Strangling North Dakota with no mercy
A place cannot be healthy and corrupt at the same time.
Michigan's small towns are dying as well, being swallowed by surburbia as more and more people move from the urban areas where they work into the once profitable cornfields, now growing strip malls and chain stores.
Indeed Lew. The same type of article could probably have been written about Michigan.
If you look at it from a world perspective, most of the world's populations will be in some 30 big cities.
I too have been following this controversy and I find it interesting how upset people get when their own community is only partially displayed but don't question the portrayal of others' communities. National Geographic is a great example of how not to portray "culture". I do not think of North Dakota as portrayed in that feature. For the most part it's a racist magazine that does well from romanticized, narrow portraits of people. How many people read it to see shirtless African women and understandably feel they are learning about other cultures as a result? As an anthropologist, I'm on a mission to explain why magazines like this are problematic.
In this case, it may be true that small towns, just like "small" cultures, are loosing ground worldwide but the text could also reflect what Graeme wrote about here: the move to more cosmopolitan centers has deeper roots in history and some scary consequences.
Whew - that felt good. Thanks for the opportunity to vent.
venting is always good. In fact, that is the primary reason for this blog 
I find myself taking such a decisive stance on the article mainly because of the enormous backlash that has stemmed from it. When I first read it, I thought to myself "yep" and that was about it. ( i thought the pictures were beautiful though. I am intrigued by abandoned homes. I searched through many as a kid)
I listened to an interview of Caroline Elkins (she wrote a controversial book on the British crackdown on the Kenyan Mau Mau rebellion) on "This is hell" this weekend (best show on the radio!) They got talking about how the media fails to put the ethnic tension that permeates throughout places like Africa in the proper context. Rarely, if ever, is colonialism brought up. It is just assumed that "tribes have always fought each other." I am planning to do a post on it when I find the time.
That would be an awesome post. Colonialism in Africa and every other country around the world (it covered almost the entire globe) is only mentioned as something happened, as though it's over and has no ongoing consequences. It touched everything, not just bodies and land, but minds, day-to-day life, and the most basic foundations of cultures - all in the name of civilization. And it was carried out by regular ol' people, not just soldiers. Anyway...
You're kidding me, right? National Geographic is now a racist magazine? Oh Christ.
National Geographic does one thing better than any other source in the world. Through photos and journalism it explores an isolated segment of a society, an idea or discovery in science, and a particular species in nature. It does this specifically for an American audience coming from an American perspective to educate Americans about that which they may not already know.
There are people who see racism in everything and classist conspiracy about every corner. Relax.
North Dakota's small towns are dying. The article was spot-on with respect to its study. It was as well-done as any other written on the subject and the prose and photos were beautiful. If it happened to hurt some NoDak feelings, that's too bad. As Graeme pointed out, they weren't there to give a balanced assessment of North Dakota's viability, transitions, urban centers, or future. They were just evaluating small towns.
Racist. Sheesh.
I heard an employer in MN talk about ND as the "Bangladesh" of the US because of the cheap labor force.
In this case, it may be true that small towns, just like "small" cultures, are loosing ground worldwide but the text could also reflect what Graeme wrote about here: the move to more cosmopolitan centers has deeper roots in history and some scary consequences.
Now here is another comparison.
NG is an overtly conservative publication.
This past year a large article about Jamestown and the region was published as part of the anniversary of the founding of the first settlement of what became the U.S. (excluding, of course, the then Spanish Empire's St. Augustine in what became the state of Florida, much later).
Several times in the first paragraphs it had to be mentioned by the authors of the text of the article (as opposed to the photographers) that the host / guide showing them around were republicans, who moved out of a more liberal state to where they felt more at home -- and stated in such as way to say this was Good and of course anyone would do that.
Recall the ilk of cheney have huge mansions around there, contributing to the die-off of the natural life of the Chesapeake.
It was such a dissonance, this sneering at 'liberal' environmental efforts, while bemoaning the destruction of the environment.
It's got to be getting more and more difficult for that ilk to be anything approaching sane as they juggle more and more contradictions and convictions in lies.
Love, C.
I subscribe to NG, but mainly for the pictures and the wonderful maps. I certainly don't read it for any political insight. I usually skip the articles.
They did a butcher piece on Chavez last year but I think they often mean well.Racism is such a loaded term it is reserved for the KKK and all other subtle forms are disputed.
Montanas economy has been growing as well but so has meth use and low paying srvice jobs. We can't use the same metrics in the new post-industrial world.
Oh come on . . . I've been to the headquarters of National Geographic in DC. A really good friend of mine works as a cartographer for them. I've known writers who've sold articles to them. I worked for the Science Museum of Minnesota and we worked with the National Geographic on NSA grants and through privately funded ventures, including a fantastic Jane Goodall exhibit . . . In all that, I never experienced one single iota of "overt conservatism."
Please people, stop swatting deamons. Deal in reality. I'm as liberal as anyone I know. I'm sensitive to political issues. I'm active in several "causes" and in a national organization. And you people are going to give yourself ulcers believing the whole fucking world is against you. You're just as bad as those nutty conservatives who need an enemy behind every corner.
Oh dear Lord. Conservative? National Geographic. Apolitical at the very worst. But everyone I've met there struck me as liberal.
Give it a fucking break . . . go gnaw on Jonah Goldberg if you need to chew on monsters.
One more thing. A Butcher Piece on Chavez? Look, I'm rooting for Chavez for the most part but the fact of the matter is that he's no saint. He's doing the best he can, but he's the product of a brutal system and he's got an uphill battle and at the top of that hill his hands aren't going to be clean. It does us all a disservice to ignore the bad just because we're so hopeful for the good. This isn't a Pollyanna world.
If we're lucky he'll succeed, and when he does I hope we don't find mass graves.
Truthfully, outside of Gandhi, how many of our heroes have clean hands. I'm sitting here wearing a Che t-shirt, but I'm not stupid to deny that he, liberal icon that he may be, executed hundreds. I happen to think he was better than the CIA dogs who hunted him down and had him executed. But would I have wanted to travel those mountains with him and be one of his guerillas? No, I wouldn't have. I wouldn't want to do what he felt he needed done.
I wouldn't want to do it for Chavez either. Or for Castro. Or for Evo Morales. You're deluding yourself when you turn those you admire into saints. Just hope that the good outweighs the bad and that life gets better for the majority and that the poor don't starve.
From what I have read, which is only the articles that jump out at me, they seem pretty apolitical. I think they fail to give historical context on many pieces, but so does nearly all sources of information. It appears it is up to us to get the info.
You're deluding yourself when you turn those you admire into saints.
I agree. I think the same should apply to the founding fathers and documents like the Constitution. Considering that the vast amount of information we recieve praises them and demonizes the left icons you mentioned, it is much more important to focus on the misdeeds of our "leaders"
What're these people so upset about? The new North Dakota advertising is pretty accurate, isn't it?
http://cityofclifford.com/North1.jpg
http://cityofclifford.com/North6.jpg
http://cityofclifford.com/North7.jpg
It's so cold these days everyone just sits inside bitching about stuff. Like global warming, and National Geographic.
Those are funny Max. Thanks.
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