Chapter 1: How can we cope with troubling news?
Thank you. News is doom and gloom. If you were reading a newspaper 800 years ago, despite the fact that the printing press hadn't been invented, you might hear something like this. Emperor Genghis Khan from the Mongol Empire has invaded Persia, China, and Eastern Europe. You could read that news and think it's the end of the world. But spoiler, the world did go on.
We're here with Tony Five, foreign correspondent in London, England, not to talk about any upsetting news, but instead to talk about dealing with upsetting news. Tony, welcome to the show. Hello there, dear boy. The last show, always coming up with the biting topical issues of today.
Chapter 2: What historical context is provided for today's news?
Genghis Khan invading Eastern Europe. Fantastic, my friend. I know all the talking heads on the major networks are talking about it and they don't have anything great to say. Look, you are someone that suffers from seasonal depression. Yeah, it's never been clinically diagnosed as a seasonal depression. But yeah, I don't like the dark night. The cold is very cold, very dark here in the UK.
If you pick up a newspaper, listen to the radio, I mean, normal radio, not this, but you know. Not freak radio.
Chapter 3: How does seasonal depression affect our perception of news?
Yeah, not freak radio. Not weirdos who shouldn't have microphones radio, which is the official genre. I mean, there's all sorts of things. I'm not in any way political. There's all sorts of things happening in every country, not just where you are, your side of the world. But in my side of the world, people are trying to invade Sesame Street. It's absolute insanity, my friend.
You know, there is a Sesame Street here in New York. And whenever I walk by it, my girlfriend, when I'm with her, she always gets mad because I sing the song. But I'm derailing at this point.
Chapter 4: What are the impacts of doom scrolling on mental health?
You deal with moods in the winter months that aren't great. You turn on your phone. You start the doom scrolling, going through the horrible headlines. I know when you're doing it because you text me like, can you believe this politician did that? And all I can think to myself is, Tony, yes, I can believe it. Yes, it's horrible. But try not to let it get you down too much.
Yeah, I just, I guess at the points where these happen, I sort of lose faith in humanity. Usually I'm a very bright, outgoing person. I like people.
Chapter 5: How can we find balance in a world full of negative news?
I love people. And I think that's the best part of the world. And sometimes when you hear and see and sort of acknowledge people being just horrible to one another, it gets... It gets to me, even though, you know, I could be a million miles away from it. And you're kind of fed this, you're drip fed this 24 hours a day through your phone, through what people say.
And sometimes you just need a bit of sort of good news or something that sort of warms the cockles of your heart. And I guess it's kind of... You're not allowed to say that on the radio. Can I not warm? But... No, cockles. There, I've said it. Now we're in trouble. I feel like with you, and maybe this is true for a lot of people and they don't realize it, there's this internal dialogue.
There's this internal war of like, you leave your house, you talk to the coffee shop person, you talk to your neighbor, you have a friend over, and the world is all of a sudden uplifting. And you're like, you know, I don't know, the well of goodness that you believe is true of humanity fills up. And then you turn on the news and And you just drain it at the end of the day.
And I'm not saying like the horrible news in the world doesn't affect us. It does. Yeah. But for you, Tony, like I wish you'd keep your head up a little bit more and just like look out your front door and see that, you know, the birds are still croaking. The beautiful cloudy weather in the UK is still there raining. Does it ever not rain there? I don't know. they're never not rains.
It's constantly. There's still black pudding and like blood sausage and whatever it is you crazy people eat. I think we don't identify our puddings in any shape, color or denomination, but yeah. Um, what I would say is, yeah, I, I get affected by it, meaning I sort of sit there and I sort of mull over it and I ruminate over it. Um,
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Chapter 6: What was the significance of the MetroCard funeral?
And I think... I read a report once or a paper saying that historically, because we were all basically cavemen and cavewomen, we were only ever worried about what was in our cave, our real close proximity, the sort of 10-metre circumference around us.
And now we're being fed this information from the other side of the world, which is all obviously very, very sad, but we can't do anything about it. And I guess... There's the part of me inside that wants to do something about it, wants to go and help people if they're struggling or wants to give someone a meal if they are home, you know, if they're hungry or homeless or whatever.
And you physically can't do it. So I guess there's this sort of like a seesaw effect in your brain where you're hearing all these horrible things, you know. Don't fall into this trap. You can help people who are struggling. You can make an impact, but you have to not set your sights on all seven, eight billion people in the world.
You can set your sights on your local community and maybe you aren't fixing some political horror show that's going on on the other side of the world. but you can feel like you made an impact.
So don't let the overwhelming nature of like, oh, I can't fix what this politician said, or I can't fix this natural disaster in this country, or I can't fix this war going on between these two countries, but I can help out locally. And I think that's the trap, right? We get so overwhelmed that we think we can't help, but I think we can in little ways. I think you're right.
I do a lot of sort of charity. I do a lot of local stuff. I look after sort of... Dogs that have come from pounds. I look after an older lady.
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Chapter 7: How did a raccoon in Toronto become a cultural phenomenon?
I go and spend some time with her. I take her out for walks and stuff. But at the same time, I think... You know, walking an older lady is different than walking a dog. No, it's exactly the same thing. And it's really embarrassing when she poops on the floor. But what I'm saying is that when you...
realize that all these things are going on and then you hear these so-called in inverted commas experts talk about it and they haven't got a clue what to do i think that was what feels demoralizing yeah all these like you say these talking heads they come online or they come on these tv shows and they say well, we don't know what's going on either. We don't know what's going to happen tomorrow.
And these are meant to be sort of the respected researchers who have spent decades of academic research trying to guess what political sort of strategies people have. And when they don't even know what's going on, when they don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, it's kind of like, oh, wow, okay. Well, that's the way it is. Well, the world's too hard a place for any one person to understand.
And anyone who claims like they understand it is probably an idiot. Or a president. Oh, I'm not political, but... Yeah, not political at all. Okay, let's do some uplifting news to that end. I mean, it's kind of a sad story, but it's based out of New York where I am. Yes. The iconic MetroCard. And it's so funny to me that you sent me this story and I didn't know about it.
And it was happening not too far from where I live. Yeah. But the MetroCard is what people use to take the subway here for many, many years. It was this yellow card with like an amazing timeless design. I think they designed the logo in like the nineties, but it was just like a wonderful, the font was cool. The color choices were cool. And they, they obsoleted them.
Now, when you enter the subway, you tap with your smartphone, your visa card, or a special card that you can like recharge that acts like a tap visa. And it's the end of the MetroCard. So what did New Yorkers do?
um they held a funeral in washington square park for the card and it reminds me of something that happened in my hometown of toronto canada when a raccoon died and the city didn't clean it up this is like a famous raccoon and then people started laying flowers and held a funeral and like put a little photo of a raccoon like you would have at a funeral parlor next to the coffin and then the city recently well not that recently they installed a bronze plaqued
to commemorate the raccoon. Yeah. And like the whole internet went wild. And I remember I just moved to the United States and all my friends at this US company were so like infatuated with Toronto because of this viral raccoon. It's like these nice moments where you hold a weird funeral for a weird iconic thing. In this case, the MetroCard, in Toronto's case, the raccoon.
It is strange because I had a Metro card.
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Chapter 8: What lessons can we learn from these unique funerals?
I remember a couple of years ago when I went, I threw it away. But I can see why it's iconic. I guess people like me, they don't really embrace change as well as I do. And it is, it's got all these different designs. And there are some like sort of clever people who have started to try and sell them on eBay for five grand. which I find quite funny as well. I would sell my, I have a stack of them.
I would sell them for five bucks if anyone's buying. But people brought MetroCard themed cakes. People did like hats. A woman taped them to her head. There was like a plaque. Apparently the MetroCard was a New York Mets fan. I guess, you know, M-E-T, they share that in common. And just all these people like mourning, jokingly mourning this card.
It was just so like uplifting under the guise of a funeral, a send-off, if you will. And that happened at the end of what, last week? And thank you for sharing that story. Yeah, I like that. I like it when people get together over something so unique and something so crazy that you would never think of. But it brings people together.
I think that restores my faith in humanity, that people can do that, you know? If you mixed your tea with the wrong kind of sweetener or wrong kind of milk in the 1800s, the queen would actually come to your house and she had a rod and she would beat you with it. And when finally the monarchy said they wouldn't do that anymore, they held a funeral for the queen's tea beating rod.
Is that something that happened or did I just make that up right now? You made that up, but I can imagine that happening with the king's rod. And I wouldn't like to be touched by the king's rod. I hate you so much. Tony, I always enjoy having you on the show. Thanks for doing something a little different with the topic of more of the same. Doom and gloom, a little different view.
I appreciate you being on the show. Your day starts right here. The number one place to be in the morning. We've got the news you need. Take that Team Canada approach. The experts you trust. More exclusives than anywhere else. And your first stop for the biggest entertainment stories. The Morning Show, weekdays on Global.
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