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Time Person of the Year 2013

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Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#31

Post by bargl »

r0h1n wrote: post #14

For crying out loud! What difference has the Pope made to the world (and do remember, the world does include non-Christian countries...or roughly 5 billion out of 7 billion people...and I'm not even getting into Catholics vs. non-Catholics here). Colour me cynical, but any publication that declares anyone other than Edward Snowden as the Person of the Year in 2013 has to have some pretty BIG reasons for doing so. And…

You are doing the same thing by assuming that Snowden's influence is as vast as that of Christianity. If you compare the percentages of people on the internet VS those who are Christian (at this point in time) you get approximately the same amount sitting at 32-34%. http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_by_country http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/watercooler/2012/dec/23/...

Now I know that the internet is going to continue spreading to the point that it is at a much higher population than this, however, we are talking about 2013. Snowden did something awesome, and deserves to be up there in the finalists, but I don't like this sort of attitude that anything Christian has no relevance.

Francis has had a huge affect on many Christians and non-Christians alike because he is attempting to depolarize the Catholic church and better integrate them with the rest of the world. Both people deserve renown for what they've done. So lets not diminish the work of either Snowden or Francis.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#32

Post by ernestipark »

I'm not saying Snowden or the Pope should or shouldn't be the POTY... but the narrow mindedness here is pretty silly (yet predictable). Maybe it's hard for atheist technologists living in the tech bubble to fathom, but the Pope is unbelievably influential to not just the millions (or even billions) of Catholics around the world, but even those who are not Catholic/Christian. I'm not sure whether Pope Francis will/has inspired policy change, moved political waves, etc, but when one person can potentially inspire perspective change in billions of people in the way they treat others and view many of the hot button issues in the world today, that seems worthy enough for POTY candidacy.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#33

Post by nalsh »

I think that some of you guys are missing the point by being a bit too America-centric. The new Pope is a gamechanger for a ton of people and has effected more lives directly than Snowden has (at least in those peoples' perspective).

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#34

Post by huherto »

kayoone wrote: post #18
r0h1n wrote: post #14

For crying out loud! What difference has the Pope made to the world (and do remember, the world does include non-Christian countries...or roughly 5 billion out of 7 billion people...and I'm not even getting into Catholics vs. non-Catholics here). Colour me cynical, but any publication that declares anyone other than Edward Snowden as the Person of the Year in 2013 has to have some pretty BIG reasons for doing so. And…

Obama has been person of the year twice in the last 5 years and there seem to be other countries than the USA last time i checked.

roughly 6.7 billion out of 7 billion people are not in the USA.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#35

Post by k-mcgrady »

StavrosK wrote: post #26
parasight wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now there are high hopes that the Pope will make a difference. Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize nine months after his election. For what reason if not high hopes? To a huge number of people on this planet the problems around the NSA are rather insignificant. EDIT: Typo

"Person of the year 2013" isn't "person we're hoping will make a difference in 2014", it's "person who has made a difference". The pope can pretty much do nothing that will affect me, but the bullshit the NSA pulls affect me every day.

>> "The pope can pretty much do nothing that will affect me, but the bullshit the NSA pulls affect me every day."

So Time should have checked with you first? I don't really care who they voted as person of the year (it really doesn't matter) but being annoyed they picked someone who doesn't effect you (but can effect millions of others) is pretty dumb and selfish reasoning.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#36

Post by leephillips »

salient wrote: post #27
parasight wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right now there are high hopes that the Pope will make a difference. Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize nine months after his election. For what reason if not high hopes? To a huge number of people on this planet the problems around the NSA are rather insignificant. EDIT: Typo

And in Obama's case, that turned out to be extremely premature. So learn from history? Then again didn't Time give this award to Hitler, too? So yeah, they don't exactly have a good record of learning from history.

Hitler was MOTY in 1938. Since he had a rather large effect on history, it seems as if they made a good call. Remember, this is not supposed to be an honor, it's supposed to identify someone who influences things.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#38

Post by jheriko »

shameful. although he has certainly had an impact, what a revolting choice.

to pick such a wicked and corrupt individual, especially one who is deluded into thinking of themselves as righteous...

gah!!!

still... at least it wasn't Snowden.

Re: Time Person of the Year 2013

#40

Post by mato »

r0h1n wrote: post #14

For crying out loud! What difference has the Pope made to the world (and do remember, the world does include non-Christian countries...or roughly 5 billion out of 7 billion people...and I'm not even getting into Catholics vs. non-Catholics here). Colour me cynical, but any publication that declares anyone other than Edward Snowden as the Person of the Year in 2013 has to have some pretty BIG reasons for doing so. And…

For crying out loud! What difference has Edward Snowden made to the world (and do remember, the world does include people not connected to the Internet... or roughly 4.5 billion out of 7 billion people... and I'm not even getting into people with not enough to eat every day here).

Colour me cynical, but any publication that declares anyone other than Chuck Norris as the Person of the Year in 2013 has to have some pretty BIG reasons for doing so. And Edward Snowden's just don't cut it.

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