Society's Child

Transfer of Venezuelan embassy in US to 'fake government' would be an 'act of war' - Max Blumenthal

RT
Wed, 15 May 2019 18:10 UTC

The US risks setting the stage for war if peace activists are evicted from the Venezuelan embassy in Washington and representatives of US-backed Juan Guaido move in, investigative journalist Max Blumenthal told RT.

"It could be considered an act of war for them [US authorities] to allow the parallel government, which is unrecognized, which controls no institutions of government and is essentially a fake government" to take over the diplomatic premises, Blumenthal told RT after US authorities tried to raid and evict the so-called 'Embassy Civilian Protection Collective' on Monday, before allowing activists to stay.

If the US tracks on this embassy, which is sovereign Venezuelan territory under international law, it is an act of war that could potentially be reciprocated against.

Russian journalist remains in Ukrainian jail under bogus treason charges - one year ongoing

RT
Wed, 15 May 2019 13:24 UTC

Exactly a year ago the head of RIA Novosti's Ukraine branch was snatched in Kiev and put in jail under a charge of high treason. Western champions of media rights have shown spectacular will to ignore the scandalous case.

Being a journalist in a nation where the government can put you in jail for unfavorable reporting is understandably risky, but at least one can hope to find international support after getting into trouble. Foreign governments and international organizations would cry foul and try to pressure the persecutors.

Well, Kirill Vyshinsky didn't get this response. On March 15, 2018 he was arrested by agents of the SBU, Ukraine's powerful national security agency, and charged with treason. Vyshinsky holds both Russian and Ukraine passports. His alleged crime was that he waged "information warfare" against Ukraine, or at least that's what the SBU said at the time. The accusation may result in a 15 year jail term.

Comment: See also:

38 arrested in Rotherham, UK, as police probe child sex abuse and exploitation on claims of 13 victims

Richard Spillett
Daily Mail
Wed, 08 May 2019 05:49 UTC

Detectives investigating child sexual exploitation in Rotherham have arrested 40 people over the past two months. The 38 men and two women were questioned following allegations made by 13 victims about sexual abuse against them between 1997 and 2015.

The National Crime Agency said the people arrested are aged between 29 and 53 and are from Sheffield, Rotherham, Leeds, Dewsbury, and Maidstone in Kent. All have been bailed or released under investigation pending further inquiries. The spokeswoman said the victims in the latest cases were aged between 11 and 26 at the time of the alleged offences.

The National Crime Agency, often called 'Britain's FBI', is conducting a huge investigation after a 2014 report found more than 1,000 young girls had been abused in the South Yorkshire town. Scandals have since engulfed other towns and cities, including Newcastle, Telford and most recently Huddersfield, with a series of similar gangs jailed.

Vulnerable young victims were typically given drugs and alcohol before being passed around between men of Pakistani heritage to be raped and sexually assaulted at will. Authorities did little to tackle the abusers or save their young victims from their terrible ordeals, often due to fears over being labelled racist.

The latest arrests are part of the ongoing Operation Stovewood investigation.

Towards the end of 2018, the NCA said it had 151 designated suspects, 275 other people under investigation and 296 female survivors of exploitation actively engaging with officers.

Alabama's state senate passes bill banning nearly all abortions

NPR
Wed, 15 May 2019 03:04 UTC

The Alabama Senate has passed an abortion ban that would be one of the most restrictive in the United States. The bill would make it a crime for doctors to perform abortions at any stage of a pregnancy unless a woman's life is threatened or in case of lethal fetal anomaly.

The Alabama Senate passed a bill Tuesday evening to ban nearly all abortions. The state House had already overwhelmingly approved the legislation. It's part of a broader anti-abortion strategy to prompt the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider the right to abortion.

It would be one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the United States. The bill would make it a crime for doctors to perform abortions at any stage of a pregnancy, unless a woman's life is threatened or in case of a lethal fetal anomaly.

The vote was 25-6, with one abstention.

Doctors in the state would face felony jail time up to 99 years if convicted. But a woman would not be held criminally liable for having an abortion.

There are no exceptions in the bill for cases of rape or incest, and that was a sticking point when the Alabama Senate first tried to debate the measure last Thursday. The Republican-majority chamber adjourned in dramatic fashion when leaders tried to strip a committee amendment that would have added an exception for cases of rape or incest.

Comment:

Police release footage of elderly man being shoved off city bus, passenger facing murder charge

KSNV News
Tue, 14 May 2019 18:00 UTC

© Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department
The surveillance video shows Bishop allegedly push Fournier out of the door of the stopped bus.

The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department has released video of a woman, identified by police as 25-year-old Cadesha Bishop, pushing an elderly man off a bus in Las Vegas.

Witnesses say the victim had been asking Bishop to be nicer to the passengers before being pushed out the doors and onto the ground.

The incident took place on March 21, 2019.

The victim, identified as 74-year-old Serge Fournier, was left hospitalized. He reportedly died from his injuries on April 23.

Malaysian teen commits suicide after followers encouraged her death in Instagram poll

Reuters
Wed, 15 May 2019 17:40 UTC

Malaysian police are investigating the case of a teenager believed to have jumped to her death after asking her social media followers to vote on whether she should kill herself.

The 16-year-old girl, who was not named, had run a poll on photo-sharing app Instagram with the question "Really Important, Help Me Choose D/L", hours before jumping off the roof of a building in Sarawak, on Malaysia's east, on Monday, district police chief Aidil Bolhassan told Reuters.

The 'D/L' meant 'Death/Life', and the poll had showed 69% of the girl's followers chose 'D', he said.

Ethiopian garment industry workers paid lowest wages in the world by company that owns Guess and Tommy Hilfiger brands

teleSUR
Tue, 14 May 2019 17:20 UTC

© Reuters
Workers sew clothes inside the Indochine Apparel PLC textile factory in Hawassa Industrial Park in Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples region, Ethiopia November 17, 2017.

With a monthly salary of US$26, Ethiopia has the lowest wages for garment industry workers in the world, as the East African nation aims to become the next manufacturing hub for the fashion industry, according to a new study from New York University's Stern Center for Business and Human Rights.

The report, "Made in Ethiopia: Challenges in the Garment Industry's New Frontier," reveals that the African country's bid has come at the expense of workers exploitation, something former Ethiopian Prime Minister, Hailemariam Desalegn, was aware of but described as a "generational sacrifice" in order to develop the national industry.

In the investigation, the authors focused on the Hawassa industrial park, about 225 km south of Addis Ababa, the country's capital. Established by the government in 2015, it currently employs about 25,000 workers producing clothes for international labels such as Levi's, Guess, Izod, Tommy Hilfiger, H&M, most of them belonging to the holding PVH.

Will the rise of the PC police kill classic movies?

Christian Toto
The Hill
Sun, 12 May 2019 17:21 UTC

The rise of political correctness can be seen across movie screens this weekend.

"The Hustle," a gender-swap remake of 1988's "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels," rails against the patriarchy between sight gags. "Avengers: Endgame" shoehorns a minor gay character into the story as a super-virtue-signal. "Long Shot" shows Seth Rogen apologizing for the United States bombing Japan to help end World War II.

Even older films, and the stars who made them great, are now seen through the PC prism. Just ask the estate of John Wayne. The legendary star got pummeled a few months ago, decades after his passing, for a racially insensitive Playboy interview in 1971. Some critics demanded that his name be stripped from John Wayne Airport in Orange County, Calif.

Singer Kate Smith's film career is dwarfed by her radio, TV and stage accomplishments. Yet Smith's recording of two 1930s songs deemed racist convinced two professional sports teams - the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Flyers - to strip her iconic rendition of "God Bless America" from their programming.

You don't say! US journalism has become 'more subjective' according to RAND study

PhysOrg
Wed, 15 May 2019 16:54 UTC

U.S.-based journalism has gradually shifted away from objective news and offers more opinion-based content that appeals to emotion and relies heavily on argumentation and advocacy, according to a new RAND Corporation report.

In a unique analysis on news discourse and presentation, researchers found that the changes occurred over a 28-year-period (1989 to 2017) as journalism expanded beyond traditional media, such as newspapers and broadcast networks, to newer media, such as 24-hour cable channels and digital outlets. Notably, these measurable changes vary in extent and nature for different news platforms.

"Our research provides quantitative evidence for what we all can see in the media landscape: Journalism in the U.S. has become more subjective and consists less of the detailed event- or context-based reporting that used to characterize news coverage," said Jennifer Kavanagh, a senior political scientist and lead author of the report, which is second in a series of research into the phenomenon of "Truth Decay," the declining role of facts and analysis in civil discourse and its effect on American life.

Comment: Even a biased institution such as the neocon RAND Corporation is capable of producing a truthful report. Their assessment of the degradation of both print and broadcast media from relatively objective discussion and analysis of events to dissemination of personal points of view is a valid observation.

The proliferation of digital portals that allow individuals to get one's message out has both democratized and increased freedom of expression and yet muddied the business of news gathering.

Harvard's Lampoon magazine slammed for photoshopped image of Anne Frank in bikini: 'Hateful, ignorant, pedophilic'

RT
Wed, 15 May 2019 16:35 UTC

The Harvard Lampoon, a long-running campus satirical magazine, has apologized after publishing a photoshopped image of 15-year-old Holocaust victim Anne Frank in a bikini.

"Gone before her time: Virtual aging technology shows us what Anne Frank would have looked like if she hadn't died," read the headline above the fake image, with the accompanying caption, "Add this to your list of reasons why the Holocaust sucked."

Paulette Schuster, a student at Harvard whose grandfather survived the Holocaust, described the image, which was published and distributed to dorms on the Ivy League university's campus over the weekend, as "unfunny, hateful, ignorant, pedophiliac and dehumanizing."

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Society's Child

Transfer of Venezuelan embassy in US to 'fake government' would be an 'act of war' - Max Blumenthal

Russian journalist remains in Ukrainian jail under bogus treason charges - one year ongoing

38 arrested in Rotherham, UK, as police probe child sex abuse and exploitation on claims of 13 victims

Alabama's state senate passes bill banning nearly all abortions

Police release footage of elderly man being shoved off city bus, passenger facing murder charge

Malaysian teen commits suicide after followers encouraged her death in Instagram poll

Ethiopian garment industry workers paid lowest wages in the world by company that owns Guess and Tommy Hilfiger brands

Will the rise of the PC police kill classic movies?

You don't say! US journalism has become 'more subjective' according to RAND study

Harvard's Lampoon magazine slammed for photoshopped image of Anne Frank in bikini: 'Hateful, ignorant, pedophilic'

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