Society's ChildS


2 + 2 = 4

Deranged racist professor resigns one year after tweeting "All I want for Christmas is white genocide"

Timothy Meads
Townhall
Sat, 30 Dec 2017 20:44 UTC
white genocide
Campus Reform reports that the controversial Drexel professor who tweeted last year on Christmas Eve "All I Want for Christmas is White Genocide" has left the university. His abrupt resignation comes after what he says was a year of "prolonged harassment by right-wing white supremacist media outlets and internet mobs."

Political science and global studies professor George Ciccariello-Maher announced via Facebook that he would be resigning in order to continue "to support and work with (students) informally, whether in reading groups, in the streets, or both" so that he can battle against the so called "Right and White Supremacists" with the "establishment of the Campus Antifascist Network."
"After December 31st 2017, I will no longer work at Drexel University. This is not a decision I take lightly; however, after nearly a year of prolonged harassment by right-wing white supremacist media outlets and internet mobs...my situation has grown unsustainable," he wrote. "Staying at Drexel in the eye of this storm has become detrimental to my own writing, speaking, and organizing."
Adding,
"We are at war, and academia is a crucial front in that war. This is why the Right is targeting campuses with thinly veiled provocations disguised as free speech. My case and many others show just how cynical such appeals are, and how little the Right cares about academic freedom. They will continue to attack me and many others, but from these attacks new unities spring dialectically forth: an upsurge in new AAUP chapters and the establishment of the Campus Antifascist Network (CAN), among others."
He left his readers with a call to action.
"In the face of aggression from the racist Right and impending global catastrophe, we must defend our universities, our students, and ourselves by defending the most vulnerable among us and by making our campuses unsafe spaces for white supremacists."
Ciccariello-Maher does not mention what these "attacks" entail and neglects to mention that his Christmas Eve 2016 tweet was not the only controversial thing that he has said over the past year.

Comment: Good riddance. Ciccariello got off lightly by resigning. Just imagine the fallout if he would have called for "black genocide", "Jewish genocide", or claimed that "blackness" is what causes a disproportionate amount of crime in the U.S. The man is ideologically possessed and should not be around young people.

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Heart - Black

Lawsuit filed against New Jersey cops filmed attacking an innocent man fleeing from a burning car

Matt Agorist
The Free Thought Project
Sat, 30 Dec 2017 20:39 UTC
police assault
A high-speed chase in Jersey City ended when the car police were chasing crashed, turned another man's car into a ball of flames. But it's the chaotic insanity which followed the crash and the fire that has now resulted in the indictment of several Jersey City police officers and a massive lawsuit against the city and the department.

The innocent victim of gross police negligence and brutality, Miguel Feliz, has filed a $25 million claim against Jersey city and its police department for excessive force used on him in the June 4th incident. Feliz has been unable to return to work since police caused his car to be set on fire, in turn, setting Feliz on fire, and then brutally attacking him.

As TFTP reported last month, the group of New Jersey police officers involved have been indicted, including two for attempted murder, after they were caught on camera kicking Feliz as he crawled from the burning wreckage of a crash involving the pursuit of Leo Pinkston.

The officers face a slew of charges each:
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Ambulance

Two more dead in Iran protests - death toll now 12


Al Jazeera
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 20:23 UTC
Tehran Iran protests Dec 2017
© ReutersPeople protest in Tehran, Iran December 30, 2017
At least 12 people have been killed in Iran, according to local news media reports, as anti-government demonstrations continued across the country for a fourth night.

Thousands have engaged in protests since the first rallies against the high cost of living on December 28, marking the biggest show of dissent in Iran since huge rallies took place in 2009.

State TV reported on Monday that 10 people were killed in several cities on Sunday, and showed footage of damage allegedly caused by protesters.

The report did not provide further details about the deaths.

Local media reports said that of those who died, six were killed in Twiserkan, in Hamedan province, and three others in Shahin Shahr, in Esfahan province.

Another person was killed in Izeh, while two others died in Dorud, in western Iran, late on Saturday.

Comment: The protests don't appear to have been fully coordinated. Rather, it appears as though several economic protests have been hijacked by a small minority with political demands. Remind you of anything? Libya, Syria...

See also:

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Sherlock

Amtrak derailment investigation gets even stranger - few details, rumors of poor training procedures

Russell G. Quimby
The Hill
Sun, 31 Dec 2017 20:18 UTC
Amtrak derailment washington state
Amtrak passenger train #501, derailed near DuPont, WA
As a retired National Transportation Safety Board railroad and rapid transit accident investigator, the more I hear about the Dec. 18 derailment of Washington state Sound Transit Cascades Train 501, the stranger it gets. Confirmed "facts" seem to be very few so far.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the accident, which killed three people and injured more than 50 others, and is still trying to determine the probable cause and prevent such accidents in the future.

People have an innate need to know, particularly with unexpected public transportation accidents as part of their own sense of security and trust. The sooner we know, the better.

But we could be waiting a while before we hear from the safety board about what led to the derailment. The length of time the safety board has taken to produce "the facts," let alone a public report, has greatly lengthened over the past two decades, mostly due to safety board management.

An accident investigation has gone from nine months to over two years for a "major" investigation such as this accident. The prolonged process has been sold to Congress and to the public as a way to produce more thorough reports and recommendations, although the success of these efforts is debatable. In the interim, the public is left guessing.

Comment: See also:

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Blue Planet

Andre Vltchek: New Year's message and warning from a journalist who sees two parallel realities

Andre Vltchek
Dissident Voice
Fri, 29 Dec 2017 00:00 UTC
Andre Vltchek
Author at Goma War Zone, DRC, 2009
Sometimes it is useful to take a break from news bulletins and newspapers, and even from 'friendly' Internet publications.

Occasionally it is good to realize that there are actually two parallel realities that are constantly competing for the 'hearts and minds' of people living all over the world. There is real life and 'fake life'. There is reality and elaborately manufactured pseudo-reality, which is designed to appear more real than the reality itself. It is like that chemically produced green apple shampoo that smells more authentic than the fruit itself.

Periodically I disappear into some jungle or a war zone, in Afghanistan, Southern Philippines or in the middle of plundered Borneo Island. When I return to what some people would readily describe as the 'normal world', and a news bulletin unexpectedly confronts me at some airport lounge, everything suddenly appears to be bizarre, grotesque, totally surreal, at least for the few initial but excruciating moments.

It is because most of the mainstream news communiqués and analyses are produced in the plush comfort of an armchair, or at a mahogany writing table, thousands of miles from shrapnel, sweat, torn flesh, blood, burning forests, polluted waterways, and the other horrors which are, in fact, nothing other than the true reality for billions of human beings inhabiting our planet.
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Star of David

Good Lorde! Washington Post ad criticizes the singer Lorde for cancelling a gig in Tel Aviv: "21 is young to become a bigot"

Tim Hayward
Tim Hayward Wordpress
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 00:00 UTC
Lorde cancels Tel Aviv concert
© Reuters/Dylan MartinezNew Zealand singer Lorde announced on December 24 she will not be performing in Tel Aviv in 2018.
A full-page advert carried in the Washington Post criticises the singer Lorde for cancelling a gig in Tel Aviv. While always ready to sympathise with disappointed fans - anywhere - this seems a bit of an overreaction.

Of course, the ad was not in fact sponsored by an overwrought fanclub. Nor is it just about the singer. Its headline announces 'Lord and New Zealand Ignore Syria to Attack Israel'.

An act of national aggression against a state is alleged!

Comment: Pink Floyd's Roger Waters calls on all musicians to boycott Israel

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Holly

'Happy New Year!' 2018 brings legal recreational marijuana to California


RT
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 17:38 UTC
Marijuana
© Stefan Auth / Global Look Press
Californians woke up on Monday to a stimulating New Year's gift: legal recreational cannabis. The state is set to become the world's largest regulated, commercial market of recreational marijuana.

Over two decades after California legalized the medical use of marijuana, America's most populous state joins Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Alaska, and Nevada to grant stores licenses for selling recreational pot to adults 21 or older.

Under Proposition 64, which passed in November 2016, Californians can also legally grow up to six plants for personal use and possess as much as one ounce.

Tax revenues from sales of cannabis are expected to generate at least one billion a year, according to Reuters. More than one in five Americans will now reside in states allowing the purchase of recreational marijuana, though the federal government still designates it as a controlled substance equivalent in status to heroin or LSD.

Comment: See also: California legalizes Cannabis giving hope to 500,000 convicted during prohibition


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Stop

'We won't take part in occupation': Dozens of Israeli teens send letter to Netanyahu, refuse to enlist in IDF

Yaniv Kubovich
Haaretz
Fri, 28 Dec 2018 10:29 UTC
IDF refuseniks
© rami shloshIDF refuseniks protest in Haifa in 2014
'The army is carrying out the government's racist policy that violates basic human rights,' 63 teens write to Netanyahu and Israeli military chief Gadi Eisenkot

A group of 63 teens have publicly declared they will refuse to be drafted into the Israel army, Yedioth Ahronoth reported on Thursday morning.

"We have decided not to take part in the occupation and oppression of the Palestinian people," they wrote in a letter sent to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot and the defense and education ministers. "The 'temporary' situation has dragged on for 50 years, and we will not go on lending a hand."

Comment: In a country so utterly ponerized by racism and the institutionalized oppression of Palestinians it is heartening to see such a display of conscience - in the face of possible government retaliation no less. Over the past few years there have been a number of such responses among various parts of Israeli society; each lending others the strength and conviction to speak out against policies that are ultimately destructive to ALL involved.

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No Entry

German social media censorship now in full effect, enforcement begins in 2018


BBC
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 15:47 UTC
Facebook NetzDG
© Getty ImagesFacebook is one of the social media companies affected by NetzDG
Germany is set to start enforcing a law that demands social media sites move quickly to remove hate speech, fake news and illegal material.

Sites that do not remove "obviously illegal" posts could face fines of up to 50m euro (£44.3m).

The law gives the networks 24 hours to act after they have been told about law-breaking material.

Social networks and media sites with more than two million members will fall under the law's provisions.

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube will be the law's main focus but it is also likely to be applied to Reddit, Tumblr and Russian social network VK. Other sites such as Vimeo and Flickr could also be caught up in its provisions.

Act faster

The Netzwerkdurchsetzungsgesetz (NetzDG) law was passed at the end of June 2017 and came into force in early October.

The social networks were given until the end of 2017 to prepare themselves for the arrival of NetzDG.

The call to police social media sites more effectively arose after several high-profile cases in which fake news and racist material was being spread via the German arms of prominent social media firms.

Comment: The problem with these kinds of hate speech laws is the vague wording which allow almost anything to be interpreted as hate speech. It follows that content critical of the official narrative will be the first to be considered as such. By forcing these companies to remove content on the basis of a user complaint with no chance to investigate will only lead to further censorship. If you think things are bad now, these kinds of draconian measures will make it worse. See also:

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Eye 1

German broadcaster ARD under fire after initially refusing coverage of stabbing of teen girl with refugee as suspect


RT
Mon, 01 Jan 2018 12:46 UTC
Refugees
© Fabrizio Bensch / ReutersMigrants enter a new temporary refugee camp set-up at at Berlin's fairground 'Messe Berlin' in Berlin, Germany.
German public broadcaster ARD is under fire online for its coverage of a crime by a refugee suspect. The channel would not immediately report last week's fatal stabbing of a teen girl in the town of Kandel.

The stabbing was an apparent crime of passion. A refugee from Afghanistan is suspected of killing his German ex-girlfriend after a bad breakup. The crime happened two weeks after the girl's family complained to the police about the Afghan, who, they said, threatened and harassed her online and on the phone after she ended the relationship.

The story received nationwide coverage in Germany, but some outlets seemed reluctant to report it. In particular, public service broadcaster ARD initially refused to report the crime after the news broke on Thursday.

Marcus Bornheim, a deputy editor-in-chief for ARD's newsroom, said the story was not promptly reported on the TV news program Tagesschau because it was about a crime of passion that involved minors. In a Facebook post, he denied claims that the broadcaster was trying to somehow suppress the story, stressing that the regional branch of ARD, the SWR Fernsehen, did report the story. He later added that the 8pm news broadcast would have a short report on the crime.

Comment: See also: Several arrested for suspected sexual assault in Berlin and Cologne during New Year's Eve festivities

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