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community weblog
Bits of sunshine in the news
That staff of Reasons To Be Cheerful staff sharing interesting news: See what stories caught our attention this week, from a scrappy, solar-powered New York lifestyle to early media literacy lessons in Finland.
posted by Brandon Blatcher on Nov 13, 2024 at 4:52 PM
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This is nice and I look forward to reading more. It reminds me a bit of Yes! Magazine, although that isn't necessarily as tightly focused on good-news stories.
posted by EvaDestruction at 5:44 PM
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You know, there is another way of looking at the whole "why can't we have more good news" argument.
Something only becomes news if it's a relatively uncommon event. As the old newspaper adage puts it: "Dog bites man is not news. Man bites dog is news">.
Take the example of an old lady who goes to the ATM and is mugged for the cash she's withdrawn. "Old lady mugged in street" would be a legitimate news headline because - most of the time - that's not what happens.
Now imagine a world where the news headline is "Old lady makes it home safely". That would imply that almost every old lady using an ATM is mugged before she gets home, and that this happens almost every time. In other words, it's a world where the outcome you'd hope for is very much the exception - and a vanishingly rare exception at that.
It's paradoxical, I know, but worth bearing in mind all the same.
posted by Paul Slade at 4:04 AM
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I agree. I think the opposite of bad news isn't good news, it's the absence of bad news.
What always irks me about these attempts to curate only "good news" is that they're just assembling the exceptions which prove the rule.
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:08 AM
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