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"Now, you want to become acquainted with a woman you see in public. The first thing you need to understand is that women are dealing with a set of challenges and concerns that are strange to you, a man. To begin with, we would rather not be killed or otherwise violently assaulted.“But wait! I don’t want that, either!”
Well, no. But do you think about it all the time? Is preventing violent assault or murder part of your daily routine, rather than merely something you do when you venture into war zones? Because, for women, it is."
"Hallowe'en is a perfectly lovely American holiday that came over with the immigrating Irish who escaped An Gorta Mor (what we were taught as the "Irish Potato Famine") in the 1840s. They brought some folk traditions connected with the evening before All Saints Day or All Hallows."
"Many modern Pagans celebrate Samhain at the end of October. Samhain is based on an ancient Celtic festival and is the third harvest festival, the Festival for the Dead, the beginning of the winter season and the New Year on the Celtic calendar.It is rather a big deal...but it is not Hallowe'en. It's an important harvest celebration and a time to remember those who have died, whether in the last year or long ago. The Ancestors.
So, all these cranky churches and schools who refuse to celebrate the perfectly American (okay, Irish-American) holiday called Hallowe'en are brainheads."
The modern incarnation of Halloween has about as much connection with its original Pagan origins as Christmas or Easter do.
"A group of parents say their children with disabilities experienced waterboarding-like torture” and other forms of abuse at the hands of two teacher’s aides at a Montana middle school.
Now, the teacher’s aides, Julie Parish and Kristina Marie Kallies, face felony charges of assault on a minor and endangering the welfare of children in connection with the alleged abuse in a special education classroom.
Witnesses say that students were subjected to water torture and forced to eat their own vomit. Further, parents say they suspect students were also confined to closets.
Parents noticed that students came home with bruises, bite marks, burnt fingertips and missing hair.
The students, who have a variety of disabilities including autism, Down syndrome and cerebral palsy, were unable to speak up about the problems due to their disabilities."
First of all, I thought that we left this shit behind in the '50's. Secondly, having volunteered with Special Olympics I cannot conceive of the type of person it would take to commit such atrocities. upon innocent children. My partner said it best, "Instead of jail, they should not be permitted to live."
"One day, when Sila Folow was an 8-year-old girl living in Mali, four elderly women held her down on the dirt floor of an outhouse and, in keeping with local tradition, used a sharp blade to cut out her clitoris and most of her labia. Her grandmother and other villagers held a celebration. Sila, bleeding and in terrible pain, could not walk for weeks. Like millions of other African girls who are forced to undergo female genital mutilation—a ritual many women say is intended to ensure that they grow up to become sexually passive wives who will not stray from their husbands—Sila never recovered. She eventually moved to New York, married, and had two children. But she was reluctant to have sex with her husband. It hurt, and the scarring made it impossible for her to feel pleasure.
This May, Sila, now 38 years old, underwent a simple but profound operation to undo the past. She traveled to Trinidad, Colorado, where Dr. Marci Bowers, a gynecological and pelvic surgeon, has recently begun to perform "clitoralplasty" or "female circumcision reversals" on African women. A relatively new procedure, it reshapes the anatomy and, in 80 percent of patients, restores pleasurable sensation. "I want my womanhood back," Sila told Bowers when she first spoke to the surgeon about the operation. "I just want to know it's there. To have the feeling that I can fight against this culture." "
"California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger - making last minute cuts to the budget - eliminated all of the state funding for domestic violence shelters. That's right - all of it.
Although the state Legislature submitted a budget with a 20 percent reduction to the $20.4 million the state provides to agencies that offer domestic violence services, Schwarzenegger slashed the funding by 100 percent Tuesday.For Catalyst, which relies on state funding for nearly 35 percent of its operating budget, the affect will be "devastating," Executive Director Anastacia Snyder said.
"We're still in shock," Snyder said Wednesday afternoon. "We were bracing for the 20 percent cut, but did not believe the governor could, with a clear conscience, cut 100 percent of funding for services that keep women and children safe and alive."
If you're a resident of California, please click on Stop Family Violence's action alert to urge lawmakers to reinstate funding for the programs that save women's lives. If you're not in CA - pass this on to someone who is! You can also post the following message to your Facebook account, or tweet it: CA Gov Eliminates funding for Domestic Violence Programs. Lives will be lost. You can help! CA residents click http://bit.ly/3jKQSo"
Evidently material goods and the auto industry are much more important than human beings.
"The OhioDaily blog reports on a “rogue” dispatcher from the North Canton Police who recently sent out a racist e-mail from her work account. Dispatcher Anita Malachowski forwarded this message:“New “Air Force One” Tail Number and yes, please forgive me, I’m really sorry, I really, really tried not to laugh, but …………………..!”
Attached to the e-mail was an Photoshopped image of Air Force one with NI66ER written on the plane’s tail. As OhioDaily writes, “This type of message is offensive coming from anyone, but coming from someone in the position of dispatching police and prioritizing calls, it’s downright horrifying. The North Canton police have a hard enough job as it is without rogue dispatchers trying to incite a race riot or stirring tensions during the hot months of summer.”"
Even if it wasn't so blatantly offensive, it's still a gross misuse of police resources.
"A downtown hotel being sued by a woman raped at gunpoint in its parking garage is claiming she was careless, negligent and "failed to exercise due care for her own safety and the safety of her children and proper use of her senses and facilities," according to court documents.
The victim's attorneys also argue the hotel has inadvertently identified her to acquaintances by asking them to testify."
So it's her fault for taking care of her children in a public area, and not the negligient security of the hotel. She was evidently asking for it by buckling her small children in. Then they broach her right to anonymity by bringing in character witnesses (i.e. people who were not present at the crime) to intimidate her.
