January '08’s Edition of National Geographic has a cover story on “Humankind’s feverish attachment to gold,” which “shouldn’t have survived the modern world.” The author holds up Keynes quoting him calling it “a barbarous relic.” She opportunistically plays upon “everybody knows it’s bad” word association taking every opportunity to use emotionally charged words like “Pristine” (rainforest) and “SUV”. Also thrown in is the image of a 13-year-old boy “put to work”. The point seems to be that the obsession with gold has caused corporations to destroy the environment and that the “social cost” of mining gold is unacceptable. They do publish some letters of about 100 words if anyone wishes to refute or counter argue.
JB