“Ignorance is far easier than I thought…Five months into my [news] blackout, I’m happier than I ever was back in the days when I was informed. My fingernails are growing back. The sleeping pills remain in the bottle. I’m getting more work done.”

— Christopher Herbert, “My Year of Living Ignorantly” (Guardian 1/1/18)

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The extended quote is from a worthy article — with even worthier comments, pro and con — from an English prof (U. of Tennessee) and novelist who went on a news blackout the night Trump was elected. “I no longer live in a constant state of alarm,” he claims. The decision for him was “about sanity and self-preservation.” As I read the article, I felt my own semi-blackout decision made on November 9, 2016 to be both reinforced and challenged, trying personally to find the balance between sanity/joy/gratitude and Edmund Burke’s dictum, “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

But is avoiding the news, as I do, doing nothing? It’s not like I’m totally ignorant of what’s going on — how can anyone be, absent living in a cave or going into hibernation? I gloated over Roy Moore’s defeat, still wake up in the night worrying about an accidental or deliberate nuclear strike (as I’ve been doing since about 1960), try to imagine what it’s like to be a Dreamer these days. I glance briefly at the Guardian headlines every morning online (avoiding other print or online news sources — getting my news from the UK somehow gives perspective to what’s happening in the U.S., where the plight of the Muslim Rohingyar in Myanmar, or Emmanuel Macron’s inspiring tightrope walk through EU politics, is virtually ignored). So I kinda-sorta keep up without wallowing in the daily “if it bleeds, it leads” news cycle. As I used to.

It helps that we don’t have a TV, don’t listen to the radio, have stopped subscribing to The Week, don’t buy the Sunday NYT anymore. I’m not on Twitter but still check Facebook for news of friends and family, quickly scrolling through the “Read this! You need to act now!” political posts. Being out of the country, as we have for much of the last 14 months, has certainly helped mute the impact of the latest denial, absurdity or shithole comment from the White House. We don’t speak His Name at home; I wander off when politics comes up in company; don’t touch the newspapers that somehow accumulate at home (I didn’t say my wife shares my blackout proclivities); meditate most days. When I crave entertainment, I lose myself in the NYT crossword or a graphic novel or the daily comics, rather than — as I used to — turn to the news to be titillated. I salve my conscience by supporting Doctors Without Borders, Room to Read, the ACLU (nothing like owning a Bitcoin, which I wrote about it here last December 10, to awaken latent generosity in a soul!). That is, I leave it to others to do the heavy lifting. “I did mine back in Nuclear Freeze days,” I tell myself.

Nothing lasts forever, I understand, but for now I’ll stick to my blackout-lite routine, still worrying (but not as much), often feeling stupid about my ignorance (per usual), finding solace in gravity waves, the possibility of life on Mars, the story of ancient civilizations, the optimism of Mexicans, the call of the grackles at sunset, the taste of spaghetti pesto. Getting out of this culture and this century. Do I have to spoil it all by turning on the news???