Which is larger? Yours, or mine? Australia or the United States of America, that is. With the bushfires in Australia out of control incinerating large swathes of the country a map was produced to visually depict how widespread the fires are. For emphasis the map was overlaid on top of America to give people an idea of the scope of the problem Australia is dealing with. Americans responded with disbelief that Australia was just as large as the USA. People were also in shock over how large an area, measured by size of US states, are currently burning. Responses on social media show how shocked and dumbfounded people were learning this.
Here is the image under discussion.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday January 09 2020, @02:40PM
Geography, shmeography. See how old I am - born in 1956. I, and a handful others, learned how to read maps, how big the world is, and all sorts of good stuff. MOST of my classmates couldn't be assed to remember which states bordered our own state, or which countries border the US, or even which hemisphere the US is in.
Don't blame the crappy school system, and don't blame millenials, or Gen X'rs, or whatever. On average, Americans have always been geographic idiots. Well, always for all of my life, at least.
Maybe they need to start drawing maps like the really old-time people. Maps with sea serpents and dragons on them, and mythical creatures captured my imagination first. As I matured, I realized all of that was make believe, but maps were still fascinating.