Time Magazine’s annual “Person of the Year” article awards and recognizes the most influential person from the previous year. It began in 1927, and there have been many people nominated for this award since then. There have been some controversies in the past over who won. For example, in 1938, Adolf Hitler won the title.
The important thing to remember is that the title is for the most influential person, which means this influence could be for good or bad. There have also been other interesting winners, like in 2006. Time Magazine stated that everyone was person of the year, for contributing to internet websites, such as Wikipedia, YouTube, or Facebook.
This year, the Ebola fighters were the winners of Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year.” Many are familiar with the epidemic from the news, but these people have experienced it first hand. The Ebola fighters have risked their lives to save others, even when there was no cure. Many nurses, doctors and other health officials have suffered the disease themselves. For example, Foday Gallah, has survived the sickness and is now immune and still helps by donating his blood. These Ebola fighters are not required to do this, but they do it out of the kindness and dedication of their own hearts. The Ebola fighters risked their lives, knowing they might not come back home alive.
The runner-ups of this year were the Ferguson Protestors, Vladimir Putin, Massoud Barzani, and Jack Ma. As most people know, the Ferguson case was especially controversial, touching upon the issue of police brutality in America. The Ferguson protesters were nominated because they started a revolution and opened Americans eyes to the fault in their country’s police system.
Vladimir Putin was also a very influential figure this past year due to his actions with Ukraine. The other runner-ups were not so well known to youth. Massoud Barzani is a Kurdish politician who has been President of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region since 2005, and Jack Ma is a Chinese entrepreneur, and the Alibaba Group, an internet based company.
On the Time Magazine website, people were allowed to vote for who they wanted to win. Ms. Lambrini’s 9th grade advisory spent time reading over the nominees, and voting on a possible winner. The general consensus was that either the Ebola doctors or the Ferguson protesters would win, mostly because of proximity, and the news of both the shooting and epidemic had spread quickly.
The BACC Rag 