I suppose we all agree: things are pretty fucked up. Climate change, the rise of right wing authoritarianism, the wealth gap, gun violence, war, racism, nativism, this-ism, that-ism. The list goes on, ad infinitum.
Truth is, things are really no more fucked up today than they were yesterday, last year, last century, and last millennium.
Since we became human, we’ve been killing each other, oppressing each other, raping the land, fouling the air and water, owning slaves, dropping bombs, sticking our noses in other people’s sex lives, slugging our spouses, and every other atrocity you may care to name.
Listen to, watch, or read the news on any channel, on any website, (I almost wrote in any newspaper but who reads them?) and you’ll want to jump off the roof of a tall building. Kids don’t walk home alone from school anymore, people don’t hitchhike, and everybody’s barricading themselves in their living rooms and dens because The World Is A Dangerous Place.
Many Americans think crime has gotten crazily out of hand. Yet, law enforcement statistics show that the crime rate has steadily declined since the end of the pandemic and, even before that, it had been plummeting since the 1970s.
Truth is, the real danger is the news on any channel, on any website, and — yes — in any newspaper (for the six or seven of you who still do that old thing).
Listening to Morning Edition on NPR yesterday morning, I learned about a horrible disease that threatens everybody in this frightened nation. Public health experts and medical scientists are working feverishly to determine the range and scope of this next epidemic. Reporters are interviewing people at risk. Politicians must be made aware of this existential threat. Oh, what are we to do?
The disease? Bird flu. NPR spent three minutes on it, next to a lifetime in electronic media.
Y’wanna know how many people have gotten bird flu this year? Two.
Two human beings out of a United States population of more than 336 million.
Twenty people, on average, are killed by lightning each year in the United States. More than a hundred people drown in their own bathtubs each year in the US. So, thunderstorms and taking a bath are far more dangerous to us than bird flu. In fact, two people were killed by shark bites in the United States last year, making that peril much more scarifying than bird flu, considering bird flu hasn’t killed anybody this year.
And if I were an NPR radio news reporter, I’d be obligated to append “Yet…” to that statement because, god knows, bird flu might be the next disaster in the making.
Two people, for chrissakes!
“Stop scaring us!” I shouted at the radio as the true nature of the bird flu menace became apparent.
In fact, that’s the whole aim of the news these days, to scare the hell out of us. When corporate and mainstream media pose everything as a threat to our lives, we become less and less able to identify the real dangers out there.
If Trump becomes president, we’re doomed. If Biden remains president, we’re doomed. If Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito aren’t kicked off the US Supreme Court right now, we’re doomed. If teenagers keep on wondering about their genders, we’re doomed. If we continue to drive cars and ride in airplanes, we’re doomed. If sea levels rise, we’re doomed. If we mow our lawns too much, we’re doomed. If we forgive college loan debt, we’re doomed. If we let people mail in their ballots in the November election, we’re doomed.
Make no mistake, there are existential threats. For instance, burning fossil fuels since the onset of the Industrial Revolution has indeed put us and much of the world’s life at some sort of risk over the next few decades. But, jeez, not every freaking thing is going to wipe us all out. Certainly not shark bites, bathtub drownings, lightning strikes, Biden’s second term, or bird flu.
Trump regaining the presidency? Well, lemme think about that one for a bit.