The decade in news photographs

This decade had infoMania. That alone makes it pretty decent.

A refugee is someone escaping from another country, coming here for freedom.

Those were American people, I beg your pardon.

They,and I took great offense in being labeled refugees.

Sorry, refuge is an easy term to describe what the situation was like for lack of a better word. I remember people being locked in and barred from crossing bridges trying to escape. I remember people abandoned in public shelters. I remember Barbra Bush saying that it was working out good for them since they were underprivileged anyway. None of that was American like.

Funny you should mention the Vietnam War, considering it had such a higher death toll than both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars combined.

yes except Iraq and Afghanistan have a catastrophically higher amputation and maiming rate. Probably also psychological damage. What is good about all of this is we know how it works now, we know who is really behind it, and more of us are flexing our democratic rights to get back a country ruled by the people for the people. Most of the people that is, not few of the people like it is right now. Those days are numbered, and those few at the top know it! That is what is different now compared to Vietnam. We didn't know about McNamara et al and people like him like we do now.

By what measurement is this the best decade ever? Standard of living? Technological development?

You can't claim things are better with such vague definitions of well-being and can't call chicken little on your opposition if you haven't been paying attention.

The standard of living is higher for more people now than it has ever been at any point in previous history. China alone lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. That's almost one-fifth of mankind that is nearly unanimously better off.

Stop dwelling on the apocalyptic sensationalism of the news and try to see the bigger—albeit more boring—picture.

Science always progresses and do-tell about these non-violent revolutions. They seem to be overshadowed by all the violent ones.

This decade has been shit. Save for some social and scientific advances which you've mentioned, it's been a decade of war, hate, terror, depression, consumerism, corruption and disaster.

There is no half-empty, half-full glass here. You're pointing out the water molecules in mud.

I am very thankful for the Billions on this planet who work to make our way of lifestyle so cheap. I think every day now of the people who handpick tealeaves in tea plantations all over the world, who have no healthcare, and when they get bit by poisonous snakes, their friends have to save them by sucking the venom out. I also think about the people working on banana plantations in Honduras, where CIA-types overthrew a democratically elected President who wanted to implement the first New Deal there. 75 yrs after we go ours. 94 yrs after the Russian revolution for a similar share of the profits.

I am also thankful for the millions of illegal workers in this country who work for hardly anything under penalty of deportation cleaning, cooking, building, mowing, loading, unloading...because nobody invested money in their countries to create jobs, since all their money came here to our stock market, some of them may make the wrapped sandwiches I buy at the deli everyday. Diddo the workers who drill and refine oil around the world in despotic dictatorships with no fair share of the humongous Exxon Mobil profits. And to our soldiers and sailors who make sure on our dime that oil gets here and Exxon gets its profits (but doesn't itself pay much in Federal income taxes that pay for those troops).

Yes, I am very thankful for all this cheap or even free labor these companies procure and my CIA guarantees for me around the world every day. Merry Christmas! Joy to the World. Jesus got in trouble for overturning the money changers tables at the Temple enriching the hypocrites. They eventually paid a heavy price for what they took, and the laws of justice they violated. Eventually, we WILL pay for what we take too!

Is the glass half empty or half full ? Neither.

When it's just a half a glass of water, I treat it like that. a half glass of water.

I think the extinction of humanity is more likely.

I have to agree with Saladin, our people never learn.

Any study of history or biology will destroy any notion of that Raymond. Human extinction cannot happen, not even if there was a nuclear war. Neither will climate change or anything else kill us. A meteor strike won't even do it. It's not even a vague possibility. We're too strong, too intelligent and too many. We've been through worse and will go through worse.

It's just apocalyptic bullshit that belongs in story books. Mankind will devour itself in its own sin and then emerge shattered and bleeding into the future.

It's how it's always happened, and it will happen again and again until we figure out a way to fix human nature.

Incredibly well said. I could not agree with you more. We fail to learn from our past, so we are bound to repeat it.

Well said Brother Saladin,

I don't know why the staff gives you a hard time.
Maybe because you're a free thinker, like me.

As an event, not significant at all.

As a symbol for what this decade meant for America, nothing is more appropriate than that stupid bimbo being worshiped by clueless, soulless consumer morons.

I think the photo of Paris Hilton was put there among these tragedies to denounce the superficiality, careless and the consumerism of our society.
I can't think of an other explanation for that, why else would the photographer choose to post this meaningless picture?

Yeah i think the juxtaposition of the photo admist the horrors is trying to make a statement. It also seems like like a statment against the media, as all the cameras are pointed at hilton, not at the horrors.

Who knows where that photo came from. It could be from anywhere.

You can read and hear all the news you want but nothing hits you on a personal level like some of those photos.

Sometimes a photographer struggles with that but to do the job well, a photographer must be detached.

Well down young man.