Media bits for news needs

When I got up I set the laptop to boot while I washed my face, combed my hair and boiled the kettle for tea. There were no urgent emails so I moved quickly to Facebook which delivered a mix of local, national and international news. I gave more attention to the national (Scotland and the UK) media bits – both mainstream and alternative. There were lots of titillating media bits but what ‘truth’ lies behind them? Who is spinning and to what end?

Some mornings when there is appetite for more titillation I scan the epigrammic tweets in my Twitter list. But this morning, so far, Facebook has fulfilled what we might call the news need.

Several of the media bits held my attention for a few seconds but most of them have now faded from conscious attention – obviously I cannot speak for what they might or might not be doing in the unconscious.

I do, however, notice a smidgin of pride for having an enhanced capacity for spotting spin. But it is said that ‘pride comes before a fall’. But by being aware I might avoid the trip.

SO – at this moment, rather than surrendering attention to particular media bits, I am paying attention to the process of paying attention. So the news need is being fed by outputs from the unconscious churn that is my mindbrain. Another smidgin of pride – I am my own man?

As a human being I am a social animal and I thus have a news need so that I can fit in and keep up with others in my group.

However, IF I gorge exclusively on ‘external’ news THEN I will come to know my society and culture as it is portrayed locally in gossip and nationally in media bits. The system is open to abuse. Thus there is a need to pay some attention to my internal news. I develop my critical and sceptical faculties and use them often. It is a matter of balance.

The ancient Oracle at Delphi recommended that you, a free born citizen, should ‘know yourself’; the modern village gossips and the spin doctors at Westminster suggest that you, the workers and wage slaves, should ‘know your place’.