Why is news always negative? Do we only care about what went wrong in our society or are the media just forcing that on us or are those the only newsworthy items there? Are there good news in the world that can fill up a newspaper/tv/radio routinely? Do people even care about the good news? Or is good news even a thing?
A lot of questions, right? I am very interested in the good news of the world/country/local area. I want to hear only the good news when I open newspaper or radio or tv. I do not want to know about the homicides, terrorism, corruption, wars or the fighting of the political parties. I want to hear about people making positive differences in other people’s lives. I want to hear about entrepreneurs that added values to some investments and business owners that created jobs. I want to know about only the positive thing happening in the society, big or small?
Is that even possible? Let me rephrase the question: how can we make this possible?
I put this idea to a couple of my friends recently. I think they were supportive of the idea but immediately mentioned that it would not work. Their reasoning was human psychology works a certain way. People are inherently wired the way that we care lot more about controversies and negativity than positive news. It appears to be that way if you follow what social media. One person says something controversial and the whole world is turned on. But is that the whole truth or just half the truth? Are we really wired the way we only react to negativity? May be.
Or may not be. Could it be that we are only brought up that way? Could it be that we just became used to the notion that news can only be negative?
I read a book that all the emotions we have can be grouped into either positive or negative emotion. Love, courage, happiness, optimism are positive emotions. Fear, anger, hate, frustration, pessimism fall under negative emotions. At any moment you will have a dominating emotion that could be positive or negative. What I found interesting is that it is impossible to have a negative emotion at the same time you have a positive emotion. You can not love someone and be angry at the same time. You can not be happy but fearful or you can not be optimistic while being frustrated. That is how our brain works. Again, I don’t know how true the science is but it totally makes sense to me.
So, can you be sad about a negative news and have a positive emotion at the same time? Probably not. What if all you hear on a radio/tv is good news. Will that foster positivity in you? I think it will.
This is why I am all for the good news. Maybe positivity does not appeal to us the same way as negativity but while there are hundreds and thousands of negative medias, can we have a couple of positive ones? Isn’t there enough good things happening around us to fill up a paper or tv/radio?
We don’t go out over the weekend looking for homicides or disasters. We go out looking to have a good time with our family and friends. We don’t look for negativity in our lives personally, we would rather avoid them and stay away from them as much as we can. But why are we interested in negativity/controversies in news or other people’s lives? It does not have to be that way.
Speaking of the good news, I think there are some good news media, for example, Good News Media. It is a good effort and I want to see it grow and cover every nooks and corner of the society like the negative media does.
One rule though: They should also not be propaganda driven, politically motivated or have a special/hidden motive other than spreading the good news in the world.
Millionaire Immigrant 