Articles You Need to Read
Three Articles that will Challenge the Way You See the World
A Brief review of three articles by TIME Magazine and National Geographic that will inform and confront opinions on religion, politics and world affairs
TIME and National Geographic are two magazines that are traditionally as likely to grace executive boardroom desks as garage worktables or any flat surface within arm’s reach of the toilet seat. Whether world affairs, the environment, the latest political scandal or celebrity misstep, it’s often easy to find at least one story of interest in any given issue. Only rarely though, will a report take that extra step in sticking with the reader by altering their opinions. These occasional revelations surpass the point of merely confirming a viewpoint already held or vainly conflicting with one that simply cannot be abandoned; they manage to reverse or revolutionize a belief that until then had gone unquestioned.
Consider this a quick guide to a few stories that simply must be read (along with those of similar collections), whenever you get the chance to sit for a moment and question your views of the world (and for those lacking a subscription, rest assured that all three examples may be found archived on their magazines’ respective websites).
The Case for Teaching the Bible
TIME Magazine – April 2nd, 2007, by DAVID VAN BIEMA
Considering the blight of religious fundamentalism that plagues the Middle East today and the rash of U.S. political scandals which many lay at the feet of that nation’s recent ‘Christian right-wing resurgence’, any article in a credible magazine like TIME which seriously discusses teaching the bible in public school will send shivers down most secular spines. Add to this, the fact that Biema’s article not only concerns bible classes in public schools, but supports the practice, and many a reader will come to this story’s opening page with a wary and standoffish eye.
The truth of it is that Biema actually has solid grounding for his argument, as he stresses that this new practice, already undertaken by some U.S. school boards, is conducted as religious scholarship, not theology. This means that students in these classes are taught about the bible, rather than from it and as Biema argues, there is a great need for biblical literacy among the upcoming generation, given the monumental influence that religion has on even supposed secular Western culture, history and political activity.
Whether you are for the Bible in schools but against its being dissected, or against the Bible in schools and for its being discarded, this is an article that will challenge you to consider an argument as logical as it is controversial.
Bedlam in the Blood – Malaria
National Geographic – July, 2007, article by MICHAEL FINKEL, photos by JOHN STANMEYER
After having been obliterated in North America and Western Europe and following marked success during the global anti-disease campaigns of a few decades back, malaria is generally seen as a plague of the past by most Westerners, yet has nonetheless swelled into perhaps the most lethal and debilitating presence that the developing world has ever known. In his revelatory article, Finkel first describes the workings of the disease, which boils the brains of those it kills (most of whom are the very young) while leaving the survivors bedridden for extended lengths. He then relates the various political and social impacts that malaria inflicts, with entire economies becoming as crippled as the people supporting them in regions where infection by malaria is a common event in the average adult’s life.
Perhaps most striking of all Finkel’s facts however, is that regarding the belief by some scientists that malaria is responsible for the deaths of roughly one in every two people ever to have lived – making this one of the most volatile infections to ever enter the human system, and a morbidly fascinating subject to read about.
The Truth about Talibanistan
TIME Magazine - April 2nd, 2007, by ARYN BAKER
Thought that Afghanistan had settled down?
While Coalition Forces have taken significant strides toward establishing a stable, peaceful post-Taliban Afghanistan, the overshadowing media presence of Iraq (and more recently, Iran) has turned most Western eyes from a growing infection along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Whereas the dominant percentile of Afghanis has embraced liberation and thrown-off the Taliban, their former oppressors had to land somewhere, and to the misfortune of the tribal communities occupying Pakistan’s mountainous eastern borderland, Taliban supporters have begun forging a new home under the same old shadow. As Aryn Baker writes, it is in this new proto-country of ‘Talibanistan’ that the various oppressions of pre-war Afghanistan are being reestablished, and it is here that Osama bin Laden most likely lurks today.
With the Pakistani government reluctant to intervene and the locals unable to fight back, Baker worries that the Taliban will soon have found their new stronghold, unless global attention can once again be swiveled back upon them.
