Re: The media is not there to help. It does not feel your pain.

lol Cisco, you didn't give in and manufacture some outrage?

Good for you, and I bet you are still friends with your neighbours:)

On the subject of the media, I found this little gem of an article. We could all do with shining some light about.

spud

http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/44472.html


Quit watching it, do something about it

Mike Stuchbery

It's really easy to break your spirit. Simply open a browser on your laptop or mobile phone. Navigate to the Fairfax and News Limited papers. Open another tab for the ABC. Take it in.

Look at the anguished faces of mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers in Christchurch, Benghazi or Bahrain. Scroll down, peruse a few of the pieces from the bloviaters, banged out hurriedly to meet deadline and drive click-throughs. Let the wave crest and fall over you.

Strip the reportage of the hyperbole, the spin, the snipes and the redoubts of self-interest. Reduce it all to its barest essentials, tease out the facts. It's still overwhelming. The interminable conflict, the blood on cement. Nature's full fury, burying families under rubble or drowning them in stinking mud. Closer to home, schoolyard dramas played out by adults, writ large across front pages, billboards and widescreens. In the capital, our leaders squabble over paralysed, calcifying policy.

This is nothing new. This is just another verse in the same repetitive tune that's played for decades. Now, however, we have the opportunity to improvise for ourselves. Sometimes the conversation played out over social media is a beautiful thing, illuminating, the rule of 140 characters distilling messages to their most evocative, direct and beautiful essence. Other times, it's a squawking, dissonant mess, full of the self-interest, ignorance and malice we find everywhere else.

At a certain point, it becomes unbearable. There's no way you can dunk your head into that pool without coming out a bedraggled, anxious mess. It's not possible to take in the world's sorrow and woe, the constant cacophony of public discourse without feeling a part of yourself blacken and die. It's okay to unhook yourself. You're not a bad person if you choose to navigate away from blood-soaked images or hate-filled screeds to pictures of kittens dressed as superheros. Better, yet, switch the bloody thing off. You're not obligated to bear witness to the world's woe. Nor are you obligated to provide a constant rebuttal of the lies and deceit coating the public conversation. Just once in a while, it's okay not to have an opinion.

It's a rather rum business, this world. There's a lot of darkness about, that's for sure. The great thing about the dark, however, is that it's rather easy to get rid of. It only takes a tiny source of light to illuminate a great space. If you doubt me, try checking your messages on your phone next to your slumbering partner at 3am. If we can somehow manage to drag ourselves away from our television, computers and mobiles, we can focus on small tasks that make our own, and the lives of others better. Read your kid a book. Give a 'charity mugger' a smile and a couple of bucks, rather than a terse frown. Ask how you can get involved at your local refugee centre, local library or clinic.

These small kindnesses, these tiny pinpricks of light are rather insignificant by themselves, but together can create a warm glow. Who knows, your kindness might prove a fuel source, igniting others like an altruistic ciggie butt. It might not be enough to drive the darkness away - perhaps nothing ever will be able to, but at least it gives us something to look forward to, rather than away from.

Mike Stuchbery is a high school English and Civics teacher, writer and occasional broadcaster living in Melbourne's western suburbs. He can be found on Twitter at @mikestuchbery. Tweet