The endless bloodshed at mass shootings, by ‘terrorists’ or ‘madmen’, wars, coups, divisive politicians, corruption, global tragedy, pop icons dying, Brexit, Donald Trump… it’s all too much for the collective psyche.
It seems as if the Nice, France, massacre by a monster driving a truck into crowds celebrating that most important French holiday, Bastille Day - which ironically represents freedom, liberty and equality – on the evening of 14 July, was the last straw.
And this was before yet another fatal mass shooting this Sunday, this time targeting police again, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, the scene of yet another fatal police shooting of a black man in the United States, just over a week ago.
People seem wrung out emotionally as tragedy after tragedy dominates the news. The danger is that we are becoming desensitised to death and destruction and war as it bombards us on an almost daily basis via the news.
What has happened of course is that social media has amplified everything and brought it to our doorstep. It is almost impossible to switch off if you want to be a fully functioning member of society, plugged in to what is happening.
With all our instant video apps and broadcast tools available now, we have death streamed live. It might be news, but it is also damaging as it is brought right to us with our ‘always-on, always-on-us, mobile devices’; or as the news channels endlessly dissect the latest celebrity death or mass shooting or terror attack - however, it is defined - death is at our door.
Humour is a great foil, as we see on social media, as people try to put overwhelming tragedy into context, by poking fun at how they feel about it or the mass memes that start up. Irony helps too.
A writer on Medium wrote a piece entitled: ‘We regret to inform you that the remainder of 2016 has been cancelled’. Kimberly Harrington (@honeystaysuper) writes: “We regret to inform you that due to extremely low approval ratings and disappointing performances in almost every category, the remainder of 2016 has been cancelled. We understand that this may cause some confusion as well as rebooking of vacation plans, but we’re going to go out on a limb and assume that like us, you’ve just f*cking had it with this already.”
That about sums it up. And she goes on to detail all the terrible things that have happened already this year, not including our own uniquely South African news, which is a challenge all on its very own.
This meme which asks whether shock movie director Quentin Tarantino is directing the year 2016, is one of them that has done the rounds this past month, along with others. The recurrent theme is that this is a terrible year of seemingly endless death and destruction and it needs to stop – many other memes ask if we can just “reboot” 2016 and start over…
We need this button!
Psychologists will tell you that it is important not to “lump” things together, as you will then feel overwhelmed and depressed about the state of the world; instead to focus on the small things, the good things in your own life, your loved ones, doing the things you enjoy.
People are struggling though, as the #2016in3words meme over the weekend attests. These were some of the top tweets…
#2016in3words is now trending in South Africa https://t.co/RRb6EHG2md
— Trendsmap SthAfrica (@TrendsSthAfrica) July 16, 2016
![[TrendTalk] The Pope, The Donald and memes](https://biz-file.com/c/1510/314431-300x156.png?2)
