Razistan.org, which was created via a kickstarter campaign, was founded by Luke Mogelson, who frequently contributes to the New York Times. I found this site through one of his articles, an awesome examination of an Afghan battalion demolishing outposts and clearing IEDs in the middle of nowhere. The article entitled "Which Way Did the Taliban Go?", along with the photo essay "Another Hard Day of Trying to Stay Alive" by one of the Razistan journalists, Joel van Houdt, totally blew my mind. This is the kind of journalism I want to do in the future, so I spent hours reading all of Mogelson's Times articles and looking through all of the Razistan journalists' stories. Some of my favorites are "Surviving the Wreckage" by Majid Saeedi, "A Village" by Lorenzo Tugnoli, and "Emergency" by Pieter ten Hoopen (especially this image, and this one; be warned, there's some blood).
This kind of journalism, especially done thoughtfully and respectfully in Afghanistan, is crucial to our understanding of the brutal and violent situation American forces have created in their country. Razistan, in my opinion, serves to combat the lack of coverage given to the area by most of the American media outlets.
For this reason, "Emergency" is probably my favorite story on Razistan. Even though most of the images depict sad, hopeless scenes, like the "Gurneys" and "Men killed in the Ashura bombing and brought to Emergency dead on arrival" linked above, those who once supported American actions should fully acknowledge the aftermath of the conflict, or at least appreciate the people cleaning up after us.
Not all of it is sad, though. A number of the stories are just plain fascinating. Check it out!
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