Material World by Peter Menzel

Hmm. Well, I’ve read through both, and have allowed my boys to browse them. I guess I don’t remember being bothered by very much. I mean, there were great differences but so much is cultural–it seemed to me that some of the least “savory” things could be presented to children as how badly that area may need the Gospel. In fact, I think that Hungry Planet especially made a resoundingly convincing argument in FAVOR of the traditional family and of mothers, even if the authors didn’t really intend it that way, that I’ve been eager to let my boys browse and discuss the book in the hope that they’ll notice the same thing I did without my having to paint them a picture. 🙂

I think one way you could address the problem if you wanted to read it aloud would be to select some profiles to study, and not others. That way you could just eliminate the ones that seemed objectionable to you. You could read a profile, discuss it, find it or draw it on a map, study things like the status of Christians in that country, and have plenty of fodder for discussion.

I have especially enjoyed having discussions over these books. These authors are NOT conservative Christians, but their work argues so very convincingly anyway, of what really matters in life. We’ve had great discussions about whether the people with the “more stuff” seemed happier or not. About the amount of work and sacrifice that others their age have had to do. About the critical role of the family. About healthy diets and the fact that many of the “poor” profiles in Hungry Planet actually got better nutrition than WE do. About the ubiquitousness of things like Coca-Cola. About whether our greater material blessings are really such an advantage, and whether they are a “right” or a responsibility we have to others. I guess to me the benefits of these books far outweighed any objectionable material, but perhaps that is more due to the ages of my children–I have teens.

Also, if you have not yet begun the habit of “dressing” up some material, now is a good time to train your children in that. I know I’ve “covered up” ladies in paintings, and an occasional paragraph in an otherwise worthy book. 🙂 Markers and/or paper and tape are a great asset to the prudent mother. LOL