Dear Doonhamers

Here’s an experiment to try. Give it a go, I’ll wait for you, then come back and read the rest of the article.

Look at your phone.

Now look around you.

Look at your phone. Scroll through a social app, read the news.

Now look around you.

Look at your phone. The world is on fire. You’re in danger.

Now look around you. You’re fine. You’re safe.

When you take in a snapshot of the world from your phone what can you really discern? News has a bias towards negativity. People have tried to create “good news” outlets, but they don’t get much traction. There is a small audience for good news, but it’s not compelling, it’s not share worthy. It’s not profitable.

Bad news, chaos, incompetence all garner eyeballs, angry emojis, clown emojis, shares and comments.

Your phone is a wormhole. It can deliver you to any corner of the planet and any time and any reality, but can it deliver you from evil?

The problem with phones is two-fold.

1. So much content nowadays is written by non-journalists such as myself. Non-journalists do not fact check. They do not subject themselves to external scrutiny before publishing. They just keep, the gravy boat turning.

2. We assume everything is happening now. Often it’s the case the video is old footage and perhaps not even real. But we assume everything we see in mobile apps is real and current. We feel they are proximate to our lives and reflect our lives or a near future version of it.

They don’t. Give your self some time off from your phone or whatever small glowing rectangle of glass feeds you infotainment. Take a moment to remember something you used to enjoy doing.

Can you get back there?