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Comment by Swizec | Hacker News Reader

My English wasn't good enough to understand any of those when I became interested in the topics they cover.

I pay for NYT and some stories are amazing. I finish maybe 5% of the ones I start reading and I probably attempt less than 5% of what they publish.

But, let's see. NYT headline right now: "Terror attack kills 4 in Heart of London". WSJ: "UK parliament attacker leaves 4 dead, 40 injured". The Economist: "A Brazilian meat scandal damages the country's two global producers"

Meh, sensationalism. How is any of this pertinent to me as a 29 year old engineer in SF? Other than making me afraid of my own shadow and riling up negative emotions.

Maybe the problem is that I am fundamentally just not interested in news. That seems increasingly likely. My fav NYT stories, for instance, are the researched not-news article. The Avalanche was one of the best things I ever read.

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> I pay for NYT and some stories are amazing. I finish maybe 5% of the ones I start reading and I probably attempt less than 5% of what they publish.

Well, hopefully you finish more than 5% of my reply...

> Meh, sensationalism. How is any of this pertinent to me as a 29 year old engineer in SF? Other than making me afraid of my own shadow and riling up negative emotions.

Seriously? Those are the only thoughts that an article like that (it's finely written, just read it) can evoke on you?

Makes me sad to read your statements, I can only hope that you're not representative of a "29 year old engineer in SF"

I happen to be 31 years old, an engineer and also live in SF... a terrorist attack in London, does happen to be pertinent to me.

> Seriously? Those are the only thoughts that an article like that (it's finely written, just read it) can evoke on you?

It's interesting yes. It's sad that some people died. It's inspiring that life continues, that people get on with their lives and don't let themselves get bogged down because some people have stupid ideas. All of that is great.

The article even teaches me some practical things about how terrorist attacks work. How to thwart them, how to carry them out. What happens after.

Fundamentally though, London has a 0.24% death rate per year. With 8.6 million residents that's 56 dead people per day.

I'm sure those 4 people that died were very important to their families and loved ones. And the other 50-ish that died on the same day I'm sure were just as important to their loved ones.

And what am i to do with this information? How does it affect my life? I went to work today, I'll go tomorrow. I'll kiss my girlfriend goodnight and play with my parrot. I'll waste some time online. Maybe write or make a video.

I'm just as likely to die in a terrorist attack tomorrow as I was yesterday. It is overall not something worth worrying about.

Even the people I know who live in London have all said "Meh, this affects nothing. I got shit to do"

My point is that following the news is kind of toxic. Every day they find ten things you should be upset about. Why? To what end? What's the point? When one crisis blows over, they'll find the next one.

If you can't meaningfully differentiate between people dying of illness or old age and people dying from someone driving a car deliberately into them and then running amok with a knife... well, I think the problem's with you rather than with the news content you're consuming.

The people I know in London (I'm about 150 miles west of there) most certainly were not saying, "Meh, this affects nothing".

I work in London and have done for 20+ years. Westminster is close by to where I currently work. I still echo this though - it affects nothing.

For those of us old enough to have lived through the IRA bombings of the early 90s, you've gotta really step up your terrorist game[1] if you actually want Londoners to react in a meaningful way.

Despite the public 'shock' shown in the media, most Londoners typically do just go 'meh', and get on with their day. London is a BIG city, 8+ million people in it every day. Unless tragedy affects you or someone you know, it's hard to get upset about it.

[1] Absolutely not condoning terrorism, just making a point.

>"Meh, this affects nothing".

As someone who lives in London (but no longer works by westminster) - this is my unpopular opinion. I'm pretty sure a bunch of people have been stabbed this year in random/gang violence but nobody is terrified by that.

Yes, it sucks that a guy in a car can intentionally run a bunch of people over. I'm sad for the police officer killed in the line of duty. It's a bad day. Literally nothing has changed.

Yeah agree.

I lived through IRA bombings although I can't recall much, I was near a pub that a neo-nazi nail-bombed in '99 and I was on a train one station along in '05. So I have trouble working out why I'm so not-scared.

Have you been able to discern why an attack in London that kills 4 people is considered more pertinent by these bastions of journalism and not the numerous that happen every single day in Iraq and Syria, a place plunged into this power vacuum by Westminister and Washington?

Lets be honest, the pertinence of an attack in London is being established not because people dieing is pertinent, its that the people are dieing in a city that looks like yours and mine.

I don't really know what to say. It is unfortunately self-evident that when something that is unusual occurs, it is newsworthy, and when something happens every day, it becomes less newsworthy (I guess that's the "news" bit of "newsworthy").

If there were a terror attack in London of a similar magnitude every Wednesday for the next 16 weeks, I imagine the headlines in July would be somewhat more muted (though of course there would then be op-ed pieces wondering what we could do to stop terror attacks happening every Wednesday, just like there are pieces in the newspaper periodically wondering what can be done to improve the situation in Iraq or Syria).

I read the article about the Brazilian meat manufacturers. Here's how it affects you. If you eat meat, you can start to wonder where it's sourced from and what standards it adheres to. The article mentioned that Brazilian exports to the US started last year. You would also know that the vast majority of such factories are well run, unlike the bad apples that this investigation uncovered. Basically it would make you think more about the food you eat.

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