"So many of us tuned in day and night, waiting for news that would finally break. When nothing decisive happened, we filled the gap with talk. Hours of it. We replayed clips, challenged opinion pieces, traded theories, speculated on rumors, and tried to predict what would come next. At the time, it felt like our civic duty and the responsible thing to do."
"Two decades later, I see the same pattern replaying. We find ourselves checking feeds far more often than intended. We keep returning to the news, waiting for something to change and hoping we will find certainty, some return to "normal," whatever that means. Adding insult to injury, social media makes it even harder to look away because updates are optimized to provoke. Taking a break from the news cycle feels risky because we might miss something we were supposed to know."
In 2003 in Caracas, intense political rupture with a failed coup and a long strike deepened divisions around Hugo Chávez and eroded democratic institutions. People watched a 24-hour news channel obsessively, tensing and leaning forward at breaking-news banners as if posture could coax history. When decisive events did not occur, viewers filled gaps with hours of talk, replaying clips, debating opinion pieces, trading theories, and speculating on rumors. Two decades later the pattern repeats online: feeds are checked repeatedly, updates are optimized to provoke, and taking breaks feels risky amid fears of missing important information. Attention has limits and selective attention shapes experience.
Read at Psychology Today
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