Being well-informed about the happenings in your country and around the globe is essential in making sure that people perceive you as a “woke person”, i.e., one who is well-versed with the important, plaguing issues, as well as for general know-how. The sources for the same however, can sometimes be extremely misleading on a very personal level. Yes, today I am talking about the effects of news media, i.e., how truly helpful news channels or newspapers really are! I talk about how negative thoughts are formed in my signature workshop "MIND TRANSFORMATION” where I share how newspapers/ channels are one of the negative sources for the same. Hopefully it shall be an eye-opening read for you, so let’s directly delve into this:-

1.   The news media are, for the most part, the bringers of bad news….and it’s not entirely the media’s fault, bad news gets higher ratings and sells more papers than good news. – Peter McWilliams

Simplistically put, the media thrives on negativity. The one huge reason for the growing popularity of news media platforms is the fact that it thrives on negativity and keeps filling your brain with toxicity from around the globe. What happens when one person focuses on pessimism? His life will reflect it. Now imagine what will happen if lakhs and lakhs of people not only consume but are made to believe what a terrible state of affairs we are living in? Unfortunately our mind is accustomed to grasp negativity quicker than positivity because of either years of feeling inadequate or because of years of the lack of knowledge about what one positive thought can do to your life. News channels and newspapers are well aware of the same and take a BIG advantage of this weakness to garner higher TRPs for themselves!

2. America is a country of inventors and the greatest of inventors are the newspaper men. – Alexander Graham Bell

Well, India is no different. It really is a universal truth as far as the media industry is concerned. It is all about twisting facts to your advantage. If you find this as something difficult to believe in, talk to any actor in our country and they will tell you how media manipulates a story and presents the facts in their own subjective manner in order to make sure that the said story seems more “appealing” to its target audience. Sometimes it is almost as if you are using your power to brainwash people! And guess what? They are being successful. There are very few media outlets today that truly focus on the real news instead of being the origin of baseless gossip.

3. A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier – H.L. Mencken

Yes, because news channels are so happily and graphically misguiding. In an era where all of us are exposed to more information available for consumption to each of us than ever before, we are unable to differentiate between good information and bad information. Whereas commercially inclined media houses tend to feed our fears and manipulate us to spend our money in the product that they are advertising! Thus, the reliance and trustworthiness upon the information from these sources is a matter of huge concern. Stories are manipulated according to the people sponsoring or backing the financial bandwagon of the newspapers or media channels. So be very careful what you choose to believe in, because there is a very calculated reason for why a piece of news is presented the way it is presented. Read ‘The Power of Subconscious Mind’ by Dr. Joseph Murphy to understand its effect more.

4.A newspaper is a circulating library with a high blood pressure. – Arthur Baer

There is no doubt in it especially with high levels of insensitivity and defamation. Most channels use their respective platform to pass on vulgar pictures of celebrities or public figures as “news” especially in the name of “pop-culture”. In newspapers we generally see how an article is written about a very sincere struggle or problem of a particular celebrity and along with it (in order to garner more readers, and in order to “retain” the existing ones), they attach a very graphically insensitive picture. We all know about the tiff that Deepika Padukone has had in the past with Times of India. Similarly, news-channels tend to defame people very selfishly and slyly, by posing an opinion and showcasing it as if were the opinion of the general public thus leading to misconduct.

5. Early in life I had noticed that no event is ever correctly reported in a newspaper. – George Orwell

Why? Because today Indian news channels and papers have their very own political inclinations that they are very cunningly trying to feed their audiences as truth. Switch on your TV at 9 p.m. and there will be debates on any particular topic, and if you view it till the end, you shall realize how you learnt nothing in that hour, just as the people debating on TV because they would not let each other speak at all! Is this news or just noise? Think about it.