Society's ChildS


Attention

Uganda: HIV positive women complain of forced sterilization at government hospitals

Yasin Kakande
Yahoo News
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 21:39 UTC
Ugandan mother
© ReutersA mother holds her baby at Kisenyi health centre in Uganda's capital Kampala April 10, 2015.
Ida, 29, was six months pregnant when she suddenly felt abdominal pains and went to a government hospital in Kampala.

Like all pregnant women in Uganda, she was tested for HIV as part of routine screening for the virus. She lost her baby and was then given the news that she was HIV-positive.

"I was in a lot of pain and the situation was bad. They told me they were going to clean my womb. They took me to the examination room and asked me how many children I had. I told them I had four," she said, recalling the events of 2008.

"They were using English. I did not understand what they were saying because I never studied English. They told me they were going to give me treatment. Later when I gained consciousness I saw a dressing on my belly, but because I was in great pain, I couldn't ask questions."
Read More...
Arrow Down

American values: Rapists set free while marijuana offenders get life sentences

Claire Bernish
The Free Thought Project
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 00:00 UTC
prison bars
© Adrees Latif / Reuters
Our so-called justice system makes a mockery of due process, couldn't care less about integrity, and victimizes those guilty of nonviolent crime — while releasing violent criminals to create actual victims in order to free up space to cage those who sell or possess a plant, even for medical reasons.

In perhaps the most striking example of justice upended, convicted rapist Brock Turner — who claimed of his victim in a police interview, "She seemed to enjoy it" — now walks free after serving just three of an abhorrently paltry six-month sentence for the violent crime.

Meanwhile, accounts like that of Jeff Mizanskey, who had been slated to die in jail after three exceedingly minor cannabis-related offenses earned a life sentence, top the headlines with alarming frequency.

Although outrage over Mizanskey's court-induced punishment ultimately earned a commutation by Missouri Governor Jay Nixon, 21 years of his life spent behind bars cannot be justified — no matter what erroneous propaganda the government shoves down our throats.

Mizanskey's automatically earned the life sentence as dictated by Missouri's three strikes law — the controversial penalty system whereby anyone convicted of a third felony reflexively earns an arbitrarily harsh sentence, generally a life term, depending on the state. His three offenses, according to Reason, "included selling a small amount of pot to a relative, possessing less than three ounces in his home, and driving a friend to a hotel to buy pot from an undercover officer."

Hardly the stuff of a career criminal hell-bent on violently victimizing the public.

Comment:


Read More...
2 + 2 = 4

Money for war, but not education: U.S. teachers resort to crowdfunding to supply their classrooms

Megan Trimble
Phys.org
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 00:00 UTC
teachers crowdfunding
© AP / Matt RourkeKindergarten school teacher, Shannon Raftery raised funds through crowdfunding to supplement the money she took out of each paycheck to pay for classroom supplies.
Paper? Pencils? Laptops? Robots? Teachers are increasingly relying on crowdfunding efforts to stock their classrooms with both the mundane and sometimes big-ticket items.

Contributions to education campaigns have climbed on GoFundMe and DonorsChoose, collectively, from just more than $31.2 million in 2010 to nearly $140 million in 2015, the do-it-yourself fundraising sites report. Both sites are on pace to eclipse that in 2016.

GoFundMe has collected $58 million in just the last 12 months, and DonorsChoose saw more than 50,000 campaigns live on the site for the first time this back-to-school season.

In her first year as an elementary school teacher in Kingman, Arizona, Shannon Raftery raised $340 through crowdfunding to supplement the money she took out of each paycheck to pay for classroom supplies. Now in Philadelphia, she's looking to raise $500 for her new kindergarten classroom at Roosevelt Elementary School.

She has a supportive principal, she said, but there is just not enough money in the notoriously cash-strapped Philadelphia district to equip her classroom the way she'd like.

Comment: While the defense budget balloons, cutbacks to school funding have forced teachers to provide items that used to be provided by school districts. Data from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found more than 30 states actually paid less per student in school funding in 2014 than they did in 2008. But none of this is surprising as the PTB have no interest in creating a generation of intelligent, creative problem solvers, but rather a compliant, brainwashed populace that won't question the established authorities.

Read More...
Info

'Forward' breaks an important story: Many leftwing Israelis are leaving the country

Philip Weiss
Mondoweiss
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 20:45 UTC
Mairav Zonszein
© Mairav Zonszein / Twitter
Yesterday the Forward ran an important piece, by Mairav Zonszein, saying that she and other leftwing Israelis are thinking of leaving the country, and many have left already:
Everywhere I turn these days, many of my peers have left, are leaving, are planning to leave or are talking about leaving. My family and I included. The reasons for leaving are always personal, and it's hard to point to a specific political trend. But the discourse around leaving is indicative of a real crisis in the Israeli left regarding the inability to effect change, and the increasing sense that our ideals are unwanted and that we are outnumbered. Not just at the polls, but at the family dinner table, too.
This is an important piece because it is news, and Zonszein is telling the truth, based on my own travels in Israel earlier this year: lots of left-leaning Jews are thinking of leaving. Two friends of mine have left, a Palestinian and a Jew, because they feel their idealistic hopes of coexistence have no place in Israel. Zonszein says the debate over emigration is raging on her Facebook page and on the Haaretz opinion pages. In January in New York, at a Haaretz photo exhibition, Chemi Shalev mentioned the discussions of emigration, and the immense social pressure against it. Five years ago Gideon Levy reported that more and more Israelis were seeking foreign passports, for fear of the society coming apart.
Read More...
Info

Merkel CDU party beaten into third place by anti-migrant AfD in local election


Sputnik
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 20:25 UTC
German Chancellor Angela Merkel
© AP Photo/ Markus Schreiber
German Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) slumped to third place after being edged out by the anti-migrant Alternative fuer Deutschland (AfD) in a regional election, an exit poll showed Sunday.

Some 1.33 million of eligible voters went to the polls on Sunday in the northeastern Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Merkel's home state, to elect a new government. The pre-election campaign was overshadowed by growing dissatisfaction with the federal open-arms policy on refugees.

Figures, published by the public broadcaster ARD shortly after the polling stations closed at 6 p.m. local time, showed the ruling Social Democrats (SPD) in the lead with 30.2 percent of votes, down from 35.6 at the previous polls in 2011.
Read More...
Heart - Black

Hundreds of refugee children have gone missing in UK during the last five years


RT
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 19:19 UTC
missing refugee children
© Ari Jalal / Reuters
Hundreds of children who came to the UK as refugees have gone missing, prompting fears that they are being sexually exploited or have been sold by human traffickers, according to government data revealed by The Independent.

UK authorities have no information about 360 refugee children, according to the figures obtained by the paper from the Home Office under the Freedom of Information Act.

A total number of 9,287 children have arrived to the UK as "unaccompanied minors" over the past five years. Eighty-one of the 360 vanished children have been missing for five years, a further 77 disappeared four years ago and 87 others disappeared off the radar three years ago.

Comment: Every step fraught with danger: Refugee children face beatings, rape and forced labor along with risk of drowning

Read More...
Heart - Black

Private security mercenaries pepper spray and sic dogs on Dakota Access Pipeline protesters

Claire Bernish
The Free Thought Project
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 17:16 UTC
Dakota access pipeline protest
A private security firm guarding the highly controversial construction of $3.8 billion oil pipeline turned mercenary on Saturday, unleashing vicious attack dogs against a sizable crowd of peaceful protesters — including women and children.

Members of the Standing Rock Sioux and at least 100 other Native American nations as well as activists and advocates peacefully chanted"water is life" while guards held dogs nearby to intimidate the crowd. Without warning, these security henchmen showered the demonstrators with pepper spray and released the dogs — at least six people were bitten, including a young child.

Called the Dakota Access Pipeline by those responsible for its construction — and an evil, immoral usurpation and exploitation by those who know better — the project is slated to span four states, stretching 1,172 miles, but threatens the reservation's water supply and would invade sacred land.

Comment: More on the protest:

Read More...
Handcuffs

Anyone dressed as a clown is subject to arrest after suspicious incidents in Greenville, SC


The Free Thought Project
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 17:00 UTC
Clown
© Jose Cabezas / Reuters
A South Carolina police chief says anyone dressed as a clown is subject to arrest following reports around the community of suspicious incidents involving people dressed as clowns, one of which concerned an alleged attempt to lure children into a forest.

During a news conference Thursday which addressed at least four recent reports of clown sightings around Greenville, South Carolina, Police Chief Ken Miller said that his department would begin enforcing a state law that bars anyone older than age 16 from publicly concealing their identity with items such as a mask for non-employment matters. He also cited a Greenville ordinance that prohibits "molesting, disturbing or following persons."

"It's illegal. It's dangerous. It's inappropriate, and it's creating community concern so it needs to stop," Miller said, according to Greenville Online.

Comment: See also:

Read More...
Eye 1

Orwell: New game desensitizes players to online spying and reporting on others to the state

Paul A. Philips
Activist Post
Sun, 04 Sep 2016 16:46 UTC
orwell game
There couldn't be a better example to highlight the extent to which governments are prepared to snoop on us than by a new computer game called Orwell. In this game you are invited to take on the role of a master surveillance officer, spying on citizens' online activities.

The game engages you in its claimed virtual state-of-the-art security, while using information retrieval and profiling on fictitious citizens. In so many words, promoters of the game say that as an international master surveillance officer you will need to have the ability to discern suspects through recognizing their suspicious online activities. The promo goes on to say that, "stakes are high and lives hang in the balance..." emphasizing you are needed to "make sure that the world is a safer place... "

Comment: This game has a dual purpose: sowing distrust among the populace, thereby decreasing the likelihood of organized resistance and self censorship (and the resultant decline in information sharing) for fear of reprisal from the state.

Read More...
Sheeple

'I'm here to listen': Trump to Detroit African American church congregation

John Wisely, Elisha Anderson and Kathleen Gray
USA Today
Sat, 03 Sep 2016 11:28 UTC
Trump
Still uncertain whether the Republican presidential candidate will address the predominately black congregation.
Donald Trump stuck to a prepared script during a service held Saturday at Great Faith Ministries Church in Detroit before a predominately African American congregation.

As the service began, Trump could be seen near the front of the church swaying to "What a Mighty God We Serve."

"This has been an amazing day for me," Trump said after taking the stage. He called the African American Christian community "one of God's greatest gifts to America" and said he was attending the religious service "to listen to your message — and I hope my presence here today will help your message reach new voices."

The GOP presidential candidate appeared at Great Faith Ministries with former Apprentice contestant Omarosa Manigualt and former Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson, a Detroit native.


Comment: Trump received a standing ovation at the church after concluding his speech with 1 John 4's "No one has ever seen God but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us." In what is becoming a pattern for the MSM, Reuters cut the feed for this video at an interesting moment:


See also: Race to the bottom: MSNBC tries to highlight Clinton accusing Trump of racism, plays fried chicken ad instead

Read More...