Society's ChildS


Bad Guys

Not just America: Majority of Mexicans favor deporting migrants waiting to enter US

mexicans protest migrants Tiajuana
© The Columbia Bugle /TwitterMexican nationals in Tijuana protest against waves of migrants on their way to the US border, November 18, 2018
More than half of Mexican nationals are not sympathetic to migrants traveling through the country on their journey to the United States and support the deportation of unauthorized persons waiting to gain entry to America, according to a new study.

The study, conducted by the Washington Post and Mexican newspaper Reforma, found "more than 6 in 10 Mexicans say migrants are a burden on their country because they take jobs and benefits that should belong to Mexicans."

Additionally, more than half of the those same Mexican citizens are in favor of deporting migrants living in the country illegally.

Comment: The situation was especially tense last November in Tijuana, which along with Juarez, has borne the brunt of the caravans of illegal immigrants




Arrow Up

Tenfold increase in reported sexual assaults at British universities - but do the stats reflect reality?

St. Johns, Cambridge
© MJH Photobraphy / Shutterstock
The number of reported rapes and sexual assaults at British universities has risen tenfold in four years, new figures have shown.

In 2018 there were 626 alleged sex crimes at universities which provided statistics, up from 65 in 2014.

Over that period there have been nearly 2,000 cases of rape, sexual assault or harassment. Of those who provided figures, Cambridge, Birmingham and the University of East Anglia had the highest number, a Channel 4 News investigation found.

Campaigners say a culture of 'blackout drinking' is partly to blame for the growing numbers, and fear that the number of crimes that are reported may only be the 'tip of the iceberg', the Daily Telegraph reported.

Birmingham has queried the figures, saying there were only 14 'formal complaints relating to sexual assault' in the last five years.

Writing for the newspaper, Channel 4's Cathy Newman said many students felt unable to take their concerns to the police.

Comment: It's hard to take these statistics seriously, especially given the "concept creep" that has been taking place surrounding sexual harassment and assault, and rape in particular - a phenomenon also seen in hate crimes. If something similar is indeed going on, it's likely that sex crimes like rape are either similar in number to what they were in previous years, or declining. That doesn't mean that all rapes are being reported, or even that all actual rapes result in conviction, of course - just that a rise in reported crimes does NOT imply a rise in actual crimes being committed.


Stock Up

Allegedly surging hate crime statistics in the UK are overcooked - hate crime incidents are actually falling

hate crime sign protest
© T. Chick McClure on Unsplash
On August 27, 2016, a Polish man named Arkadiusz Jozwik was brutally murdered in the English town of Harlow in one of the most notorious of many racist hate crimes occurring around Britain's referendum on leaving the European Union.

On BBC News, experienced reporter Daniel Sandford said police thought the attack may have been racially motivated: "The fear is that this was a frenzied racist attack triggered by the Brexit referendum." In flagging up his report for BBC's Newsnight programme, John Sweeney, an experienced and respected investigative journalist, described the incident as "post-Brexit rage meets anti-social Britain."

Jakob Krupa, UK correspondent for the Polish Press Agency, followed up for the Guardian in an article entitled: "The killing of a Polish man exposes the reality of post-referendum racism." The New York Times joined other publications in reporting that Jozwik was attacked by a gang because he had been speaking Polish in public. Liberal-left commentators and their readers worked themselves up into a frenzy of anger and blame, with LBC Radio's James O'Brien saying that Brexit campaigners had "blood on their hands."

European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker piled in, saying in his annual address, "We Europeans can never accept Polish workers being harassed, beaten up or even murdered on the streets of Harlow." It became such big news in Poland that the government arranged to send its own police to the town in order to protect its citizens.

Except it wasn't true. When the case came to court, it emerged that Jozwik had approached a group of teenagers with a friend after a night of drinking, pushing some of them and apparently throwing the odd racist insult. When one of the youngsters, who was on bail at the time, got up and punched the burly Jozwik in response, he staggered, fell and cracked his head on the pavement. The 15-year old defendant was given three years and the case was consigned to the dustbin of history, with the BBC burying it on a local news page.

Light Sabers

German mission to Palestine caught liking 'anti-Israel' tweets, investigation launched

twitter
© Global Look Press / Ole Spata
The Twitter account of Christian Clages, head of the German mission to Palestine, was spotted liking posts deemed to be "anti-Israel" and even "anti-Semitic." A probe was launched, but the diplomat denies his involvement.

The suspicious activity on Clages' account was first spotted by German tabloid Bild on Thursday, triggering an internal investigation by the country's Foreign Ministry. The posts liked by the official account of the German Representative Office in the Palestinian territories included claims that Israel only "respects its own religious holidays," a video praising Palestinian women fighting Israeli soldiers...

... and even the well-recycled "crying Neymar" meme adapted to poke fun at Israeli soldiers, as well as other posts by Twitter users who blamed Zionists for various things and compared Israel to a totalitarian state.

Magnify

Meet the dead droppers - reckless pawns in Russia's drug war who last just weeks on the streets

Russia's drug police
© Russian Interior MinistryRussia's drug police arrest a suspected heroin dealer
Petr says police got him before he finished his first dead drop. His story isn't rare: among Russia's 'dead droppers', the couriers trying to get rich quick by hiding drugs in caches, those who make it to 6 months are called vets.

It's October 2017, and Petr is a 19-year-old second-year language student in Izhevsk, the home of the Kalashnikov rifle, from a middle class family. Two years later, his mother, an economist, will show RT his untouched room inside the family apartment - Russian New Wave posters on the wall, PC on his desk, barbells on the floor.

To become an independent adult, Petr needs money. He has a girlfriend now, together they want to rent a place of their own. Job offers he gets after posting his resume online offer $200 a month max for full-time work as a freight handler or on a building site. KFC already rejected his application.

Nuke

Idaho advances plan to build first small US nuclear reactors

small nuclear reactor
A mock nuclear reactor at NuScale Power.
A plan to build the nation's first small modular nuclear reactors to produce commercial power is a step closer.

A Utah-based energy cooperative said Wednesday that it has sales contracts for enough carbon-free power to begin a license application process with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to build the reactors in eastern Idaho.

Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems already has agreements with the U.S. Department of Energy to build the reactors at the federal agency's 890-square-mile (2,300-square-kilometer) site that includes the Idaho National Laboratory.

A small modular nuclear reactor can produce about 60 megawatts, or enough to power more than 50,000 homes. The proposed project includes 12 small modular reactors.

The energy cooperative says it has carbon-free contracts for more than 150 megawatts. Its goal is to begin construction on the reactors in 2023.

Comment: Generation IV nuclear is the way of the future: clean, cheap, efficient, safe. With any luck, more states will follow suit!


Red Flag

Cartoonist slams Guardian for spiking illustration over 'anti-Semitism' concerns

Steve Bell
© RTCartoonist Steve Bell
Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell has written an angry email to staff after the newspaper declined to publish his latest cartoon, allegedly over worries about "anti-Semitism" and a possible "legal challenge."

In a leaked letter posted to Twitter by BuzzFeed journalist Mark Di Stefano, Bell refers to a "bizarre telephone conversation" he had - presumably with an editor - about his latest cartoon. Bell was told that the paper's lawyers "were concerned" about the cartoon, which features the Labour Party's deputy leader Tom Watson as a witchfinder on the hunt for "unholy anti-Semitic tropes," as well as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

One of the panels shows Netanyahu with two plush puppets he calls "Trumpy Wumpy" and "Bozzy Wozzy" - clearly referring to US President Donald Trump and current candidate for Tory leader and UK prime minister, Boris Johnson.

Cell Phone

Huawei getting most of its 5G contracts from Europe

huawei 5g
© Xinhua
Huawei, the world's largest telecommunications equipment vendor, said more than half of the contracts it has signed so far to supply next-generation 5G gear are with European operators.

Huawei has secured 50 5G commercial contracts globally, of which 28 were signed in Europe, Chen Lifang, president of the telecoms giants public affairs and communications department, said in Brussels on Thursday.

The Shenzhen-based company, which leads in global 5G equipment sales, did not disclose the names of its partners. Huawei's major competitors in network development, Finland's Nokia and Sweden's Ericsson, had secured 43 contracts and 22 contracts as of the end June, respectively. Huawei's crosstown rival, ZTE, has publicly announced 25 commercial deals.

Eye 1

Hundreds of child trafficking victims have been refused the right to stay in the UK

Immigration enforcement
Linh was 16 when she left a life of poverty and violence in Vietnam for England. Just weeks later, she was gang-raped by her traffickers.

The rape came to light only after a British doctor told her she had a sexually transmitted disease. "I was a virgin before I left Vietnam and I am not a virgin anymore" is the only way she could articulate to BuzzFeed News what happened when she became a domestic slave.

When the police arrested her at a Manchester nail salon in September 2017, Linh was relieved — she thought she was finally about to get help. The good news came eight months later: The UK authorities recognised her as a victim of modern slavery.

But days after her 18th birthday, the government that had pledged so loudly to help victims like Linh rejected her asylum claim and informed her that she would be sent back to the country of her traffickers.

"She's been gang-raped and brutalised, and you're now saying you're refusing her right to stay?" her foster father said. "The default is to reject. It is brutal for the children."

Comment: See also: Epstein case has the potential to be the biggest scandal in American history

More on child trafficking:




Mr. Potato

Berkeley's gender-neutral city code sponsor snubs Fox News appearance, calls Tucker Carlson a 'white supremacist goblin'

goblins tucker carlson
© Global Look Press /ZUMA Press/Gary Mitchell; AFP/ GETTY IMAGES / Chip SomomdevillaGoblins (Left) Tucker Carlson (Right)
The 23-year-old council member who spearheaded the removal of gender-specific words from the Berkeley city code has bragged about turning down an appearance on the Tucker Carlson show, labeling him a "white supremacist goblin."

Rigel Robinson, who was a co-sponsor of the ordinance to cross out such commonly used words as "manhole,""manpower" and "craftsmen" from the city's municipal code, and replace them with "maintenance hole," "human effort" and the medieval-sounding "artisans," has dramatically turned down an appearance on the Tucker Carlson Tonight show to discuss the fresh politically correct purge.

Robinson tweeted a screenshot of his email exchange with the show's booker, Chelsea Gilman, who asked him if he would like to go on air to give background on his initiative and speak about how it was received by the locals.


Comment: Robinson's email screenshot tweet is no longer available. Interesting . . . but he's happy to retweet others quoting him.


Comment: If Berkeley keeps electing people of this caliber, it's doomed.