News Round-up: Stories You Can't Miss
1. Silicon sweatshops/Globalpost. The international news Web site, Globalpost.com, is known for its flavor-of-life feature stories from freelancers around the world. But the publication is showing it can do hard-hitting investigative reporting, too, with Kathleen McLaughlin's series on "silicon sweatshops" in China. McLaughlin reports on the medical problems facing workers in Apple's iPhone factories abroad who were exposed to the chemical n-hexane, as well as other problems of the global supply chain for mega companies like Apple, Nokia and Dell. Read it here
2. Animal suicide/Time Magazine. Do animals commit suicide? Time Magazine's Justin Nobel attempts to answer this question with a thought-provoking story about how scientists and philosophers view the issue. "The questioning of animal suicide is essentially people looking at what it means to be human," says one medical historian quoted in the story. Read it here
3. Thai blood protest/BBC news. In a gory and startling story, Thai red-shirt opposition members protested by splashing their own blood at the prime minister's house and other government buildings in Bangkok. This was the largest protest in recent years, and many thousands of protesters donated blood for the cause. The protesters say the current government is illegitimate. Read it here
4. Strangest financial instrument/Slate Magazine. This article by Slate's Daniel Gross is an interesting look at an obscure financial instrument: credit-default swaps. Gross explains how credit-default swaps got AIG in trouble, and what are the potential implications for buying credit-default swaps on countries. Some are saying this practice helped aggravate the financial crisis in Greece. Interestingly, there are credit-default swaps on U.S. government debt, leading Gross to explore the theoretical possibility of if the U.S. defaulted on its debt. Read it here
5. A question of consent/Columbia Missourian. Roseann Moring investigates why so few of the sexual assaults reported on college campuses get prosecuted. Moring explains the difficulties in prosecuting sexual assault cases and why this crime is still viewed differently than other crimes. Read it here
Those are a few of the more interesting stories I've stumbled across this week. Feel free to comment or add links to good stories you've read.
Published by Jan Hewitt
I am a journalist and world traveler, who specializes in travel writing, financial news, technology, and education. Most recently, I've been based in Europe writing about technology, but my motto is my home... View profile
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