Society's ChildS


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Homosexuality is illegal in 14 U.S. states - It's legal in Russia

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A surprising number of states still have anti-sodomy laws on the books, nearly a decade after the Supreme Court ruled such laws unconstitutional.

Up until March, Virginia was the 14th state to maintain the federally unconstitutional legislation. The state's "Crimes Against Nature" statute, which outlaws sodomy between consenting adults, was struck down last month after judges found it contradicted the 2003 Supreme Court ruling in Lawrence v. Texas.

Now the state of Virginia, led by Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli, has appealed to the 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Richmond, asking the court to allow the statute to stand so he can prosecute a 47-year-old man who solicited a 17-year-old for oral sex.

Comment: Meanwhile, in Russia:
On May 27, 1993, homosexual acts between consenting males were decriminalized.
There you have it: legal in Russia, illegal in the USA.

Any questions?


Attention

UK 13-year-old defies 'big brother' and refuses to be fingerprinted

Melody_3
© KristieMelody, 13, protesting the United Kingdom's policy of obtaining biometric data from minors at school.

Cardiff - Since 2012, over 800,000 children have had their biometric data taken by the government in the United Kingdom via the school system. One 13-year-old girl is refusing to comply with the demands.

In 31% of cases, the programs obtaining fingerprints or other biometric data from minors across the UK have done so without parental consent, according to Big Brother Watch. The civil liberties watchdog filed Freedom of Information Requests with over 3,000 schools. Less than half of those schools responded as required by law.

The watchdog's report states:
As we are now one term into the 2013-14 academic year, and expect the number of schools using the technology to have increased over the summer, and the secondary school population now above 3.2 million, if the number of secondary schools using biometric technology increased from 25% to 30%, more than one million children would be fingerprinted
A 13-year-old student at a school in Wales refused to submit to the data collection. Melody, whose last name is being withheld due to her age, doubted the school's good intentions when it was declared that fingerprints were going to be collected from students in order to shorten lines in the cafeteria.

A simple act of defiance was not enough for Melody, who discussed her idea for a one-person protest with her mother, Kirstie, over dinner. Her mother signed a form stating that she did not give consent for her daughter to be fingerprinted.

Bullseye

UK citizens fed up: Environment Agency boss heckled, attacked by MP

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© SWNSLord Smith visiting flooded areas of Somerset today
Environment agency head Lord Smith was branded a "little git" today by a Tory MP as he visited flood-stricken Somerset Levels - but has vowed not to step down.

Lord Smith was given a hostile reception as he made his first trip to the area since it was hit by floodwaters.

One victim of the floods said he was "bloody mad" that Lord Smith had refused to apologise for the Environment Agency's decision not to dredge the rivers on the Levels - an action which it has been agued may have reduced flooding.

Tory MP Ian Liddell-Grainger, who represents Bridgwater and West Somerset, branded Lord Smith a "coward" for not notifying him of his visit.

Water

North Carolina DOT preparing roads for winter storm

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© WSOCDOT prepares for winter storm.
North Carolina Department of Transportation crews were back on the roads early Monday morning, preparing them for the snow that is expected to fall in the coming days. They already treated some of the major roads Sunday.

Crews will be gassing up trucks and heading out on the roads all morning to pour more brine.

An NCDOT spokesperson said they have replenished their salt supply and are ready to go. Meanwhile, as people are re-stocking ahead of the winter storm, they said supplies are hard to find.

"If it gets bad, I'm just going to stay indoors because the traffic will be horrible," LaToya Patterson said.

Patterson spent her Sunday getting supplies for the storm.

"Last time I was out without a shovel, and now I have a shovel," Patterson said. "So now the only problem is finding salt."

At the Lowe's on Perimeter Parkway, shovels, generators, and gloves were laid out for customers, but salt was nowhere to be found. The store ran out after the last winter storm, and since this storm is happening so soon after, Lowe's hasn't been able to restock.

Bulb

Give parents power to oust teachers?

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© Thomas Trutschel/Getty ImagesEd Miliband wants to create a schools improvement team that will work separately from Ofsted.
Proposed public service overhaul includes education hit squads to boost performance of failing schools or teachers

Parents are to be given a new power to call in a specialist team to boost the performance of failing schools or teachers, under a set of wide-ranging public service reform plans to be laid out on Monday by the Labour leader, Ed Miliband.

The improvement team, working separately from Ofsted, will have powers to set out school improvement plans, order greater collaboration between schools or even remove failing headteachers. The body would have powers to intervene with academies, free schools and community schools.

Miliband has been relatively quiet on reform of schools, hospitals and local government, but will say on Monday he wants to usher in "a new culture of people-powered public services".

Writing in the Guardian, before delivering the annual Hugo Young lecture on Monday night, Miliband concedes: "I meet as many people coming to me frustrated by the unresponsive state as the untamed market. And the causes of the frustrations are often the same in the private and public sector: unaccountable power with the individual left powerless to act."

He will claim he is just as determined to tackle unaccountable power in the public sector as he has already shown himself to be in relation to the private sector.

Heart - Black

Barbarians! Shameful! Marius the giraffe killed and dissected at Copenhagen zoo despite worldwide protests

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Young giraffe unsuitable for breeding was shot, dissected in public and then fed to lions despite offers of a new home

In the chilly dawn of Sunday morning a healthy young giraffe in a Danish zoo was given its favourite meal of rye bread by a keeper - and then shot in the head by a vet.

The death of Marius, an 18-month-old giraffe considered useless for breeding because his genes were too common, was followed by his dissection in front of a large crowd, including fascinated-looking children, prompting outrage and protests around the world.

Copenhagen zoo carried out the killing despite a small group of protesters at the gates and an international petition which garnered more than 27,000 signatures, as well as offers from several zoos to rehouse the creature. Yorkshire Wildlife Park, near Doncaster, which offered to take Marius, said it was saddened to learn of his fate.

The zoo's decision to conduct the public dissection, and the disclosure that the animal was shot rather than being killed by lethal injection so that it could be fed to the carnivores, fanned the protests and provoked some calls for the zoo to be boycotted or closed. The controversy was fed further by startling images and video of the process, including a picture of a large chunk of meat with an unmistakably spotty hide being fed to the lions.

Bengt Holst, the zoo's scientific director, said he had never considered cancelling the killing, despite the protests. "We have been very steadfast because we know we've made this decision on a factual and proper basis. We can't all of a sudden change to something we know is worse because of some emotional events happening around us.

Display

TV propaganda and the mind control culture

"Almost all people are hypnotics. The proper authority saw to it that the proper belief should be induced, and the people believed properly." ― Charles Fort
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© Batr Org
Few subjects present an undisputable window into modern society than the electronic version of reality that is dispensed through television broadcasts. This technology does not require interactive skills or critical thinking acumen. Just watch and fall into a daydream trance. TV is the stealth killer that penetrates 114.7 million American households. According to Nielsen, the 2012 Universe Estimate (UE), reflects a reduction in the estimated percent of U.S. homes with a television set (TV penetration), which declined to 96.7 percent from 98.9 percent. Should this turn down suggest promise or is it merely a result of internet substitution?

With the proliferation of cable channels and 24 hour programming, the landscape of TV addiction vastly impacts perception and dramatically excludes normal interpersonal relations. Melissa Melton cites the following in her article, TV: Your Mind. Controlled.
"According to last year's Nielsen report, the average American over the age of two years old watches more than 34 hours of television per week, plus at least three more hours of taped programming. The report also noted that the amount of time we spend watching television increases as we get older."
This overwhelming intrusion into and over personal time and space are often called entertainment. Broadcasts that bill themselves as news or business shows claim to provide useful information. Sport coverage makes no pretense of presenting socially significant content. Yet, vast segments of the public are wrapped up in the childish exercise of false hero adoration.

V

One killed as South Africa's miners go on strike again

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A union steward was killed in a clash with police at an Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) mine in South Africa, where workers were holding a strike to press for higher wages, the company said on Saturday.

The world's biggest platinum producer said the worker, a member of the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU), was killed in a "violent outbreak" when police tried to clear a barricaded road leading to the company's Union mine in the northern Limpopo province.

It did not provide further details and Limpopo police could not be reached for comment.

Syringe

New York Palisades Mall warning: Shoppers exposed to measles

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© NBCShoppers who were at the AT&T store or the Best Buy at the Palisades Center Mall on Sunday may have been exposed. Brynn Gingras reports.
Shoppers at a New York mall, particularly those at an AT&T store and a Best Buy, were possibly exposed to measles, a county health department warned Friday.

A case of measles has been identified in Rockland County, and anyone at the Palisades Center Mall on Sunday between 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. could have been exposed, the county Department of Health said.

The health department said people who shopped on the first floor of the mall and at those two electronics stores are at the greatest risk of exposure.

It's a painful, contagious disease that many people mistake for the common cold.

Despite news of the measles case, the parking lot at Palisades Mall was packed Friday night. One shopper who contracted it 25 years ago called it "scary."

"No one should have to go through it," said Leanne O'Brien of Newburgh.

Bruce Pratt of Munsie also had the measles decades ago and still remembers the pain it caused.

"I had a cold, rash on my stomach and little spots, and you cough a lot," he said.

Health

Somerset UK: Floodwater contains 60 times the amount of safe bacteria - epidemics may follow weather woes

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© PATests found samples contained 60,000 to 70,000 bacteria per 100 millilitres.
Health fears are growing after floodwater in Somerset has been found to contain 60 times the amount of safe bacteria for agricultural water.

Tests found samples contained 60,000 to 70,000 bacteria per 100 millilitres.

The World Health Organisation says agricultural water should have no more than 1,000 bacteria per 100 millilitres.

The safe level for bath water is capped at just 500 bacteria per 100 millilitres.

The research was commissioned by Sky News and carried out on Thursday by Microbiologist Nathaniel Storey from the University of Reading.

There is so sign of the weather letting up, as Flood-hit communities have been warned to be on their guard as high tides and gale-force winds could send water levels rising even further.

The Environment Agency has especially warned those living in parts of south-west England and the Midlands to take care as it issued nine severe flood warnings - meaning there is a danger to life - for the Cornwall and North Devon coasts and the River Severn, south of Gloucester.