The 3 Cs of 2022: War, Climate Crisis, Corruption!
(The latter applies at least to Austria.)
Journalism does an incredible job of keeping us informed about world events in a fact-based and reliable way. Yet for the most part, it’s negative news that bombards us day in and day out! Is our world really that bad? And is consuming the news still good for us?
It is much easier to simply expose problems than to also propose solutions. And yet many journalists do exactly that:
Convinced that this is the best way to elicit the greatest concern and attention, they describe every crisis in the most dramatic terms possible. … Yet the more dramatic and negative a problem is portrayed, the less we are willing to work toward solving it. … And so, with every news story, fewer and fewer people believe they can influence politics and society.
The journalist and author Ronja von Wurmb-Seibel is dedicated to constructive journalism, which promotes a different kind of reporting (Read more about this under “Journalistic Stories That Inspire!”).
In her view, the well-known adage “Only bad news is good news” is outdated. In her bestseller How We See the World to understand how the media actually works, how this credo came about, and what makes a journalistic story “good”?
… that is how Ronja von Wurmb-Seibel describes news stories, which are usually selected based on so-called news factors. An event thus makes it into the media when it
The journalist questions whether journalism, based on these selection criteria, actually succeeds in distinguishing important events from unimportant ones, and whether the information provided always serves to explain world events clearly to us. After all, some important developments slip past newsrooms unnoticed as a result.
The result is that we see reality in a very one-sided way. When it comes to distant countries, for example, we only hear about the worst events, such as wars, natural disasters, and terrorist attacks. According to psychologist Jodie Jackson, our brains make little distinction between learning about an event through the media and experiencing it firsthand. A distorted picture of these countries and the realities of life there forms in our minds. We forget that other things happen there as well.
As a result, we tend to perceive many global trends in a more negative light than statistics would suggest. Many of our decisions are based on this perception (voting behavior, career choices)—including the actions of decision-makers, which are often ill-suited to solving a problem.
Try it for yourself at
Deaths from natural disasters, suicide rates, people living in poverty. Have these figures gone up or down in recent decades? The Swedish organization gapminder.org uses short questionnaires to challenge our perceptions of the world by presenting the relevant facts and figures.
News stories are stories too! In literature, film, and journalism alike, the so-called hero's journey is a popular and widely used tool for effective storytelling.
The Hero's Journey in a Nutshell
An individual, initially unaware of their special abilities, is confronted with a problem. Empowered by a mentor, they set out on a journey to solve this problem. Along the way, they find companions who help them overcome various obstacles. In the end, however, the person must face the enemy alone, whom they ultimately defeat—usually in battle. Our heroine emerges as a new, empowered, and transformed person and passes on her experience and wisdom to those around her.
Example from literature: Harry Potter vs. Voldemort
Example from the media: Greta Thunberg vs. Donald Trump
This narrative approach gives us the impression that it is up to individual people to solve the major problems of our time (e.g., the climate crisis). The rest of us can do no more than be passive observers.
However, major problems are always solved when a large number of people take many small steps. It requires social participation, cooperation, protest, social movements, and so on. When we hear that hundreds of people are working together to solve a problem, it is no longer a Herculean task for a “superhuman.” We learn that our own involvement in a group is, first of all, effective and, second, feasible. It doesn’t always take a struggle or conflict for us to change things for the better.
There is another problem with the hero principle. The spotlight on individuals causes other participants to fade into the background. Author von Wurmb-Seibel cites coverage of Donald Trump as a prominent example: Not only the actual issue (e.g., immigration), but also the growing far-right movement—which had been fueled by many politicians in the years prior—was largely overlooked.
Added to this is the group paradox within us. When we hear about the fate of individuals (e.g., the story of a mother fleeing with her children), we find it easier to form an emotional connection. We are more likely to help a specific person in need than an entire group in need (a wave of refugees). The more people are affected by a disaster, the harder it is for us to feel empathy and to help. We can keep this “inability” in mind when reading the news.
… that’s how political scientist Natascha Strobl describes the news. This is because news coverage often singles out two opinions that are as polar opposite as possible, or provocative statements, pitting “heroes” and “anti-heroes” against one another.
Controversial reporting attracts readers, followers, and so on—with great success. The result: a polarized, black-and-white social discourse marked by entrenched opinions. Most sociopolitical issues, however, are too complex and require a nuanced discussion—one with many shades of gray.
Journalists generally strive to report on a topic in a balanced manner and to examine it from multiple perspectives. However, because journalism tends to polarize, certain viewpoints unfortunately receive too much attention time and again.
The views of climate crisis skeptics have repeatedly been contrasted with the statements of climate scientists. (Nature). We get the impression that the group of skeptics is 1) similarly large and 2) therefore that their opinion carries as much weight as the statements of the tens of thousands of scientists warning of the climate crisis. The difference: the skeptics’ opinion is simply wrong; it completely lacks scientific substance.
Cranky Uncle, aka John Cook, a climate communication researcher at Monash University, illustrates "false balance" as follows:
This is referred to as a “false balance”—a misleading sense of balance in reporting—which must be avoided at all costs. The journalist Jonathan Foster advises:
If one person says it's raining and another says it's dry, it's not your job to quote both of them. It's your job to look out the window to find out what's true.
quoted in *How We See the World*
… it takes longer to end a war than to start one.
Ronja von Wurm-Seibel in her book *How We See the World*.
Negative events that make it into the media often occur in a brief, tragic moment (natural disasters, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine)—a surefire headline.
However, positive change doesn’t happen overnight. It only becomes apparent through statistics or long-term observations, and since it tends to generate less buzz, it rarely makes the news.
A large-scale study by Oxford University shows that an increasing number of people are actively avoiding the news (38 percent of respondents in 2022, up from 29 percent in 2017). Among their reasons are that consuming the news dampens their mood (more than a third of those who avoid it) or makes them feel powerless (16 percent of those who avoid it).
News consumption can even trigger “pre-traumatic stress”: we develop stress and anxiety even before terrible events occur—or even when we are highly unlikely ever to experience them (economic crises, terrorist attacks, illness). It makes relatively little difference whether we merely imagine events or actually experience them. We become despondent, numb, and feel helpless in the face of situations we cannot change.
A well-informed society is essential for positive development and problem-solving. But what might journalism look like if it filtered out the relevant events for us and encouraged us to keep reading, listening, watching, and getting involved? Not feel-good journalism, but journalism that inspires? Read now: Journalistic stories that inspire!
