Society's ChildS


USA

New video shows what it's like for a woman to walk around NYC being harassed by men for 10 hours

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A new video by filmmaker Rob Bliss and the advocacy group Hollaback shows the kind of street harassment often hurled at women in New York City, Mashable reported.

The video, "10 Hours of Walking in NYC as a Woman," shows Shoshana B. Roberts silently walking through Manhattan behind Bliss, who is filming her with a camera hidden inside a backpack. Though she does not engage with anyone, she is "complimented," told to "smile," and leered at by men.

"What's up girl? How you doing?" one man says early on. "Somebody's acknowledging you for being beautiful. You should say thank you more."

Other men are shown following Roberts without her consent, including one who tails her for five minutes.

"Maybe the guys who see this and don't understand may still think there's nothing wrong with this," Bliss told Think Progress. "But at least for the first time, they got to experience a little bit of what it's like to go through a day of getting harassed."

According to another advocacy group, Stop Street Harassment, 65 percent of U.S. women have experienced street harassment.

"Street harassment is a new term for an old phenomenon. It can include stalking, groping, verbal and physical assault that happens in public space," Hollaback states on its website. "Even though there are no population level studies, smaller city-wide studies in the US, Canada, Egypt, and India indicate that it is a pervasive and serious problem."

Roberts, who became part of the project after answering a classified ad, said the video captured "really just a day in the life for me."

Watch the video, as posted online on Tuesday, below.


Ambulance

Chicago school evacuated and 9 students hospitalized over gas leak

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© CBSHarper High School
As many as nine people were taken to hospitals Wednesday morning, after high carbon monoxide readings were detected at a West Englewood high school.

Around 10 a.m., firefighters conducted a hazardous materials response at Harper High School, at 65th and Wood, due to high carbon monoxide levels. The school was evacuated, and will be closed for the rest of the day.

People's Gas spokeswoman Bonnie Johnson says Peoples Gas "is supporting [the Chicago Fire Department] in their investigation into a foreign odor at Harper High School."

Chicago police said nine students were hospitalized as a precaution, although the Fire Department said six students and one teacher were hospitalized.

Students who weren't sick were being bused to other schools.

Officials said a construction crew was relining sewers in the area, and vapors from the sewer might have seeped into the school, raising carbon monoxide levels, and making some people feel ill.

Pistol

Gunman in North Carolina shoots and injures two men in front of courthouse

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© AP Photo/The Rocky Mount Telegram, Adam JenningsThe North Carolina State Highway Patrol works at the scene of a shooting on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2014 at the Nashville courthouse in Nashville, N.C
A gunman opened fire on two men in front of the courthouse in this small North Carolina town on Tuesday, sending panicked lunchtime shoppers ducking into shops along the normally quiet main drag.

The suspect was caught by late afternoon after a manhunt that included dozens of armed officers canvassing the woods along a state highway with a police helicopter flying overhead. A second suspect was still on the loose. Authorities didn't offer a motive but believe the victims were targeted. Both were expected to survive.

The shooting shattered the calm of the sunny lunch hours along Nashville's main street, which is flanked by the courthouse on one side and one-story shops across the street. Witnesses on the strip that includes a flower shop, cafe and furniture store said violence is unusual in the town of about 5,500.

"We heard gunshots, like: Pow! Pow! Pow! Pow! Pow!" said Judy Winstead, who works at a real estate office across from the court. "It was very loud, and when we came out we even smelled gunpowder."

Question

Washington's official story on Ebola arouses suspicions of darker motives

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Soldiers conduct training before their deployment to West Africa, at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.
The federal government has announced that thousands of additional US soldiers are being sent to Liberia. General Gary Volesky said the troops would "stamp out" ebola. The official story is that combat troops are being sent to build treatment structures for those infected with ebola.

Why combat troops? Why not send a construction outfit such as an engineer battalion if it has to be military? Why not do what the government usually does and contract with a construction company to build the treatment units? "Additional thousands of troops" results in a very large inexperienced construction crew for 17 treatment units. It doesn't make sense.

Stories that don't make sense and that are not explained naturally arouse suspicions, such as: Are US soldiers being used to test ebola vaccines and cures, or more darkly are they being used to bring more ebola back to the US?

I understand why people ask these questions. The fact that they will receive no investigative answer will deepen suspicions.

Stormtrooper

Smog couture: Models parade face masks at China's fashion week

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© Reuters/StringerA model wearing a mask presents a creation at the QIAODAN Yin Peng Sports Wear Collection show during China Fashion Week in Beijing, October 28, 2014.
China's smog problem has infiltrated haute couture. One fashion designer has embraced the country's ongoing problems with pollution, incorporating the need for face masks into their Spring/Summer 2015 sportswear collection.

Yin Peng's collection was paraded at China Fashion Week, currently being held in Beijing, with models parading down the catwalk wearing face masks.

The models looked determined not to let the conditions of the city in which the fashion show was held get to them.

The masks varied from full-face cover, as with a fencing mask, to angular lightweight mouth-covering designs to compliment running gear.

Arrow Down

New York woman beheaded by man who then jumped in front of train

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© Reuters
A man in his 30s beheaded a woman in her 60s on New York's Long Island and then jumped in front of a moving commuter train in an apparent murder-suicide, media reported on Wednesday.

The body of a woman who was "the victim of an apparent homicide" was found in Farmingdale at about 7:55 p.m. local time on Tuesday, Nassau County Police Officer Steve Zacchia told Reuters on Wednesday.

About 25 minutes later, Metropolitan Transit Authority Police reported that the body of a man who had been struck by a Long Island Rail Road train was found about 1,000 feet away, Zacchia said.

He declined to confirm media reports that the woman had been decapitated by the man, who then leaped in front of the train.

Arrow Up

Russian deliver space station cargo after US flop

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© NASA
The company behind the dramatic launch explosion of a space station supply mission promises to find the cause of the failure and is warning residents to avoid any potentially hazardous wreckage.

Orbital Sciences Corp.'s unmanned Antares rocket blew up just moments after liftoff Tuesday evening from the Virginia coast.

Meanwhile, early Wednesday, the Russian Space Agency launched its own cargo vessel from Kazakhstan and the spacecraft arrived at the International Space Station six hours later with 3 tons of food. The smooth flight was in stark contrast to the Orbital Sciences' failed launch, and had been planned well in advance of the accident.

The Orbital Sciences rocket was carrying a Cygnus capsule loaded with 2 1/2 tons of space station experiments and equipment for NASA. No one was injured when the rocket exploded moments after liftoff, shooting flaming debris down onto the launch area and into the ocean.

Ground crews were ready to access the fire-stricken area of NASA's Wallops Flight Facility at daybreak Wednesday to search for accident debris.

Gold Bar

Egon von Greyerz on the Swiss gold referendum and coming financial reset

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Switzerland's Egon von Greyerz
Wealth preservation expert Egon von Greyerz is not bullish on the U.S. dollar. Greyerz explains, "More and more countries are trying to go away from the dollar, and I think the days of the dollar are counted. I think the dollar is going to start falling rapidly in coming months and years. Of course, it already has fallen dramatically in the last few decades, but that will now accelerate. It will go down to its intrinsic value which is zero, which most currencies do over their lifetime. Of course, we have the movements in Russia and China with alternative currencies for commodities like oil, etc. There will be a very disorderly reset with currencies falling. They can't all fall at the same time, but they will fall dramatically, and gold will, of course, reflect that. The stock markets are in a bubble, and they will also fall. I think the secular bull market we have seen is finished. Now, we are going to see a very long bear market. Of course, the biggest bubble of them all, where governments do all they can to keep the bubble going, is the bond market. We have more debt than ever and interest rates at zero. That just doesn't add up." Greyerz goes on to say, "You can't have governments borrow more than ever and have interest rates at zero. You can only do that temporarily because you have governments printing money and artificially holding interest rates down. That will not last either. So, the reset will be dramatic. It won't happen overnight, but there will be events that trigger short term pitfalls, but this is a long term thing."

Light Saber

Stop thanking me for my service

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© Shutterstock.com
As a veteran, I'm tired of being blindly celebrated. Good intentions aren't a substitute for good politics


Last week, in a quiet indie bookstore on the north side of Chicago, I saw the latest issue of Rolling Stone resting on a chrome-colored plastic table a few feet from a barista brewing a vanilla latte. A cold October rain fell outside. A friend of mine grabbed the issue and began flipping through it. Knowing that I was a veteran, he said, "Hey, did you see this?" pointing to a news story that seemed more like an ad. It read in part:

"This Veterans Day, Bruce Springsteen, Eminem, Rihanna, Dave Grohl, and Metallica will be among numerous artists who will head to the National Mall in Washington D.C. on November 11th for 'The Concert For Valor,' an all-star event that will pay tribute to armed services."

"Concert For Valor? That sounds like something the North Korean government would organize," I said as I typed Concertforvalor.com into my MacBook Pro looking for more information.

The sucking sound from the espresso maker was drowning out a 10-year-old Shins song. As I read, my heart sank, my shoulders slumped.

Special guests at the Concert for Valor were to include: Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, and Steven Spielberg. The mission of the concert, according to a press release, was to "raise awareness" of veterans issues and "provide a national stage for ensuring that veterans and their families know that their fellow Americans' gratitude is genuine."

Stormtrooper

Former cop headed to trial for raping a child while other officers watched

officer rape trial
© LiveLeak.com
Pharr, Texas - Trial is set to begin December 1, in the case of former Pharr police officer Erasmo Mata, Jr., accused of repeated first-degree felony sexual assaults of a child.

A federal civil lawsuit filed with Texas Southern District Court back in May accused Mata of assaulting the minor five times, on five separate occasions, all while on duty. The suit alleges that the attacks took place in abandoned houses around the city as other Pharr police officers stood by and watched.

The lawsuit also accused the department of engaging in a cover-up to protect the officers from criminal charges, as well as not conducting a rape kit or immediately testing the evidence.

The lawsuit was filed against the officer, the City of Pharr, the Pharr Police Department and the Pharr police chief.

Claims against the City of Pharr and the Pharr Police Chief Ruben Villescas were dismissed, however the motion to dismiss Mata was denied.

The Pharr Police Department did an internal investigation, but the family claims Chief Villescas told them not to hire an attorney and that he would personally take care of the allegations against the officer, Valley Central reports.

While the officers were terminated, neither Mata, nor the officers who allegedly watched, initially faced any criminal charges for the 2013 attacks.