And Just Like That

After several days of going back and forth in my mind, I finally took the plunge,  deactivating my Facebook account and canceling my longstanding subscription to the New York Times on the same day.

And just like that, I felt better. 

Let me peel those two activities apart: Facebook first, then the Times.

My Facebook friends span the political spectrum from way left to way right. I have not unfriended any folks for their voting choices. Ever. Period. For the record, I have very close friends and family, near and dear to my heart, who vote very differently from me. They are not the reason I deactivated my Facebook page. 

I deactivated my Facebook page because of the friends with whom I share many similar political views (liberal, to say the least). I know how I feel about the current administration. I strongly feel our nation and our democracy is at risk, and, at a personal level, that my family members and I are at risk. That being said, I don't need to be shrieked out several times a day with posts about what the Orangeman said, what his administration is doing, and how outraged I should feel. I am beyond tired of living in an echo chamber. 

And just like that, I was out of the echo chamber. 

Stepping away from the New York Times was a different decision involving a lot of moving parts. One, Warren had stopped reading it much at all months ago because of overloads on his personal time; he had (still does) more pressing matters to deal with. Looking back, I realized I had pared way way way back on how much I read it. So neither of us were getting much out of it. Two, there were the recent editorial losses: longtime columnist Paul Krugman left because the management was leaning on him heavily with edits he could not tolerate; Charles Blow left to take a prestigious fellowship at Harvard but also because of management leaning on him; Peter Coy (my favorite economist ever) left saying he was "retiring" but I wonder if it was more than that. Three, yes the overload. The overload the  overload the overload. Four, the cost. If we were reading it more regularly, I wouldn't look hard at that cost, but for not reading it, yeah, it's a tad pricey. I was paying $25.00 every four weeks, or $325.00 a year. That's way more than a lot for a subscription we were not using. (Interesting now that I have canceled, when I do open it while our current paid subscription time runs, they are offering me a full subscription at $1.00/week.) So I canceled my subscription.

And just like that, I didn't have to keep up with the newspaper anymore.

I let Ben and Alix know about both decisions.  (Sam eschews social media, so he is not worrying about whether his mom is on Facebook.) Because of Alix's job, he has to follow the national press, but he totally got my reasoning.  Ben's response was even more direct:  "The media cycle is overwhelming and all the outrage in the world isn't getting anything done." 

That comment about outrage not getting anything done struck home. Where I can make a difference is here locally, which is why I posted a photo of a slow food cooker at the start of this blog. Yes, the hot sandwiches to go program at the Justice Bus is running well. We just repeated it for our March Bus. My next door neighbors have started supplying the Bus with fresh-baked (as in "just this morning") sourdough loaves. Trust me, warm food, a loaf of bread, and welcoming our clients are all needed right here, right now. So when I arrived to set up for the Bus Thursday, I posted this sign:

And this one:

And just like that, we were off and running. 

We do not ask clients their political views before assisting them; hard times do not care about your voting pattern. As a long-ago, long-deceased friend reminded me back in the late 1970s (a lifetime ago) when we discussed activism, "April, it's hard to show up for a rally or a protest meeting when you are working two jobs and trying to keep a roof over your head." I feel that neither major party cares about poverty—food insecurity, hunger, housing insecurity, homelessness, medical care—because at the top, they do not have to worry about doing without. (Who do I agree with most of this topic? Matthew Desmond, author of Evicted and Poverty, By America. Here is a very recent appearance by Desmond on the Daily Show talking about poverty and our abysmal record in this nation: just watch it.)

From time to time, I will still check in on Facebook because there are a few family members I only see photos of on Facebook. It amuses me that the only person who has contacted me about not being on Facebook is a cousin whose minster's wife (a high school classmate of mine) reached out to her to make sure I was okay because she was thinking of me and couldn't find me. (For the record, my cousin and our mutual connection do not share my political views.) That just reinforced my thoughts about the echo chamber: if all one does is screech, one does not see the community. So I emailed my cousin an update and told her to share my note with our friend.

And just like that, I went on with my day.