[whalesalad]

> How is a modern person so much more stressed out?

srs? lol. back in the day your concerns were food, warmth and that is about it. now it's social media, covid 19, spy balloons, nuclear war, pronoun war, civil war, market crashes, wealth disparity, climate change/refugees, toxic chemical plumes ... I mean the list goes on and on.

[jacobr1]

But they question is why does this stress everyone out. In our day-to-day lives you can basically ignore all of it, provided your basic needs are met and you are living in an environment where more of your material needs are being met. So what is it about "news" that causes more actual physical stress than local conditions?

[kelseyfrog]

> What is it about "news" that causes more actual physical stress than local conditions?

News is written in a way that exploits human psychological flaws. It is written in this way to gain attention. News outlets game attention because newspapers that relied on ad-revenue out competed subscription revenue models. The reason this is so is that people place relatively little important on the time value on their attention compared to the monetary value of their subscription. The reason behind this is...

[whalesalad]

> In our day-to-day lives you can basically ignore all of it

This is true for people who are able to detach from the events of the world, but that is not a universal skill.

Plus a lot of the concerns I listed are not just news you hear about - they are things people are living on a daily basis. Just the other day a guy walked into MSU, about an hour away from me, and killed a bunch of people. For some you can tune that out and carry on with your life. For others, notably people in the community or families who were directly impacted, it's traumatic.

The plume of shit in the air down in Ohio is also about an hour from me. It's not just a news story, farm animals are dying. That is someones livelihood and its indicative that the environment is toxic. That would stress you out, wouldn't it? Should I drink the water? Do I need to move? Can I move? Can I even sell my house now that the local area is toxic?

I think you can stick your head in the sand for a certain amount of time but at some point you need to come up and look around at the world we are creating and become proactive instead of just watching it crumble.

[johncessna]

You've clearly never been hungry and cold.

EDIT: I'm not saying that 'modern' stressors aren't actually stressful. I'm saying that not knowing when and where your next meal is coming from or if you're surviving the winter is just as stressful.

[sidlls]

It’s not as simple as that. I’ve been hungry and cold (poor, homeless or near enough to it). I’m well off now. I stress about other things than hunger and temperature: but that stress is very real, and just as urgently felt.