You can block entire communities, that’s typically what I do. I just Boost for Lemmy and on the triple dot menu for each post there’s a block option for user, community, or server. I make heavy use of community blocks.

I’ve blocked several hundred communities with news, comics, politics, pretty much anything depressing or upsetting. I want Lemmy to be a place I come to chill and relax, not a place that riles me up and makes me afraid.

Some folks have argued with me that I’m sticking my head in the sand, but for news I’ll check AP News a few times a week for a limited time. I’ve got a Leechblock plug-in that restricts how many minutes a week I get on AP News, so I’m not doom scrolling it. In that time, I’ll decide if I’m making any changes to my behavior for the next few days. This way I’m greatly reducing my time spent worrying and stressing about current events.

The way I figure it, 99.99% of the time I used to read news daily on social media, I would get more angry and scared but it was entirely an internal torment. I’d never change my behavior, I would just become more tortured and stressed. This became a very real addiction, I craved feeling the rush of cortisol from reading some outrageous political news. I can’t live like that anymore.