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I don't know if this exists in any form, but it should. Think about it: a color-coded, systematized scale of how badly life sucks in a given area at the moment. We already have scales for air quality and color-coded weather maps, why not for more important things too? It'd make presentation of the evening news much quicker, too, since the anchorpeople would in effect be reduced to a different kind of meteorologist ("...aaand in Pakistan, as you can see here, Musharraf decided to suspend his country's constitution just for fun, making the region a lime-green 2.1 on the HMI, while...").
I've even come up with a rudimentary scale. Suggestions (of the constructive kind) would be appreciated.
0 (Purple): Easy Street. Examples include Martha's Vinyard and Beverly Hills. Nobody wants anything, everybody's well protected and insured, and there's generally nothing to complain about but lazy servants. You won't get into trouble unless you really look for it, as in Paris or Lindsay.
1 (Blue): Hassles. New York City or anywhere else decently prosperous. You have to worry about work, paying for your kids' college, and all the little things that come with life. There's always a risk of crime or disaster, but you can live with it. Mostly you're just a little tired.
2 (Green): Injustice. Saudi Arabia, China, etc. Basic needs are attended to, but everything's all crooked. You have to bribe officials to get things done, tolerate incompetence and unfair laws, possibly be treated prejudicially by the law. You can prosper, to an extent, by working the system, and you can get by so long as you keep your head down and your mouth shut. But you feel dirty and you can never really relax.
3 (Yellow): Poverty. Subsistence farmers everywhere, various third world countries. Crap happens and there's nothing you can do about it. Mudslides, floods, locusts, blighted crops, famine, epidemics, intestinal parasites, you name it. As if that weren't enough, there may be bandits, or roving resistance movements "appropriating" your food and property for the cause, or government troops burning down your hovel to keep the resistance movements from using it.
4 (Orange): War. Baghdad, the Tet Offensive, France during the Hundred Years' War. There's a sporadic but unceasing low-level war going on. You may be shot, disemboweled or blown up without notice and for no reason. Life goes on in the meantime, and you could survive, but you're never safe. Due to the violence, the supply of basic goods and services is frequently interrupted or of spotty quality.
5 (Red): Hell. Darfur, Khmer Rouge Cambodia, Stalingrad...a continuous orgy of senseless pain and death. You can be pretty sure you're going to die in the near future, you just don't know when and how. Rape, murder, starvation, death by exposure, torture, cannibalism, everything bad all in a giant ball.
Obviously there are intermediates in this scale; Somalia might be a 4.5, orange-red, while Western ghettos with crooked cops are a likely 1.something, blue-green. You get the idea.
I've even come up with a rudimentary scale. Suggestions (of the constructive kind) would be appreciated.
0 (Purple): Easy Street. Examples include Martha's Vinyard and Beverly Hills. Nobody wants anything, everybody's well protected and insured, and there's generally nothing to complain about but lazy servants. You won't get into trouble unless you really look for it, as in Paris or Lindsay.
1 (Blue): Hassles. New York City or anywhere else decently prosperous. You have to worry about work, paying for your kids' college, and all the little things that come with life. There's always a risk of crime or disaster, but you can live with it. Mostly you're just a little tired.
2 (Green): Injustice. Saudi Arabia, China, etc. Basic needs are attended to, but everything's all crooked. You have to bribe officials to get things done, tolerate incompetence and unfair laws, possibly be treated prejudicially by the law. You can prosper, to an extent, by working the system, and you can get by so long as you keep your head down and your mouth shut. But you feel dirty and you can never really relax.
3 (Yellow): Poverty. Subsistence farmers everywhere, various third world countries. Crap happens and there's nothing you can do about it. Mudslides, floods, locusts, blighted crops, famine, epidemics, intestinal parasites, you name it. As if that weren't enough, there may be bandits, or roving resistance movements "appropriating" your food and property for the cause, or government troops burning down your hovel to keep the resistance movements from using it.
4 (Orange): War. Baghdad, the Tet Offensive, France during the Hundred Years' War. There's a sporadic but unceasing low-level war going on. You may be shot, disemboweled or blown up without notice and for no reason. Life goes on in the meantime, and you could survive, but you're never safe. Due to the violence, the supply of basic goods and services is frequently interrupted or of spotty quality.
5 (Red): Hell. Darfur, Khmer Rouge Cambodia, Stalingrad...a continuous orgy of senseless pain and death. You can be pretty sure you're going to die in the near future, you just don't know when and how. Rape, murder, starvation, death by exposure, torture, cannibalism, everything bad all in a giant ball.
Obviously there are intermediates in this scale; Somalia might be a 4.5, orange-red, while Western ghettos with crooked cops are a likely 1.something, blue-green. You get the idea.
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