Society's ChildS


Eye 1

Federal court rules no constitutional right to consensual BDSM sex

consensual bdsm
© Herwig Prammer / Reuters
A federal district court has ruled there is no constitutional right to practice consensual BDSM sex in a case over the expulsion of a George Mason University student for having such a relationship. However, a much bigger precedent was set by the case.

At the end of February, Judge TS Ellis of the District Court of the Eastern District of Virginia dismissed the case through summary judgment, noting that GMU had violated Doe's right to due process by not properly handling the appeals process.

"This is the first sexual campus misconduct suit in which the plaintiff won on summary judgment, meaning there is no genuine dispute of material facts," James Dillon, Doe's lawyer, told RT. "We want him to get a clean record and to be able to go back to school."

The case centers on a now-former couple, John Doe, a GMU student, and Jane Roe, a student at another university, who had engaged in a BDSM sexual relationship. BDSM refers to bondage, discipline, dominance, submission, sadism and masochism, and may involve biting, choking, spanking, the use of restraints, or other, even more untoward, activities.

Black Magic

Virginia passes law approving execution by electric chair

electric chair
© Reuters
Virginia senators have passed a bill allowing condemned inmates to be executed via the electric chair. The legislation comes amid a nationwide shortage of lethal-injection drugs, though Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe has not said whether he will sign it.

The bill won approval in a tight 22-17 vote in the Virginia Senate on Monday. If Governor McAuliffe vetoes the legislation, lawmakers will have to somehow garner more support to override it and pass the bill into law. It is expected to be sent to the governor this week.

Supporters say that death penalty abolitionists are making it difficult to obtain lethal injection drugs. Democratic leader Senator Dick Saslaw said that when offenders murder multiple people, they no longer deserve to be treated humanely.

"When you commit acts like that, you give you up your right to as far as I'm concerned to say well I want to die humanely," Senator Saslaw told the Associated Press.

Comment: If the state doesn't have enough drugs to administer death by lethal injection, maybe they should just let the prisoner live instead of finding another, more cruel way to kill people.


Health

Passenger train derails in California, injuring 14

ace train derails
© KGO-TV
At least 14 people have been injured, four of them seriously, after a commuter train traveling from Silicon Valley to Stockton derailed and two of its cars crashed into a local creek in California.

The incident took place in a rural area some 72km east of San Francisco on Monday night, Altamont Corridor Express (ACE) train officials told KCBS radio, adding that there were at least 214 passengers on the train at the time of the incident.

At least four of the 14 people hurt in the incident received "serious" but "non-life-threatening" injuries, the Alameda Fire Department said. Officials added that it was raining heavily at the time of the incident.

Heart - Black

Tourist kills swan after dragging it from lake for selfie

swan selfie
All for the selfie: The female tourist is seen smiling for the camera as she drags the swan from the lake
This is the moment a female tourist dragged a swan from a lake in Macedonia in order to pose up for a photograph, before leaving it to die on the beach.

The woman, reportedly from Bulgaria, grabbed the unsuspecting swan by the wing and dragged it onto the pebble-strewn shoreline of Lake Ohrid, south-western Macedonia.

When the unidentified tourist had gotten her selfie snap, she abandoned the swan, which later died on the beach of Lake Ohrid, local media reports.

Shocked witnesses have described how the swan did not react to the woman walking up to it, as they are used to the presence of tourists visiting the town of Ohrid, which shares the lake's name.
swan selfie
Cruel: The brazen tourists then left the swan 'motionless' on the shores of Lake Ohrid

Comment: People have truly gone mad. They have lost whatever conscience and empathy they had and replaced it with a vain desire for attention. If you've ever wondered about alien abductions and why they occur, one need only look at the above despicable behavior. Those beings above us do what they want to us for their own selfish gratification without any consideration for the trauma that is being inflicted. And here we seethe maxim - as above, so below - applied. That this behavior is becoming more and more common should be even more cause for concern:


Arrow Down

Oklahoma state bill heads to Senate that will criminalize abortion as first-degree murder

abortion
On Tuesday, the Oklahoma Senate will hear two of the most controversial anti-abortion bills in recent history. One bill would revoke the medical license of any physician who performs an abortion, and the other bill would criminalize abortion as an act of first-degree murder.

This legislation is an unprecedented move by anti-abortion advocates. However, this sentiment is not uncommon. Lawmakers in the past have attempted to arrest, at least, one woman, for murder, after inducing an abortion.

Comment: See also: Not number one: 11 things other countries do way better than America


Eye 2

Government indoctrination: FBI now targeting high school students

spying children
McCarthyism quietly returned in January — repackaged, rebranded, and updated to fit a modern narrative — in an official policy set forth by the FBI that asks high schools to target their students.

"Preventing Violent Extremism in Schools," an unclassified 28-page manifesto for the ostensible purpose of waging the War on Terror in U.S. schools, opens with a brief summary of what we can expect from the latest in governmental indoctrination:
"High school students are ideal targets for recruitment by violent extremists seeking support of their radical ideologies, foreign fighter networks, or conducting acts of targeted violence within our borders. High schools must remain vigilant in educating their students about catalysts that drive violent extremism and the potential consequences of embracing extremist beliefs."
Presented as ostensibly well-intentioned guidelines for identifying an individual's burgeoning extremist ideology, the entire summation, and its accompanying website, are a thinly-veiled excuse to target Muslim-Americans.

But Muslims aren't the only subject of this alarmingly McCarthyistic program.

Eye 1

No prison time in child molestation case, controversial but not uncommon experts say

child moletser no prison sentence 800px
© Indianapolis Metropolitan Police DepartmentJeremy Schwer pleaded guilty to felony child molesting.
The response was immediate, emotional and filled with disgust.

A Marion County judge's decision not to send a convicted child molester to prison drew public ire last week on social media.

Jeremy Schwer was not just another defendant; he is the father of the victim, a then-6-year-old girl diagnosed with cancer. And he is not just her father; he was her caregiver when the crime was committed, when she was sick from chemotherapy.

"I am sickened how this young girl has been failed twice by our judicial system," one IndyStar reader said. The girl was failed not only by her father, she said, but also by the court. Another said Schwer's sentence, which includes 12 years of probation, sends the wrong message to child predators.

But the judge's decision was not all that uncommon, legal experts say, and it demonstrates the difficulties in sentencing someone when punishing the offender also could punish the victim.

Friends and family members argued in letters to the judge that imprisonment of the 41-year-old Indianapolis man could have detrimental economic consequences, not only on the defendant, but more importantly, on his family.

"It's certainly a heinous offense, there's no question about that," said David Finkelhor, director of the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center. "There are three elements that are involved in punishment. There is the protection of the community. There is the deterrence of other possible offenders. And there is the justice for the victim. The question is, 'Does justice for the victim outweigh the other needs?'"

In Schwer's case, the financial consequences to his family outweighed everything else. His now-estranged wife asked the court not to send him to prison so that he could work to support their two young children — an obligation that Schwer's attorney said he will fulfill.

Comment: This is absolutely disgusting! How can any society that claims to stand for democratic ideals not have in place provisions for assisting families in instances such as these?


Heart

Girl writes letter to Putin asking for a dog - Putin delivers

putin girl chihuahua
© Крыминформ ИА / YouTube
An 11-year-old in the city of Sevastopol in Crimea has sent a letter to Vladimir Putin, telling the president she wanted a dog. Now she has become the happy owner of a chihuahua.

"I wrote: 'Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin! Please give me a chihuahua as a present,'" Alina Zykova told local media. The girl had watched the president giving presents to other children on TV, and decided to ask him to make her wish come true too, her mother added.

The family who moved to Sevastopol from the Donetsk region in Ukraine because of the girl's health (doctors recommended her to stay away from coal mines), received a phone call from the local government.
putin girl chihuahua
© Ruptly

Comment: When was the last time one of our Western leaders actually read a letter from a citizen? Hint: the answer is less than 1.


Eye 1

Never again? Anti-immigrant 'Alternative for Germany' scores huge gains in local German elections

Alternative for Germany
© Hannibal Hanschke / ReutersSupporters of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) demonstrate against the German government's new policy for migrants in Berlin, Germany, November 7, 2015
The anti-immigrant right-wing Alternative for Germany party (AfD) scored huge gains in local elections in the German central state of Hessen over the weekend, becoming the third strongest political force in the region amid the ongoing refugee crisis.

The anti-immigrant party garnered on average of 13.2 percent of vote throughout the region, coming in behind only Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU), which received 28.2 percent, and the Social Democrats (SPD) with 28 percent, according to preliminary election results, as reported by the German media.

AfD also scored significant gains in Hessen's several major cities, winning 10.3 percent in Frankfurt, 12.2 percent both in Kassel and Darmstadt, as well as enjoying particular success in the regional capital of Wiesbaden, attracting 15.3 percent of the vote.

Comment: Further reading: Anti-refugee rallies in Germany, Netherlands, Swedish mosque arson attack


Hearts

Co-founder of "Dog Tales Rescue and Sanctuary" can't decide which dogs to save- buys entire shelter instead

Dog shelter
© Dog Tales
Danielle Eden is no stranger to hell.

She usually brings a few dogs back from there.

As cofounder of Dog Tales Rescue and Sanctuary, she has visited countless animal shelters throughout the world. And often she would bring dogs in the most dire circumstances back to the rescue's own rolling 50-acre property in King, Ontario.

But she wasn't prepared for what awaited her at a shelter she visited in Israel last January.

Every last dog was in desperate straits.

"This is the worst shelter she had ever seen," Clare Forndran, media director for Dog Tales Rescue and Sanctuary, tells The Dodo.

Comment: Kudos to Dog Tales Rescue and Sanctuary in their mission to save the lives of so many dogs and give them a new lease on life.