If you are, you wouldn’t be the only one. Our decline in emotional or empathetic responses to violent or traumatic content is due to its constant and repeated exposure. The normalisation of global crises does not come from a loss of emotion but rather from a habit; an endless cycle of witnessing images of destruction through scrolling and swiping, before becoming disturbingly familiar with it. Breaking news after breaking news, our attention and awareness struggles to keep up with a media landscape that consistently flashes overwhelming urgency. It’s not that we passively accept suffering, but rather, our brains and emotions no longer know how to process it.
This is particularly evident in the way crises in the Middle East are consumed through media. The wars in Gaza or Iran are not isolated events; they are part of wider patterns of geopolitical instabilities. For many viewers, these crises and wars blur into one another, reducing them to just headlines that appear briefly before being replaced by the next big red ‘breaking news’ alert on our screens.
...these crises and wars blur into one another, reducing them to just headlines that appear briefly before being replaced by the next big red ‘breaking news’ alert on our screens.
I have come to believe that as a consequence, we are also less sensitive to the collapse of world order, currently led by the erratic man playing with global security and peace in the White House. Who, interestingly, also largely benefits from media overwhelm to distract the public from national crises and outbreaks in scandals (I think we all know what I’m referring to). Thus, when the world becomes one of the world’s most powerful man’s board game, can we really expect the public to react with sustained shock? With the normalisation of the US’s international actions in Venezuela or more recently in Iran, it has become a game of guessing what ludicrous decision will be implemented next. When unpredictability becomes the norm, we become less sensitive and, in such a context, outrage simply loses its impact… such as claims to “wipe out an entire civilization”.
At its core, the topic remains that wars and conflicts have simply never been more advertised via the media than today. Advances in communication mean that events unfolding thousands of miles away from us are almost instantly accessible, which emphasises a feeling that the world is constantly deteriorating. We begin to ask ourselves whether we are turning away from conflict out of indifference, or out of a deeper sense of helplessness.
But is our world truly getting worse? Hasn’t society always faced crises? The truth is that crimes have always existed, wars have always been declared and history does keep repeating itself and will continue doing so until the end of time. The difference today lies in how these events are communicated. What was once distant or unseen is now immediate and unavoidable. The result is not necessarily a more dangerous world, but a more visible and connected one.
What was once distant or unseen is now immediate and unavoidable.
You have probably heard your parents, or grandparents say that our generation is poisoned with hate and disrespect, convinced that the world is currently worse than ever. But it is often forgotten that the television and media landscape has significantly expanded in the past decades, leading people to believe that because they are seeing more violence. It is more present. From only four news channels to hundreds in the UK in just over 40 years, how can anyone turn away from the horrors taking place across the world?
So how do we practice constructive and conscious consumption of violent media? I would watch, read and listen intentionally; analyse and critically engage with media and allow your brain to consume it in a way that benefits your learning and awareness. By engaging with freelance journalists who take care of telling one story at a time or getting information from only one news channel a day, you might start feeling more connected to what is going on in the world instead of enduring the pain of information overload.