Schadenfreude

Our neighbors do this. It feels like gossip. Except they don't know the people. So it's more weird.

Something happened to someone ... somewhere.

My best friend tends to be like this. She has chronic depression and is on meds for it.

Tragedy Vulture

Anonymous wrote:It’s tragedy porn. This person likely grew up in a dysfunctional or addictive family where it was constant chaos. They do not feel right unless they’re observing other conflict/chaos in the world around them.

This describes my sibling. She will open a convo with, “Did you hear about the kid in Illinois who was forced to live in a shed for ten years!?!”

Um, no? And I don’t need the details either.

There was someone who posted here recently because their life was too overwhelming. But most of the things they listed were happening to strangers far away or to people they didn’t know well.

I suspect addiction to tragedy is the answer.

Grief theif. I just heard that term in the tv show Bad Sisters and it fits what you're looking for. Someone who takes other people's tragedy and absorbs it and makes it theirs.

My mother in law. Literally, she’s obsessed with everything bad that happens. A random person she met once who has cancer, someone she barely knows whose son lost his job…it’s exhausting.

Anonymous wrote:Performative sadness

Not performative

Anonymous wrote:A tool to work through an unresolved trauma, experience grief and sadness at a remove.

Interesting. This person seem to get very depressed over things that have little to nothing to do with them

Performative sadness

A tool to work through an unresolved trauma, experience grief and sadness at a remove.

Anonymous wrote:drama llama

Drama llama like a drama queen is someone how loves making everything into a drama involving themselves. Sounds like OP's friend is searching out the drama going on the world, or community that she isn't specifically a part of other than through life. This is more psychological as the earlier PP stated.

drama llama

It’s tragedy porn. This person likely grew up in a dysfunctional or addictive family where it was constant chaos. They do not feel right unless they’re observing other conflict/chaos in the world around them.

I have a friend who seems to be drawn to every bad or negative thing in the world and then gets depressed over it.