So, I get most of my online news from Yahoo!, as I have a My Yahoo! page. While the majority of my interests are more entertainment related (shocking, I know), I can't help but have a desire to stay informed about more important and topical matters, so I read the main headlines daily. I would say on at least one occasion, I find an article that is of interest to me, often political, and I read it.Then I look at the comments.
You ever look at a comment section of a Yahoo! news article?
Oy.
Now, it would be easy for me to say that the fault lies on the conservative side of the country, as it seems that most articles about President Obama seem to cause a feeding frenzy related to how he's a Muslim, or he's a socialist, blah blah blah. They manage to find ways to discuss President Obama in articles that have NOTHING to do with politics! Don't even get me started on comments written regarding gay rights (i.e. DADT, marriage equality).
However, the liberal side isn't much better. Many of their comments in response to the conservative comments are just as repugnant, if not more at times. The whole idea that there are people who seem to derive pleasure from such negativity saddens me. I feel like we are a nation that will never come together again, that the viewpoints we have will become more extreme instead of learning to work together and compromise. I also feel like we are a nation of idiots at times, considering the numerous grammatical and spelling guffaws I see
So, I know what you're thinking. "Then stop reading the comments."
That's the problem....I can't. I know they serve no purpose other than to anger me, but I can't stop looking at them.
So my question is, what do I do? One idea would be to find another outlet for my news. I don't want to go to a more liberal site, as I want my news to be as non-slanted as possible. However, I don't want to be tempted to read comments that just piss me off. Are there any websites out there that you can all think of? Anybody?
And before anybody asks, No, you can't get news about Congress from Falcon Studios. I'm talking to you, Huffington.
3 comments:
I actually get most of my news from one of two places: NPR blogs (especially Foreign Dispatch, Tell Me More, Fresh Air, and Planet Money) and the BBC. I feel like, for the most part, they are a lot more balanced, and the comments sections tend to be conversations and debates, rather than screaming matches.
http://news.google.com
Add/expand sections you like, remove the ones you don't care about, get local news on the sidebar, and generally the sites providing the news either have "Click here for comments" (much easier to avoid) or have better moderated or just less trafficked comment boxes.
Mike Branson got nothing on you Big Guy!
Post a Comment