Samikhsya Bureau
It should not sound like someone playing an Ombudsman amid the trend of news of negative taste aired whether by the print or electronics media, it is difficult to adapt one’s mind for things that upsets when it is disproportionately more. It may have some scientific basis but an overdose of it really impacts the minds of normal people.
There is nothing like advocating against highlighting news which reflect a sense of negativity or things relating to crime, or misdeeds or purely bestial in essence, quite natural that, any such over hype does disturb the mind. But, beyond that there is or there are something else.
For last one week or so, in few of the news channels in Odisha, the headlines are mainly dealing with issues that leaves a viewer with a sense of ennui at the end.
Minor raped, woman gang raped and new born baby girl dumped in a dust bin, attempt to club a minor girl to death after rape, it is usually a pack that make the bulletins rating worthy for the market.
And all those become topics for the politics of the day lacing the legislative proceedings. Such incidents, of course, deserve space but beyond such stuffs there are many things somehow fail to make to the bulletins. Like, positive inputs those speak about tales of achievement by people or individuals, community-driven initiatives, social, cultural or even environment related good works those may occasionally get relegated to the lower order or just not appear. Media need not be reactive only but, proactive also. That is missing barring few exceptions.
There is a perceptible tendency to turn tragedies or dastardly occurrences into an opportunity by which the media upset the victims rather than offsetting the pain. At the same time, a viewer’s exposure to such headlines are bit disturbing also.
In the name of positive inputs of gratuitous nature which is comprised of pretensions or hypocrisy of the political leaders. Some call it as ‘ paid news’ or planted ones.
In nutshell, an overload of negativity, however relevant they may be, deeply impact the inner peace. That is when a viewer becomes mentally so fatigued and switches over for something lighter stuff and entertaining to drain out the load of daily life. Everybody has a longing for stronger peace of mind and a sense of wellbeing those now-a-days get seriously affected by antipathy.
This is an issue which deserves a revisit by the fourth pillar.
