After the Manchester terror attacks, Newsround – the news show for precocious children who think they’re better than cartoons – put out a guide for children trying to cope with upsetting news.
The article – titled “Advice If You’re Upset By The News” – gave kids helpful advice if the news was making them feel scared or giving them nightmares. It included useful suggestions like:
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Although people are spending a lot of time talking about it, it is still very unlikely that events like this will affect you or your family. .
or
“Try to balance the news you read. If you read a sad story, then try and read a happy one before you go to bed”
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“If the news has upset you, talk to an adult you trust about it”.
Sound advice, but if you’re a child upset about the news, please don’t talk to me about it. The president of the United States is a trigger-happy Nazi sympathiser who wants bring about a nuclear conflict with North Korea and defend the rights of the KKK to violently attack non-whites in the streets. I don’t really know how to sugarcoat that for you.
At least small children have an obvious support network to guide them through a difficult but basically abstract sense of fear. Adults are infinitely more aware of the real and terrible dangers we all face, but have no idea how to deal with them and are basically alone in this world. It’s one thing trying to grapple with night terrors when your mum is there to give you a hug and tell you no one can hurt you. What about dealing with your own impotence and unimportance in an uncaring world when the only friends you really have are Deliveroo and r/gonewild?
It’s not that the Newsround guide is bad; it’s not – it was a highly valuable thing to publish in a period in which many children were understandably worried. It’s just that adults need a guide too. So here, just after we found out that the president thinks civil rights activists are basically the same as the KKK, is what to do if the news is making you upset.
It’s OK to feel confused
The news is often complicated, and it’s not always easy to know what to think about it.
Perhaps, like me, you are white Jewish and therefore both part of the group that are doing the terrorising, and the target of their terror. What is the right way to feel watching Nazis chant “Jews will not replace us” or standing outside the synagogue with semi-automatic rifles so that congregants have to leave out the back?
My black friends on Facebook are telling me that, as a white person, I need to take responsibility for white supremacy – this is my problem to fix, not theirs. My Jewish friends on Facebook are telling me this is code fucking red (and we would have been safe if Bernie had got in).
So what is one supposed to feel: guilt or persecution?
Don’t worry. If you’re Jewish, you can do both. Indeed, feeling both guilty and persecuted at the same time is kind of our thing.
Try doing something nice to distract yourself
Sometimes you need to give yourself a break from the news. You could try reading a happy article after reading a sad one, or why not distract yourself with some TV like The Americans, a TV show about Russian spies wielding influence over the White House, or Man in the High Castle, a show about Nazis ruling over contemporary America, or HBO’s forthcoming drama Confederate, about what it would be like if slave-owning white families in the South had won the civil war.
If that’s not enough of a distraction, you could always try alcohol. There’s nothing quite like entering a cycle of drinking, hangovers and eating to disconnect you from the news cycle. If this stops being effective, try harder drugs – although, be careful, doing too much cocaine can lead to a career in journalism.
Talk to your parents about how you feel
Feeling scared is normal, but there are other adults out there who can help.
Why not talk to your parents. They’ll remember what it was like to spend much of your life in fear of a nuclear armageddon. But don’t worry: it definitely hasn’t fucked them up winky face.
Better yet, talk to your grandparents – they can tell you what it was like to live in a society where white supremacism was still the dominant ideology of government, and maybe provide handy tips of how to deal with it, like, “I’m actually still a racist myself.”
Remember that bad things are happening far away from you
America is a long way away and their President is really their problem, so even though the racism in Charlottesville is very disturbing, remember that it probably won’t upset you or your family.
Although, in another sense, the politics of America are already the politics of Britain – our prime minister has not specifically condemned Donald Trump’s Nazi sympathies, no doubt feeling that she can not alienate her relationship with the US at a time when Britain is severing its ties with Europe. As Justice Minister Sam Gymiah has already subtweeted, “Silence matters. We must call out hate unambiguously…” May’s silence has certainly been deafening.
Of course, the problem of far-right groups is an issue in the UK, too, although there have been fewer protests by the likes of the EDL, hate crimes in the UK have gone-up, particularly against Muslims, Jews, and LGBT people. Just yesterday, 100 MPs signed a letter to The Sun – Britain’s most popular newspaper – asking them to apologise for a racist column about “The Muslim Problem” (the Sun’s capitalisation), which used the language of Nazis to talk about how to deal with British Muslims. The Sun has refused to apologise. Two weeks earlier, its sister paper The Irish Sunday Times ran a column which made antisemitic comments about celebrities like Claudia Winkleman and Vanessa Feltz.
So be thankful this isn’t happening in your country, but also it 100 percent definitely is all the time and more often.
Don’t forget that tiny impulse in you that makes you want to do something about this
I mean, don’t get me wrong: there is nothing you can do about this. You couldn’t even do anything about British tuition fees, how are you going to stop white supremacy in America or prevent nuclear war. You are not. You are right to feel helpless.
Also, don’t listen to people who tell you that you can do your bit by talking to your racist nan about progressive politics. This didn’t stop Brexit, it didn’t stop Theresa May and it’s not going to stop World War III. Besides, all my nans are dead and my parents are pretty woke already. I suppose there are some dodgy opinions about Palestine in my extended family, but then what are you saying, exactly? If I spend the afternoon in Hendon trying to have full and frank discussions with some second cousins about the Middle East, that’s going to stop Kim Jong-un bombing Guam?
Still, though, as a citizen of the world it’s worth remembering that feeling of fear and anger you have now. Who knows – maybe one day you will be in a position of power and you’ll be tempted also to ignore hate, to let bad things happen to good people; and when that temptation arises, don’t forget how you felt when Donald Trump made a speech from a gold room and said that some of the people at the Klan rally were good and honourable.