[NonNefarious]

For the first time since I started caring about the news, I've started to avoid it.

Yes, news programming sells itself with hysteria. But some things have unquestionably regressed, notably U.S. politics and the dignity and respectability of those who hold office in the USA. And, for that matter, the Supreme Court.

But all of that goes back to the deliberate, belligerent ignorance championed by millions of people in this country. The tragedy is that the Internet, once a conduit for scientific knowledge and research, has been turned into a clearinghouse for retrograde "thought," allowing stupidity to reach the critical mass required to bring down entire societies.

[jdmoreira]

The internet really allowed people to reinforce their own idiotic believes by following and connecting with other people with those exact same believes. And now you get thousands of loonies all reinforcing each other over the internet and living in a bubble of other people obsessed with some random niche thing.

[cinntaile]

Why did you concern yourself with the news before? It is not like you can influence any of it anyway. It mostly influences you.