Pros and Cons of the Outrage Culture

Feelings of outrage are natural. We live in a world unlike anything humans have experienced before. The massive rise of technology and social media means that we can be aware of situations in real-time. We can be triggered by videos and photographs of atrocities from around the world just seconds after they occur—sometimes even as they occur while people live-stream the events from their mobile devices. We are more aware of outrageous situations and our brains are bombarded by them from nearly every angle. It’s not just the newspaper or the nightly news anymore.

This gives rise to a situation in which our brains are on high alert, looking for the next bit of news to trigger a familiar feeling: outrage. It turns out that outrage can be addictive.