This video from “The West Wing” Season 2 Episode 16, was recommended by an elementary school teacher who is doing a unit on maps with her class.
The Gall-Peters projection is one specialization of a configurable equal-area map projection known as the equal-area cylindric or cylindrical equal-area projection. It achieved considerable notoriety in the late 20th century as the centerpiece of a controversy surrounding the political implications of map design.
Read more on this design at Wikipedia HERE
Up and down are merely a matter of perspective, so flipping the image is just as valid as the way we usually look at it.
I have to admit that it is the upside down image that floors me the most. That is probably the image we should use as it flips EVERYONE on their head.