Family: TV news: Turn it off and get a better picture of the world

TV news: Turn it off and get a better picture of the world

Written by Katherine Westphal

Television news programs are just about repparttar

worst way to get news for two important reasons.

1) Television itself inhibits repparttar 110189 functioning of left brain rational analysis. 2) The television media has become centralized into a few huge media conglomerates.

Most people are aware of repparttar 110190 consolidation of repparttar 110191 media industry. However, people are only dimly aware of TV's inhibition of left brain functioning. Try this experiment. Right now. Critically review three of repparttar 110192 news stories you watched on TV last night. Ready. Set. Go!

So, only a few perspectives are presented on repparttar 110193 TV news, and when viewers like yourself watch this news, they are inhibited from logically analyzing repparttar 110194 stories. That is terrible news for democracy. Democracy needs informed citizens that can analyze and discuss different views of a situation.

I use a few simple guidelines to get a picture of what is going on in repparttar 110195 world. These do require a little more effort than parking in front of a TV set and mindlessly absorbing repparttar 110196 images, but not too much more.

Reading is more efficient

The first step is to start reading, instead of watching, your news. Television generally takes a lot of time to get across a little bit of information. With reading you can absorb information much faster. A five minute story on repparttar 110197 news can be read online or in repparttar 110198 newspaper generally in less than a minute. The spare time can be used to analyze repparttar 110199 story.

Get several quality news sources

The next step in developing a good picture of repparttar 110200 world is to get several good news sources. Begin with a mainstream newspaper or website to simply get an idea of repparttar 110201 basic issues that are at stake.

Then, select a couple of alternative news sources outside repparttar 110202 mainstream. I am not going to recommend a particular source, because I do not wish to become engaged in liberal/conservative partisan discussions. These distinctions start to fall away once you start to analyze repparttar 110203 news for yourself anyway.

Analyze repparttar 110204 information

The next step is simply to start critically viewing repparttar 110205 material that you read. Does it make logical sense? Are there inconsistencies? Does repparttar 110206 story change from one day to repparttar 110207 next? Are there any patterns to events? Finally, repparttar 110208 most important question to ask for any given situation is: who benefits? Rarely do events happen by chance in repparttar 110209 world and asking that one, little question can lead to much greater understanding of any situation. Put that left brain into hyper-drive.

Should We Apologize To Our Children?

Written by Russell Turner

An apology is a sign of strength, not weakness. Sometimes we may believe that if we apologize to our children we weaken ourselves and repparttar

rules we are trying to keep. We may also believe it will make our children think their behavior was okay. It is important to understand that this is not repparttar 110188

case. I have found myself at times reacting negatively to my daughter’s occasional inattention to her daily diabetes care. Not just negatively but loudly. What I discovered was that I could apologize for how I responded to her behavior, without condoning what she did. (Or didn’t do) Apologizing in this manner makes it clear that I am not relaxing repparttar 110189

rules. It does not undermine my authority or my ability to make repparttar 110190

rules and expect compliance. I found it does set a good example and encourages her to be open and apologize when she has done wrong. Apologizing shows empathy for what I may have done to her feelings and respect for her right to be treated fairly.

Apologizing shows that you can admit error without loss of face. It shows that your self-esteem is strong enough to be left intact. It teaches your child to take responsibility and shows them that everyone makes mistakes. And finally it will prove to your child that you both can survive mistakes.

Showing that we have repparttar 110191 strength to admit to and survive mistakes helps to encourage our children to have repparttar 110192 same strength in their dealings with others. It’s important to demonstrate that a relationship can survive errors. Our children need to know that it’s possible to make amends and give another person repparttar 110193 option to do repparttar 110194 same in return. Apologizing lets a person both give and experience forgiveness. If our children grow up with repparttar 110195 experience of apology and forgiveness within repparttar 110196 family, they will be far better equipped to deal with repparttar 110197 relationships they will develop as they grow up. There are few life skills we will ever teach our children that are more important than this.

Different Ways of Apologizing We can apologize by saying it in words, by doing something for our child, or buying something for our child. Don’t start yelling at your computer screen, I’ll explain repparttar 110198 buying part in a minute.

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