The Art of Not Giving a Shit About the News
Just shut up, progressive women.
(Originally published on Substack on July 10, 2024).
After eight years of Trump in the news, I think it’s safe to say that he is not a new entity at the slightest. The media can’t seem to get enough from writing about Trump, or how bad the Democrats are. It’s honestly like liberal news writers talking about their marital affairs and ranking their ex-lovers from worst to best, except that they’re doing that metaphorically IRL. Non-Western readers, you might want to skip this article since I’m basically talking about liberal Western democracies.
To tell you the truth, politics hardly ever matters in your personal life. I’ll have to exclude states like Texas here, sorry. Politics only contributes 5% to your personal life, the other 95% is your own hard work. Far left and far right pundits like to preach nihilistic values like “the world is falling apart”, “the young people are destroying America”, “religious people are destroying America”, when in reality those guys are doing it for the views, kind of like a political MMA where both sides hype up their own sides. I used to be an ardent believer in left-wing nihilism until I realize just how absurd and ridiculous it was, several years on. That’s what you get when you combine teenage testosterone with political news.
Politics is unpredictable and the only constant is poor health and anxiety. Following politics is a lot like supporting your sport team: you’re living on a result-by-results basis, not knowing when your team is going to win a cup trophy. Politics is also a lot like a celebrity obsession (“Alan Rickman just died, I felt like I just lost a father”, “Beyonce miscarried a baby, I should feel like my sister just miscarried”), it’s all fluff and has 0 concrete meaning.
Politics should not be a hobby. The news is one of the most depressing hobbies you can get in this day and age. Find actual hobbies. Your two goals in life is work to earn a living for your family and community and having hobbies. 95% of human history did not involve any democratic voting. Tribal people didn’t have to suffer feminism, youth political/cultural entitlement, or not being able to relate to their political leaders. I’m not saying you should go into the wilderness, but what I’m saying is that skip the politics, skip the news, and your life will be immensely better and more worthwhile than the dearth of junk that gets passed as news in 2024.
When I grew up in the 2000s, all I had growing up was following pop culture and my hobbies. I was a fairly normal and happy-going kid. What’s the difference between now and then? Pop culture has been blown to smithereens and me having payed too much attention to the news. Remove both of those things, plus social media/smartphones, and I’m basically back to my back-to-roots 2000s self with my own personal goals to fulfill, instead of seemingly solving society’s ills with politics singlehandedly.
Christianity and religion tells you to help your community out. In my opinion, you don’t have to do that if that’s not your personality, but what god or any religious figure should be messaging to you is that he/she wants you to live a happy, good, and meaningful life and to do whatever means possible to achieve that without harming others in the process.
If you do want to help people, make people happy or laugh. Don’t be another political analyst. Be the next Mr. Rodgers. Be a musician or a comedian. Do something your kids will be proud of.
