After the election, the WSJ put together this interesting website “Blue Feed, Red Feed” where you could see just how drastically different people’s newsfeeds were on a variety of topics. By clicking around, you can observe how easy it would be to form one-sided and ill-informed opinions by limiting yourself to certain news sources.
Up until about two years ago, I was pretty apathetic when it came to politics and current events and generally felt too busy with other life stuff to bother with keeping up with the news. It sort of became a self-perpetuated cycle: the longer I stayed uninformed, the more overwhelmed I felt when I tried to become informed. Eventually, I started becoming tired of staying silent during political or otherwise intelligent conversations out of fear I would expose my education gaps by having a “What’s a Leppo?” kind of gaffe. My silence was a mix of imposter syndrome and genuinely not feeling educated enough on current events to contribute anything intelligent.
So I resolved to become a more informed citizen, setting an original goal of something like taking the time to read one news article per day. The more I started keeping up, the easier and less overwhelming it became. Last spring, I chose to take a Middle Eastern Studies class to motivate me to learn more about past and current events. The class majorly kicked my butt, and since most of the students in that class were PolySci majors, I felt really out of my league (!). They would rattle off stuff about the Huthis, and the Sunnis, and the Six-Day War, and Gadaffi etc. and I would sit silently, praying I didn’t say something stupid when it was my turn. Suffice to say, I’m really glad I put myself through that experience. I’m by no means an expert, but I have a lot more context now through which to process news about things happening in the Middle East.
So what do I read these days? I’ve been guilty of reading exclusively more liberal-leaning news sources, but since the election, I have tried to expand by reading The Hill and the WSJ. Otherwise I read the Atlantic, Politico, NPR, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and occasionally the New Yorker (but I’m always running out of my free articles), the Economist (though I don’t have a subscription unfortunately), and Vox. I also read some German news like the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and Der Spiegel. (It’s always interesting to see what and how they cover US politics.) I also have been trying to add local news into the mix by following the Indy Star, the St. Cloud Times, and reading the Ostsee Zeitung. Since my computer has been dead, I’ve been a bit lazy with just accessing articles through Facebook, but as soon as I get a new computer, I’ll probably try to access the newspaper’s websites directly and browse headlines there. When I need to laugh about what’s happening in the news, I’ll watch clips from Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, or Trevor Noah or occasionally, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee.
I’ve also been trying to expand beyond just newspapers and have been going to the library to access some academic journals. Lately, I’ve enjoyed reading articles in Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, and some Women’s Studies journals.
As far as books go, I’m not really reading anything political, but I’ll include it anyways. Currently, I’m in the middle of H is for Hawk and Der Vorleser. Since I tend to listen to audio books when I’m sick, it’s a bit stop and go, but I’m halfway through The Martian and the second Harry Potter book. I also want to read When Breath Becomes Air but might wait until I’m back in the US to read it, because I’m trying to read more exclusively in German while I’m in Germany.
Compared to my attitude towards politics and news around two years ago, I’m surprised to admit that I actually read about this stuff for fun now. I’m not entirely sure what caused the change, but I do think that the more informed I’ve become, the easier it’s become to piece things together and put them in historical context. It’s become more interesting, rather than feeling like a burden.
In general, it also seems that most Americans my age don’t care much about politics or current events. And I too was like this. But with all the talk about “fake news” and increasing distrust in the media, I’ve been mulling over how important it is—even a responsibility— to stay informed. I also think this is what might help avoid further polarization—the more of a grasp we have on a topic, the more nuance we can bring to a discussion. I’m not really sure how to inspire more Americans my age to continue to be informed and to read the news, but I thought this might be a start—by sharing my own story.
Of course, since graduating from college, I’ve had a lot more time than usual to read the news on a daily basis—both a positive and a negative thing. I’m still trying to find a balance between consuming and being consumed by the news. And I still have a lot of apathy, particularly when it comes to financial related stuff. (When people start talking about Goldman Sachs or Wall Street or investments, I just kind of glaze over. Economics is not really my thing.) Anyways, I’m continuing to fill in information gaps and expand my knowledge and build a foundation of understanding of global events.
So, how do you stay informed? What are your information gaps? What news sources/articles/books would you recommend?
Sarah the Adventurer 