re: What’s the point of globes?

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The Mercator was designed in 1569 by cartographer Gerardus Mercator. You probably saw it hanging in your Geography classroom, and it may be how you imagine the Earth to look.
However, it has been heavily criticised because it exaggerates the size of imperialist powers like Europe and North America, and shrinks South America and Africa.

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This week, children at schools in Boston would have found an unfamiliar map of the world in their classrooms, according to The Guardian.

City authorities decided it would be best to introduce the Gall-Peters style map of Earth to schools, because it shows the size of countries more accurately. It replaces the traditional Mercator map style that many of us are familiar with.

The Boston authorities thought in an era of "alternative facts," a shift in the map style was called for, to "decolonize the curriculum" in public schools, and more accurately depict the sizes of countries. Greenland, for example, is actually a lot smaller than the Mercator shows, and South America is really twice the size of Europe.

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