[bombcar]

I suspect that for many people, the pounding outside is what mainly affects their happiness - if everything reported in the news is sunshine and happiness, they tend happier.

And if it's all doom and gloom and "go outside and you kill grandma" - are we surprised they get sad?

[autoexec]

In my experience most people don't care about what the news tells them anywhere near as much as what's going on in their personal lives.

If they've got money and they aren't worried about paying their bills or the price of food or the price of gas and they can afford a nice place to live and can afford to send their kids to college and can take at least one big vacation a year and they're spending their time going out with their friends they aren't losing much sleep over news stories that mention war in Somalia, or some politician's latest scandal, or how deforestation is threatening the habitat of a bunch of animals. They might not like what they hear, but they'll feel pretty happy about their life.

When their standard of living declines and they have to cut back to make ends meet and they watch their children struggle in ways they didn't have to at their age and their grandma actually dies because she went outside people start to get upset and suddenly the constant news stories about the latest pointless trillion dollar war, and the politician stealing from taxpayers, and the huge decline in wildlife populations starts to hit differently.