The new post at Bad Data, Bad! reminded me of the site "Strange Maps," which eventually got subsumed under bigthink.com. The earlier posts tend to be more fun, I have found. #22, Core Europe, has always been a favorite of mine. It's certainly what many Americans think is really Europe, rather than a hanger-on; apparently many Europeans think so too.
Yet I wonder...did they really mean to include so many Italians? I mean, there's the Renaissance and everything, but are we still giving them credit for that?
As infuriating as this map may be to many people, the CIA World Factbook, Eurovision contests, and most modern lists put the number of European countries around 50, including Azerbaijan, for pete's sake. When I write or say the word "Europe," there is no one who immediately has a picture of Cyprus come to mind. They're not Asian, I suppose. Have to put 'em somewhere.
I guess they really mean "The West" when they say "Europe."
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