be blind to what's happening in my/the world, but I want to have a positive and optimistic outlook on the future. How can I make that happen? How can I get away from an engagement economy constantly bombarding me with bad news without giving up on learning about the things that I am interested in?

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

Try to be informed about the stuff you can have an impact on

For example on my rss feed I just wiped out most of the non EU stuff. It’s ok to know that there are wildfires somewhere in the world but being overexposed is really just toxic

I can organize here in Italy, not even the whole of it but my region and the cities I spend time in. It’s much better to know what my little city council is discussing about rather than any even major event but so far from me.

Unluckily, social media doesn’t help too much with curating the feeds but as others said try to work more on mutes and filters. Don’t forget that getting informed is just one tool for change, do not get too high on it :)

Edit and P.S. : it’s also much easier that on social networks driven by engagement algorithms the posts that travel the most are the ones that cause hate/rage and sex or generally emotions easier to exploit online. Newspapers themselves tend to post more negative stuff. It’s just a human bias, take it into account and watch around yourself to find the positive stuff of life