It seems clear that both are partly true? For example: while climate change has been getting worse in the last few decades and so has wealth inequality in the west, humanity as a whole has made some great strides in reducing preventable diseases and global hunger.

In any case the fact that pessimists prevail in the headlines may not have anything to do with how the world actually is, but more with what sells newspapers. It is well-known that (after sex) human misery sells much more copy than happy stories. "If it bleeds it leads" and all that.