VOA慢速英語:世界是一團(tuán)混亂嗎？

[ti:Is the World a Mess] [ar:Christopher Cruise] [al:In the News] [00:00.00]From VOA Learning English, this is In the News. [00:10.33]The word "mess" can be used to describe something [00:15.40]complex or very difficult to deal with. [00:19.94]A former United States official used the word last weekend [00:25.39]when she spoke about recent world events. [00:28.93]"To put it mildly," Madeleine Albright said, [00:33.18]"the world is a mess." [00:35.77]Ms. Albright was the first woman [00:38.82]to serve as Secretary of State. [00:41.31]She served as the country's top diplomat [00:44.61]during the presidency of Bill Clinton. [00:48.00]Ms. Albright appeared on the CBS News program Face the Nation. [00:53.74]Reporter Bob Schieffer asked her [00:57.18]if she knew of "a time when there was so much trouble [01:01.77]in so many different places?" [01:04.50]She said two "huge game changers" [01:08.64]have affected recent events. [01:11.19]One is the behavior of Russian President Vladimir Putin toward Ukraine. [01:19.05]The other is what has been happening in the Middle East, [01:23.79]starting with the political unrest known as the Arab Spring. [01:29.62]She also noted what she called [01:32.57]"the artificiality of the borders [01:35.95]that were established after World War I." [01:39.23]The conflict in Ukraine has been in the news [01:43.43]almost daily since the shooting down [01:46.57]of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 last month. [01:51.12]All 298 people on the airplane were killed. [01:56.49]The same day, the Israeli military launched a campaign [02:02.27]against Hamas supporters in the Gaza Strip. [02:06.08]Since then, more than 1,000 people have died in the fighting. [02:11.61]The war in nearby Syria has displaced millions of people. [02:17.64]Thousands of Central American children [02:21.08]have entered the United States illegally [02:24.18]and without their parents. [02:26.17]Add to that the religious violence in Iraq. [02:31.00]So some would say the world [02:34.39]does appear to be a mess at the present time. [02:38.22]Micah Zenko is a senior fellow [02:42.06]at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, D.C. [02:46.30]He says many people believe [02:48.94]that the world is either on fire [02:52.04]or "facing chaos or spinning out of control." [02:57.09]He thinks technology and social media [03:00.89]are driving news reports on the conflicts. [03:04.48]He notes the influence of broadcasters like CNN. [03:08.92]"Part of this is because it is so vivid, [03:12.27]the imagery and the concerns and the instability, [03:15.16]and this is now translated in real time -- [03:17.66]not just as they used to call 'the CNN effect' [03:20.28]but it's sort of the CNN effect on steroids, [03:22.88]which is to say journalists, activists, [03:25.12]researchers in conflict-prone countries [03:27.97]can place images of suffering, of damage, [03:32.00]and they can appear on your Twitter feed, [03:34.70]on your Facebook posts sort of instantly. [03:37.24]And so it's in not just real time [03:40.37]but sort of immediacy that allows us [03:43.11]to connect with suffering in a way [03:45.76]that we don't see in terms of positive news stories." [03:48.55]The Council of Foreign Relations lists 33 conflicts [03:54.01]on a part of its website called the Global Conflict Tracker. [03:59.35]Reports about these conflicts have appeared [04:02.84]in news media over the past six months. [04:06.37]Micah Zenko says the world has experienced other periods [04:12.15]of chaos or unrest. [04:14.39]The issue, he says, is that positive, or good, [04:18.68]news does not get reported. [04:22.08]He notes the drop in the number of child deaths [04:26.28]and progress in fighting diseases like polio. [04:30.76]He says people are living longer than their parents did [04:35.20]and generally have better health. [04:38.25]He also notes the spread of democracy around the world. [04:43.19]And, that's In The News from VOA Learning English. [04:50.07]I'm Christopher Cruise.

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