After President Donald Trump’s second inauguration, Jay, a 49-year-old living in upstate New York, underwent a “total media blackout.” This meant he deleted social media and avoided the news as much as possible. As someone who struggled with a severe panic disorder, general anxiety and depression, he needed a break from reading about politics, which had become a toxic part of his life.
Jay, who asked not to have his last name published because of a fear of doxxing, said he’s lost friends because of politics and had familial relationships strained over the years. While he previously found Reddit to be a place of negative reactions to the news, nearly six weeks after his self-imposed blackout, he discovered the subreddit Political Optimism, a place where people take current U.S. and global political news, “find the silver lining” and “debunk the doom,” according to its mission statement.
“My mental health has improved since I found this sub because I found hope again,” Jay told Salon.
Hope and optimism, for many who are left-leaning on the political spectrum, are not synonymous with politics these days. According to a survey conducted by the American Psychological Association (APA) in 2024, 7 in 10 adults reported the future of the United States to be a significant source of stress in their lives. In the same survey, 32% of those who reported stress cited the current political climate as a source of strain between them and their family. Indeed, over the last few decades, research shows that the U.S. has been polarizing faster than other democracies, affecting people’s everyday lives.
The subreddit was founded because, according to the moderators who chatted with Salon over direct message, Reddit had a lot of “reactionary takes” and misinformation in the wake of the 2024 election and inauguration, according to one moderator whose screen name is Lantis28, a 26-year-old in Atlanta.
One moderator, Emily C., a 30-year-old from Pittsburgh, said the group itself is “center left-leaning.” However, they don’t explicitly identify themselves as Democrats as they try to be “less tied to parties.” She said they do have a few “center-right” people who feel “safe” to be part of the community. Discourse in the subreddit stays grounded in the facts.
“A while back, a joke/rumor was going around Reddit that Trump was going to try to give drilling rights or outright sell Alaska to Putin during their meeting,” Emily C. said. “Some of our members were genuinely concerned, and it was causing them distress, so we reassured them of the facts of exactly why that couldn’t happen.”
Another moderator, who goes by the handle Lantis28, said political optimism is “finding the good in whatever is happening.” It’s finding a positive perspective even when “it’s not obvious.”
“It’s a healthy reassurance that is ‘yeah, this is bad, but it could be so much worse,’” Jay, who is also a moderator, added.
This approach should not be confused with toxic positivity, which is when people only look for the positive while negating any negative emotions. Nor should it be mistaken for blind optimism, which is when people can have an overly positive outlook and be in denial that something exists. Instead, it sits somewhere in between the doom-and-gloom takes on the news by grounding current events in facts.
At the time of writing this, the subreddit has 11,000 political members and 35,000 regular visitors. Back in March, the group only had 525 people, the moderators told Salon. The moderators told Salon they tend to see bursts of people active in the community around major news events, like the passage of the Big Beautiful Bill or the assassination of Charlie Kirk. The subreddit’s popularity also appears to be part of the rise in other “good news” subreddits, like Optimists Unite, where politics is not allowed.
Notably, many of those in the group refer to themselves as “recovered doomers,” a term they use to describe “someone who realizes that not everything is black and white.”
Emily said she is one such person. Everything used to weigh “so heavily” on her, she told Salon, and she let the Trump administration “rent space” in her head for free.
“Now I can see their losses, and most importantly, hope,” she said. “Now I spread hope, or I try to in any case.”
Mentally, she has made “leaps and bounds,” she said. She no longer feels the need to check the news obsessively and feels the sense of “looming dread” is gone. “This is a safe space to rest your head whenever the Internet gets too wild with doomscrolling.”
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Doomscrolling, a word that can now be found in the dictionary, is the act of endlessly consuming news and content that heightens feelings of anxiety, sadness, or anger. It has become a habit for many people over the last decade, consciously and even unconsciously. Scientists believe people do it because the human brain tends to have a negativity bias. It satisfies an evolutionary urge to scan for threats. While it can make people feel more in control or prepared for the future, having more information about a current event, it can also fuel anxiety, depression and interfere with sleep. However, scientists believe that reading good news or at least finding the good in humanity can act as a buffer against negative news and even elevate the moods of news consumers.
Max D. is a 27-year-old “recovered doomer.” Instead of staying in his room, reading articles that are just going to make him “spiral” all day, he’s made an effort to get more involved in his community by joining a non-profit and joining the No Kings protest.
“I found this subreddit when looking for hope,” he said. “It helped me because it made me realize the world isn’t just getting worse, and people are trying to make it a better place and fight against the current administration.”