I can see a reason they believe this. Just not a good one. 'When I were a lad' we got the local paper delivered every afternoon (by children, ironically enoug

I can see a reason they believe this. Just not a good one. 'When I were a lad' we got the local paper delivered every afternoon (by children, ironically enough). We watched the day's national news on TV at 6pm, followed by the local news at 6:30. In today's world, even trivial news such as this can reach me, the same day, over 5000km away. The world feels like a much darker place, because I'm exposed to so many more evils. And even though the vast majority of them shouldn't, they do end up interfering with our already poor ability to judge risk. Many years from now, when I'm deciding whether or not it's okay for my hypothetical children to walk to school - this story might vaguely cross my mind, in that strange way our memory is prone to - and end up factoring in my choice somehow, despite the irrelevance of some tiny muni half a world away. Our brains just aren't good at this.