WARNING: Opinions expressed on this blog are so cold you can skate on them. Reader discretion is advised.
I’m old enough to remember when journalism was an honourable profession. (Yeah, I’m that old.) In those days (and this isn’t just nostalgia) reporters reported the news, good reporters sought the truth and the great ones found it. Even as I type this, it does sound a little corny and old-fashioned. However, anyone, who was alive before Phil Donahue and his insipid brand of Jello Journalism f-f-f-fouled things up, will know what I’m talking about. Edward R. Murrow’s boys (and more than a few girls) set the standard, and typewriters all over the world clattered away, trying to emulate them. Unfortunately, those days are gone, and they’re not coming back.
These days journalists deal in porn. It comes in many forms. It wears many disguises. But it’s always the same – an artificially arranged scenario whose sole purpose is to stimulate the audience — and any way you slice that, it’s porn.
Disaster Porn – Touring the wreckage has become de rigueur in television reporting. Filming stunned survivors stumbling through the rubble is gold, and if you can get a shivering puppy on camera, you’re well on your way to a Pulitzer Prize.
Grief Porn – Shoving a camera into somebody’s face and asking, “Can you describe what was going through your mind when the police first told you your daughter had been eaten by cannibals?”
Poverty Porn – Camera crews and well-fed reporters, cruising through a refugee camp like it’s a guided tour of a human zoo of misery. But the money shot is when they pull over and ask one of the locals just how horrible their godawful, wretched existence really is.
Ain’t it Awful Porn – This is when the downtrodden get an extra kick in the ass. Journalists particularly enjoy empty foodbanks, old people who get scammed out of their life savings, and single mothers with cancer who lose their jobs a week before Christmas.
Trump Porn – OMG! Look what the guy did, today! LOOK! JUST LOOK! It’s way worse than yesterday!
It’s Not Really Porn Porn – No wonder feminists are pissed off all the time. Believe me, Red Carpet cleavage, the wardrobe malfunction, the ever juvenile nip slip, and the full skirt caught by a random breeze are not actually news. They’re occasions where polite people discreetly look away.
But the worst journalistic porn in the world is:
Inspirational Porn – Clearly, the only reason disabled people even exist is to demonstrate to the rest of us lazy bastards just how petty our problems really are. Think about it! The truth is, regardless of how talented, determined or resourceful these people might be on a normal daily basis — without their wheelchairs, journalists wouldn’t give them the time of day.
WD Fyfe 
This is why I do not watch it, read it or listen to it. Haven’t for years. The “news” is not healthy, and so i choose not to expose myself to it. Some will call me ignorant, but I really don’t care. Sadly I still see snippets when I am on the internet, but I avert my eyes and have a long hot shower afterwards.
Like you I gave up years ago but sometimes it does ooze it.
I was a journalism major for the first half of my college career, but I’ve given up on following the news too. You’ve uncovered the chief problem — they use people as a means to their end, their end being to sell their product back to us.