Society's ChildS


Mr. Potato

Author says trans women aren't women - because they've experienced male privelege

Ngozi Adichie
Ngozi Adichie
Feminist author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has found herself at the center of a controversy over gender identity after comments she made about transgender women during an interview, which can be viewed in the clip above, recently went viral.

Speaking earlier this week with the U.K.'s Channel 4, Adichie, who is promoting her new book Dear Ijeawele Or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions, said, "When people talk about, 'Are trans women women?' my feeling is trans women are trans women."

Her argument appears to stem from her idea that because many trans women have been assigned and raised male from birth until whatever point they decided to transition, she believes the male privilege they may have received fundamentally sets their experiences apart from those of cisgender women.

"I think the whole problem of gender in the world is about our experiences," she said. "It's not about how we wear our hair or whether we have a vagina or a penis. It's about the way the world treats us, and I think if you've lived in the world as a man with the privileges that the world accords to men and then sort of change gender, it's difficult for me to accept that then we can equate your experience with the experience of a woman who has lived from the beginning as a woman and who has not been accorded those privileges that men are."

Comment: Jordan Peterson's response pretty much sums it up:




Heart - Black

Toddlers locked in 'cell' covered in feces 'sadistic' father jailed

child turning away
© Michaela Begsteiger / www.globallookpress.com
A father has been jailed after his two toddlers were found locked in a "cell" bedroom covered in feces, sores and lice. The two children used only grunts to communicate.

Derbyshire Crown Court heard the children, aged two and three, were found in the bedroom by a social worker. They were dressed only in nappies and T-shirts, had lice infestations and had feces between their toes and in cuts on their hands and feet.

They also had sores on their bodies, blisters and reddening of their legs from being kept in a cold environment, the court was told.

The only word they knew was "car" and used grunts and "primal scream" noises to communicate.

Stop

Top EU court: Employers can ban wearing of visible religious symbols

women wearing berka
© Susan Baaghil / Reuters
The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has ruled that employers can ban staff from wearing visible religious symbols at work in the first case of its kind before the EU's top court.

The ECJ has ruled on the cases of two female employees in Belgium and in France, fired after they refused to remove their headscarves at work.

In the first case, a Belgian woman working as a receptionist for G4S Secure Solutions, which has a general ban on the wearing of visible religious or political symbols, was dismissed for refusing to remove her religious attire. In the second, a French IT consultant was also let go when she refused to take off the headscarf after a client complained.

"An internal rule of an undertaking which prohibits the visible wearing of any political, philosophical or religious sign does not constitute direct discrimination," the court said in a statement.

Comment: What about jewelry, for example? Would this apply to a crucifix necklace? Yes, if that's the company's policy. Is that such a horrible thing? Basically, European companies are allowed to prohibit their employees from wearing any "political, philosophical, or religious signs". In other words, if you don't like the dress code, don't work there. So if you're wearing a cross, tuck it inside your clothes. If you regularly wear a headscarf, take it off for work. Everyone makes compromises when they work for someone else. It's called life.


Pirates

Pirates in Somalia strike for first time in 5 years with freighter hijacking

pirates Somalia
© MOHAMED DAHIR / AFP
Pirates have hijacked an oil tanker off the coast of Somalia, the first commercial vessel hijacking since 2012. Somali officials say more than two dozen pirates have boarded a Sri Lankan flagged freighter off the northern coast.

'Aris 13' sent out a distress call Monday before its tracking system was turned off and its course was set for the port town of Alula. Pirates in the town confirmed they were expecting the ship, Reuters reported.

Sri Lanka's Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement on the hijack, stating that is "taking action to verify the alleged incident, and initial enquiries have revealed that while the vessel involved is not registered under a Sri Lankan flag, it has an eight-member Sri Lankan crew."

2 + 2 = 4

CBO finds 14mn Americans lose healthcare next year under 'Obamacare 2.0'

Obamacare Healthcare protest
© Mike Blake / Reuters
The Congressional Budget Office has some bad news for Republicans pushing repeal of Obamacare. While health insurance premiums and the federal deficit are projected to drop by 2026, about 24 million Americans would also lose coverage in that time.

The CBO, a nonpartisan federal agency created by Congress over four decades ago, released its analysisof the American Health Care Act (AHCA) on Monday, leaving the Trump administration and Republican leadership in the House and Senate on the defensive.

The legislation, introduced by House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) last Monday, would replace the Affordable Care Act, former President Barack Obama's 2010 signature health care reform bill better known as Obamacare. It faces unified opposition from Democrats, and a sizable group of more conservative Republicans have also criticized it as "Obamacare-lite."

Comment: Further reading: Obamacare 2.0: Big Pharma and the corruption of the Trump administration
The proposed replacement for Obamacare is being drafted by big pharma's representatives in politics: recipients of hundreds of thousands of dollars from pharma corporations, namely Paul Ryan (Speaker of the House) and Congressman Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif).

It's called the American Health Care Act (AHCA). We don't really get to see what is in it yet, but those vying for power have privileged access to ponder it before us citizens.

Ryan and McCarthy created the bill. They are respectively the 2 House of Representatives members with the closest financial ties to big pharma.



Map

Poland says 98yo Minnesota man was Nazi officer, demands extradition

Nazi
© Print Collector / Gettyimages.ru
Poland will seek the arrest and extradition of a Minnesota man after confirming he was a top commander of a Nazi-allied SS unit and suspected of ordering the burning of villages and the killing of Poles during World War II, according to a prosecutor.

Ample evidence gathered during years of investigation into US citizen Michael Karkoc, 98, confirmed "100 percent" that he was the commander of the Ukrainian Self Defense Legion, prosecutor Robert Janicki told AP. Karkoc reportedly went on to serve in the 14th Waffen-SS division "Galizien," a Nazi unit raised in Ukraine.

"He is our suspect as of today," Janicki said.

Heart - Black

Former cop and wife accused of torturing two teenage sons for months

Michael McIntosh and Jessica Cox
© Knox County Sheriff's officeMichael McIntosh and Jessica Cox
A married Tennessee couple allegedly tortured and starved the man's teenage sons for five months in 2013, People confirms.

The teens were 14 and 16 at the time of the alleged abuse, which took place in their trailer home, according to the Knoxville News Sentinel.

Jessica Cox, the boys' stepmother, is currently on trial in a Knox County courtroom on multiple charges including aggravated child abuse, a court official tells People.

The boys' father, Michael McIntosh, a former police officer, already pleaded guilty to 15 counts of aggravated child abuse. As part of his plea deal, he will testify against Cox, the official says.

During the testimony of the older son, now 20, prosecutors showed photos of his body taken after he and his brother allegedly escaped the home, the official confirms. Prosecutors also showed permanent scars allegedly left by the abuse, according to the official.

Arrow Down

Is the reduction of empowerment to a marketing strategy a welcome development?

Woman headscarf
© Beawiharta/ReutersPairing the veil with parading and cat-walking is, at its foremost, the reduction of female form to an aesthetic object, writes Zakaria.
Two weeks ago it was running shoes. Nike, the shoe manufacturer whose logo is a fixture in the global consumer imagination, released an online advertisement that features a woman in a headscarf running through the old neighborhoods of Dubai. Sweaty female boxers and fencers follow until the adrenaline-infused montage wraps up with the hopeful - if cliched - image of a little girl.

Where advertisers lead, magazines follow, and a week after the Nike commercial, the soon-to-be-launched Vogue Arabia released its cover image. Featuring the model Gigi Hadid, made-up face partially obscured by a heavily embroidered face veil, it was touted by the editor-in-chief as communicating "a thousand words to a region that's been waiting far too long for its Vogue voice." Hadid's bare arm lurks in the shadows.

Today marks the commemoration of International Women's Day, celebrated around the world for more than 100 years, every March 8.

For those Muslim women who have not been waiting for their "vogue voice" or Nike shoes to speak or run, it is also a good time to ask some pointed questions.

Is the reduction of empowerment to a marketing strategy a welcome development? What stance should Muslim feminists take to such representations of Muslim women?

Syringe

NYC Police Commissioner: Most heroin entering US is 'coming from Mexico'

heroin
© AP Photo/ Damian Dovarganes
Mexico is the predominant source of heroin that is trafficked into the United States, with some of the drug originating in Asia, New York City Police Commissioner James O'Neill stated in a press conference on Monday. O'Neill also noted that besides Mexico, some of the heroin smuggled into the United States is coming from Asia.

"Most of the heroin is coming from Mexico," O'Neill said during the launching of a new city-wide initiative to combat the opioid epidemic. The commissioner explained heroin is smuggled in different ways — by boat, over the border, through tractor trailers and in airplanes.

Sheriff

Nashville, Tennessee police training textbook names threats: 'KKK, minorities and kids left in daycare'

Tactical Edge police training manual
© Tony Gonzalez/WPLNOn day one of training, every new recruit in the Nashville Police Academy is issued a stack of reading materials. Right on the top is Tactical Edge, a textbook dedicated to high risk patrol.
On the first day of training, every new recruit in the Nashville Police Academy is issued a stack of reading materials. Right on the top is Tactical Edge, a textbook dedicated to high risk patrol.

The dedication page reads: "For those officers who want to win." The book, written by former journalist Charles Remsberg, was published in 1986. With gritty black and white photographs and tabloid-esque writing, it depicts a world of constant and increased threat. And it prescribes an aggressive approach to policing at a time when Nashville's department, and many around the country, are trying to move the other way.

The Metro Nashville Police Department says the most contentious material in the book is not taught. But some policing experts say the entire book, with its 31-year-old statistics and racially charged undertones, has no place in today's law enforcement training.

"It's important for people know going through the academy that this is a dangerous job they're getting into, but the first images in the book are of dead police officers," says Matthew Barge, the co-director of the Police Assessment Resource Center, which helps departments across the country on reform initiatives. He's referencing the black-and-white photo of five dead officers on page one of the introduction. It's followed by pictures of black men in prison and a teenager jumping on a police car.