“The Amazon Cannot Be Recovered Once It’s Gone.” “Melting Arctic Ice Caps May Speed Up Global Warming.” “Why The Rest Of The World Could Push The U.S. Into A Recession.” These blatantly pessimistic headlines are only a few examples of the myriad of articles published within the past few months that seem to indicate our world is falling apart around us. Yet, they all only seem to be focusing on singular issues, rather than asking the major question at hand: is a societal collapse on the rise?

The answer to such a daunting and surreal question is not a simple “yes” or “no,” but rather a layered, and incredibly complicated, “maybe.” The aforementioned events, ranging from climate change to political toxicity, all show a decline in stability within their areas of concern. For instance, in the world of climate change and the environment, the Amazon rainforest in South America has been experiencing massive wildfires for the past month. Estimates indicate that there are around 74,000 wildfires burning away in the rainforest. The fires are burning delicate forest land, and are smoking out families from their homes and communities. Yet, other sources indicate fires like this one are a natural occurrence; this event is simply an outlier in its size, and especially its coverage. 

Thus, in terms of the events and issues occurring in our world, the majority of them have most definitely been blown out of proportion. Why? This is simply due to the fact that news outlets, whether they been Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, etc., are businesses. Businesses, in order to stay afloat and grow, need to make money and profit. For these news outlets, the way to garner capital is to get advertisements, views, and clicks on their articles. The easiest way to do such a thing is to transform seemingly small events into gargantuan, world-wrenching cataclysms. 

All in all, we cannot make a completely sound conclusion on whether or not a societal collapse is happening as we speak, yet we can calm ourselves a little. The majority of events that are being preached by media outlets are either being portrayed in a negative light, or are so minute that the only reason such an article is being published is for generating revenue and profit. I believe that the chances of a societal collapse occurring soon are slim to none, and that we, while there still are events to be concerned about, should not be entirely worried of the walls of human civilization collapsing around us.