And now for some Good News.....

 

Before the event of Microsoft's use of the term "windows", windows often referred to the boundary between the inside and the outside, the private sphere and the public (although, in literature the term is also used in: "the eyes as windows to the soul"(heart, mind).

I take the meaning of "the eyes are the windows of the soul" to be that through someone's eyes their inner states are possible to be "seen".)

 Do you watch the news? I do, and last night when I was watching the news it suddenly dawned on me that the news perhaps can be viewed as "windows" into a multitude of situations and events, but also into people's lives, both public and private.

“To grow interested in any piece of information, we need somewhere to 'put' it, which means some way of connecting it to an issue we already know how to care about.”   Writes Alain de Botton in his book: "The News: A users manual". As I was watching one news item after the other of destruction, violence, natural catastrophes, crying children and celebrities doing "stupid" things, etc. etc., Alain de Botton's words rang true to me.

Where are we to put all these "windows" of information?

According to statistics, we are becoming increasingly more anxious about what the future holds for us personally as well as collectively. Some of us may choose to avoid watching the news and current affairs programs, documentaries and commentaries on world events, some of us may feel that it is important to keep up with such and seek them out, some of us perhaps compartmentalise and only watch and read about those particular things that we feel invested in, and some of us perhaps don't want to see or hear about any of those things because after all, "what can we do about it anyway?"

May I suggest, that the TV screen (computer, ipad, phone) is in itself a "window", and regardless of what we may be watching, what we see, affects us in a myriad of different ways.

Reality shows, for instance, why are they so attractive to so many of us? Could they not perhaps be seen as quite voyeuristic in nature, as an intrusion into peoples private spheres? Peeking behind the curtains, so to speak? Some suggest that reality shows give us an opportunity to compare: ourselves to others (I wish I had his/her life), others to us (gee, I am happy I'm not living his/her life), "I would never behave like that, I would never do that, I would never say those things, I wish I was brave enough to do that, I could have become a .......too, I am just as good as him/her so I am going to give it a shot", etc.etc.. Personally, I find it interesting to watch talent shows, whether they are about music, painting, cooking, baking, renovation, or etc.etc.., I find it encouraging and inspiring to watch people having a "go" and developing their skills at doing something they are passionate about.

But back to the news and the many confrontational images that enter our private spaces through the TV screen (computer, ipad, phone). Alain de Botton again: “Though anger seems a pessimistic response to a situation, it is at root a symptom of hope: the hope that the world can be better than it is. The man who shouts every time he loses his house keys is betraying a beautiful but rash faith in a universe in which keys never go astray. The woman who grows furious every time a politician breaks an election promise reveals a precariously utopian belief that elections do not involve deceit.
The news shouldn’t eliminate angry responses; but it should help us to be angry for the right reasons, to the right degree, for the right length of time – and as part of a constructive project."

The thing with the News as I see it, is that it does not "peek behind the curtains", rather, the curtains have been removed altogether and what we see (although interpreted to some degree), are actual events, which is perhaps one of the reasons why it can be so confrontational to watch news programs. "Good News doesn't sell newspapers" so some say, and then often goes on to add: "people don't want to hear about happy people, happy events, or happy outcomes, people want to hear about other people being worse off than themselves so that they can say to themselves that they are not so bad off after all".

Is this really true? Hearing of others tragedies, does that help us to view our own less tragically?

Then what? Is it not possible that if a measure of "good news" had to be included in the news reports along with the "bad news", we may feel less overwhelmed and inclined to throwing in the towel, but instead feel encouraged to entertain the notion that we can all find some small, or big, way to contribute something "good" for the betterment of mankind?

(There are a few sites on the web that offers Good News/Positive News, and browsing those I have found can be rather inspiring when the onslaught of bad news seem to fill every channel.)

Alain de Botton again: “To live in modernity--an era contemporaneous with the triumph of the news--is to be constantly reminded that, thanks to science and technology, change and improvement are continuous and relentless. This is part of the reason we must keep checking the news in the first place: we might at any moment be informed of some extraordinary development that will fundamentally alter reality. Time is an arrow following a precarious, rapid and yet tantalizingly upward trajectory.”  

Did you know that:

 Ebola was eradicated in Liberia in May 2015, in Nigeria in October 2015, and both Sierra Leone and Guinea were declared free of the disease in December 2015?

There is a new kind of antibiotics called Teixobactin that can kill "superbugs"?

Australian scientists has solved the puzzle of how Alzheimer’s disease destroys connections in the brain?

Park rangers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo reported in 2015 that the mountain gorilla population had quadrupled in recent decades to 1,000?

Some doctors in Canada has developed a method for penetrating the protective layer of the brain to allow medicine to be delivered directly to deadly tumours through the blood stream. The breakthrough allows easier and far more effective treatment of cancer, Parkinson’s, and Alzheimer's disease? (from  GoodNewsNetwork)

 

One of the good things about our "artificial" windows in my view, is that we can turn them off when we want and or need to, .....real life on the other hand,  .........not so much.

But, there is always something we can do for someone else, no matter how small that something may be, to make that someone else's life a little bit easier, happier, and/or more endurable.

All that is needed is to look for that window of opportunity to lend a helping hand.