It's news to me

Last Tuesday evening, a crew was working on the infrastructure on York Rd in Baltimore County. Something went wrong and they broke a 24" water main, causing a hole about the size of Delaware to form in the road, a flood to ensue, and a natural gas line to rupture.

Since York Rd is the main road in the central portion of the County (it runs from Baltimore City, where all of a sudden right where my old dentist's office used to be it changes its name to Greenmount Avenue to York, Pennsylvania, which was the first capital of the United States way back when - you could look it up!) so you can imagine this caused quite a disruption in traffic. It was the lead story on the morning newscasts on radio and tv.

So why was I surprised to see the news later on that day showing people being interviewed by reporters, and saying that they had no idea about York Rd being closed to traffic?

I've heard this from a lot of people, people saying they don't watch the news or listen to news on the radio or read the newspaper.  After I finish shuddering, I always ask why they feel that not knowing what's happening in the world is a good thing.

And I'm not talking about news that causes opinions to break out. Knowing that your route to work or home will be radically different, or that a thunderstorm is coming, or a blizzard, or a severe heat wave, or that certain foods have been recalled...these are not "fake news" stories or reasons to be dubious. There's no spin on traffic information.

It scares me to see these stories in which people are interviewed and asked simple questions about simple facts of history or current events. We laugh when high school graduates are perplexed about when World War II took place ("18 hundred something?") or when people are unaware of how society works (the local government will haul away your trash and recyclables, but will not mow the grass in your back yard) but it's really not all that funny.

I googled the reasons why people might be inclined to skip knowing the news. One of the reasons seems to be that the news is an "infinite source of negativity" that "keeps me up at night worrying" and besides, "I try to stay positive."  

My stance is, and I hate to drag out everyone's favorite tautology, but the news is what the news is. A war is not good news, neither are floods and murders, but history is just yesterday's news. There are good and bad parts of every day. Knowing about both is worth the time!

I'd be interested to hear what anyone thinks about the trend of not wanting to be up on the news!