Mean World Syndrome

a letter to the editor

People everywhere in America are thinking violent crime rates are high as ever. This is simply not the case. This anomaly is called the Mean World Syndrome. The mean world syndrome causes people to be more paranoid than they should be.

The crime rates have not been this low since the seventies. Some caution is a good thing, but the world isn’t getting more violent. In fact, the amount of violent crimes went down since the nineties. According to Politifact, “for the last 30 years violent crime has been declining.”

Many forms of media document more of these crimes to the public. If we think that the world is getting worse, it will be harder to trust people that we don’t know all that well. These things can still happen so be cautious, but they are happening less and less.

The media is just showing more of these happenings, because they will get more clicks. When someone sees something scary or nerve wracking, they might just want to read it. When we see something bad happening, it piques many people’s interest as to why it happens. So we click.

Overall we should be cautious but not too cautious. These things will probably not happen to you, but be careful. You never know what will happen.

Jacob Larson (class of 2021)