
There is nothing more depressing than “positive news” - paulpauper
https://theoutline.com/post/7552/the-danger-of-positive-news
======
sametmax
There is a huge difference between positive news, and news represented with an
overly positive tone.

A new tech/drug/math/specie/dino bone is, to me, positive news. It don't need
the reporter to scream "awesome" and add kittens when presenting it.

The problem is not positive news. It's that the US is becoming a parody of a
1960 sitcom, like in the excellent movie "Pleasantville", where everything is
"fantastic".

Everybody is "so excited" about their new project, or "passionate" about their
work. Their "best friend" is "amazing".

Everybody wants to hype up everything, and there is no more space for
appreciating reality as it is. You can't say chicken wings are breath taking.
What will be left to talk about your greatest achievements or the birth of you
child ?

This is what depresses people.

Not positive news.

~~~
sysbin
I agree with mostly everything except when it comes to drugs I’m not
impressed.

My perspective is that a large crowd of potential buyers must need the
“researchers find the new drug results exiting” to actually make their
transactions. Similar for a mindset of clicking on ads. The marketers would
prefer ads on content making a person genuinely excited.

~~~
sametmax
A person should say "excited" when they are in the same state a 5yo is when
taken to ice cream.

You can be excited about a new drug you created. But I don't know many adults
that would feel 5yo-excitement about anything. They may be proud. They may
feel happy. But genuine excitation is rare, not a ten times a week event, even
if your life is great.

So they should keep "excited" for those rare occasions when they are, indeed,
excited.

We don't communicate anymore. We do PR. PR is fake, fake is depressing.

It's like with sugar. We figured that adding a fake excitement to something
sells it better. So we added it everywhere. And now we need enormous doses of
it, nuances are lost and it's not healthy.

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zandjager
Disagree. A constant stream of news unbalanced towards the negative doesn't
necessarily reflect what is "reality". Reality contains as many positives as
negatives!

~~~
Angostura
> Reality contains as many positives as negatives!

That's an interesting hypothesis, but is it true. There are actually two
separate suggestions here:

1\. Reality contains as many positives as negatives - possible, interesting
philosophical assertion

2\. Reality contains as many _newsworthy_ positives as negatives - seems
unlikely to me. No-one is really that interested in 'Kitten doesn't die,
continues living as normal'.

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hackeraccount
I don't think this person is complaining about what they think they're
complaining about.

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RickJWagner
If you look for depressing news, you'll find it. And you'll end up depressed.

If you look for good news, you'll find it. And you'll end up... thinking
better of people.

------
drinfinity
Everything is going to shit and we are all going to die in a horrible,
horrible fire while being trampled by giant T-Rexes.

------
treerock
What a bizarre website. Not sure if it's parody?!

------
microcolonel
> _Positive news is categorized not just by content but by framing and
> prominence..._

Just like news news.

Just because you have a terrible attitude on life composed of torturing
yourself with extreme mischaracterizations of reality and denying yourself any
reprieve, doesn't mean you have a firmer grasp on reality. If you can't handle
the status quo, you have an illness.

It's one thing to live in a little bubble where you don't need to confront
what's wrong in the world; it's another to avoid getting dragged into the
culture war by a torrent of stories framed entirely to embitter.

> _Yes, there are immigrant children in concentration camps on American
> soil..._

No, the U.S. government isn't reoriented toward a goal of "gassing the kids".
You need to take a chill pill.

You seem to have no trouble criticizing "positive news", and sure, some of it
is just as delusional; but don't kid yourself and think for one second that
it's any more insidious than your favourite extreme rage-bait nonsense, fueled
by the far-stronger sharing impulse for _angry_ news.

~~~
dexen
While the parent comment is getting downvotes, probably due to the somewhat
accusatory form, the facts behind it are universally true: our civilization is
improving. If you took several metrics and weighted them by people's concern,
you would see a positive trend [1]. Any "good news" is a statement of the
fact, and should be a _duh_ moment to everybody.

Granted, we need the "bad news" too, as certain things still need fixing.
However living with a negative impression of the world is living in denial.

[1] [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sm5xF-
UYgdg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sm5xF-UYgdg)

~~~
lurker458
Civilization has improved _so far_. The underlying reason for that is the
cheap and abundant energy source (fossil fuels). The bill for that is due and
it will materialize by those metrics going down again.

