Newsy

I am of the opinion that most news isn't very informative, in the sense of providing useful information about people, places and things around us, because it's not really expected to be. In the wake of the Oprah Winfrey interview with ex-British royals Harry and Meghan, that story held four of the top 10 most read stories on the site, and was edged out of the number one slot by news that Mackenzie Scott (Jeff Bezos' ex-wife) was marrying one of her children's teachers. And it's not like the BBC is a fluffy tabloid gossip site.

For all that I understand the push by "good media" sorts to lever "the media" into creating an informed and educated public, I'm not sure that this is what the public itself turns to news media outlets for. And I think that there's something to be said for understanding, and acknowledging, that point. The saying "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink," presumes that one has some level of control over the horse to begin with. Without that control, one can't even lead the horse.

I wonder if it's time for an approach that doesn't treat entertainment as the equivalent of "empty calories" and "real news" as unseasoned vegetables. I (sometimes) take the time to wade through the diverting news to find other items because I'm not really all that interested in the lives of celebrities. As much as I can't understand most of what I find there, I've come to find PubMed to be a much more interesting place to spend time. But I'll be the first to admit that it's also diverting - I read articles there because I enjoy it. The fact that they're sometimes understandable to me, and so I feel better educated is a side effect, although a welcome one.

Understanding why people read the news articles they do, and catering to that, might be the way to give people the education that some activists want them to have. It might not come across as uplifting as one might want it to be, but if the people won't come to you, then one has to go to where the people are.