Giving up reading news will make us happier

"The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers." Thomas Jefferson "Once a newspaper touches a story, the facts are lost forever, even to the protagonists." Norman Mailer "Newspapers are unable, seemingly, to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilisation." George Bernard Shaw "In the real world, the right thing never happens in the right place and the right time. It is the job of journalists and historians…

It's not just news. I cut out mainstream media several years ago, and noted a definite improvement in my psychological well-being. As of the end of last year, I stopped engaging in mainstream social media. So much better. I still keep a Facebook account for Messenger and Events, but don't post, read timelines, or participate. Not only do I have more time to read books and learn new things -- made pita bread from scratch for the first time this…

So little of the news is actionable, as the article points out. The only remotely actionable news for me is what’s happening in my local community; but the gradual demise of our local newspaper has made that difficult to track. Yes, the news - national and international- shows trends that an ordinary person could act on; but not in the rapid cycles that define modern news presentation. I believe Tyler Cowen once remarked we’d be better off reading far more…

Former reporter here: One of the things many people don't understand is that news organizations exist for themselves as much as they do for their readers. They are drama queens crying out for attention. Now imagine putting 10 drama queens in a room together with 100 innocent bystanders. That is the media industry. They will tire you out. Media organizations have several proven strategies to push our buttons: voyeurism, outrage, greed, fear, prurience and envious aspiration are at the top…