What’s it like to be fleeing war?

I’m fairly certain that this week, the New York Times has upped the standard for mainstream journalism in telling the story of three of the 60 million people who have fled their home because of war and persecution.

It’s providing its multimedia presentation in “virtual reality.” Granted it’s a comparatively crude set-up with the Google Cardboard virtual reality viewer. The paper will distribute them with Sunday’s editions.

But it raises fascinating possibilities as virtual reality in journalistic storytelling begins to mature. How might public policy and the world’s reaction to its problems be different in the future if the people unaffected can more easily experience — or turn away with more difficulty — events far away?