I am quite sure this does not mean that Canadians consume less digital content. Just that is is not news (from Canadian news outlets).
For a sovereign country this is catastrophic.
It probably means that Canadians consume even more reddit style media, YouTube shorts or outright propaganda from foreign nations.
scaremongering people’s amygdalas 24 hours a day for more than six consecutive months must have left a mental scar on people’s minds and the newborn children
It’s not a hard ban. I’ll click a link someone sends me, not that people do that. I’ll walk past my partner’s iPad and look over her shoulder. Occasionally I’ll pick up a print edition of the Economist.
But, by and large, I don’t ’read the news’. I can only recommend it. ‘The news’ as published on the majority of sites is mostly crap you don’t care about. Even the reputable sites. And then when it’s some big event that you are supposed to care about, that just makes you sad/angry/whatever.
People say that I’m absolving myself of my responsibility to society. Nah. I vote (I have to, I’m Australian). My vote hasn’t changed in 20 years, nothing I read is going to do that now. And I wasn’t politically active before, so that hasn’t changed.
Just stop reading the news.
Australians need to care more about improving society - not just the media landscape but in so many facets. Its not going to fail-forwards for much longer, and the cracks are showing
If that's indeed the case, it should be an alarm call for all citizens to start caring and getting politically involved even more than before. It's not like the world owes us not to go up in flames, and if it does, we shouldn't just sit down shaking our head in disappointment.
And I'm already politically active, I always was. But I the these people thrive on dissent just like social media does. Anger is a very strong emotion.
Ps I have since edited the term fascist to extreme-right as it's a more appropriate description. Though both apply IMO. For example the party in question doesn't even permit members. It's all about the one guy who decides everything.
It's not. The Netherlands remains a parliamentary representative democracy.
The good thing is that the current coalition is so unstable it will likely collapse soon. Even during their inaugural debates they couldn't stop slinging mud.
Unfortunately this is how the far right is able to gain power.
> I don't think this is a bad thing tbh.
Less real news, but not necessarily less political content. And now you can't reply to misinformation with a link to a real news story.
I don't think this is a bad thing tbh. I've also started reducing my news consumption years ago. First there was the pandemic where there was only bad news not worth watching. And now we have an extreme-right government in Holland so I'm simply disillusioned and I don't care what they do anymore.
At the same time most news sites (like the mainstream nu.nl) require either payment or logging in with an account which I refuse so I'm just skimming the news headlines on the national state broadcaster (NOS) once a day or so.
I still follow the local city news a bit because those things actually matter in my life. But not on social media, I've blocked all news outlets there (on the few i still check because I've greatly disconnected from socials since even before the pandemic). I simply don't care anymore.
And guess what? I'm a lot happier for it. A lot less things to get angry about. I just spend my time talking to friends and people I do actually care about.
I think it's because both socials and the regular news love promoting controversial topics because they get more engagement. People get all wound up and that makes them stay on the platform to argue and thus see more ads. I'm kinda done with that.
And most news is really not that important anyway. My life is not noticeably changed by not knowing all but the most important news facts. I'm fine without it, most of it was just FOMO.
Ps I really appreciate HN for not doing this. I still learn a lot of nice and interesting things here.