Society's ChildS


Heart - Black

US: Woman 'sacked for having grey hair'

Ed Pilkington
Guardian
Sun, 10 Jul 2011 20:42 UTC
Sandra Rawline
© Houston Chronicle/APSandra Rawline with her lawyer Robert Dowdy.

Employee sues for discrimination claiming she was fired over her refusal to dye her silver locks

Sandra Rawline's hair turned grey when she was in her early 20s. She stuck with it, proudly displaying her shoulder-length locks with their natural silver streaks. "This is who I am," she said.

But it seems that who she was, when it comes to grey hair in the workplace, was not satisfactory to her Texan employer. In August 2009 her boss approached her and told her to confect a more "upscale image" to go with her real estate firm's move from the Houston outskirts into a central commercial area.
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Propaganda

Propaganda! UK Terror threat is down but attack could occur at any moment says Home Secretary

Duncan Gardham
The Daily Telegraph
Mon, 11 Jul 2011 16:15 UTC
threat level
© flickr/billypalooza
Britain has lowered the threat level from international terrorism less than a year after the last attempted attack.

The level has been reduced from "severe," meaning an attack in highly likely, to "substantial" meaning an attack is a strong possibility, but the Home Secretary stressed that a terrorist attack might occur without further warning.

The threat, which is at the third level of a five point scale, is now at the same level as the threat from Irish terrorism on mainland Britain.

Theresa May, the Home Secretary, said: "This means that a terrorist attack is a strong possibility and might well occur without further warning.

"The change in the threat level to substantial does not mean the overall threat has gone away - there remains a real and serious threat against the United Kingdom and I would ask the public to remain vigilant."

The decision to change the threat level is taken by the Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre, part of MI5, independently of ministers and is based on the latest intelligence.
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Che Guevara

Thousands camp out in major Egyptian cities


Press TV
Mon, 11 Jul 2011 14:17 UTC
Image
Tens of thousands of angry protesters have camped in city squares across Egypt, calling for the sacking of the former regime's remnants, including the head of Egypt's Military Council.

Tents set up in Cairo, Alexandria, Suez as well as several smaller cities, remained in place on Sunday.

The demonstrators blocked traffic and formed picket lines outside the government complexes in central Cairo on Sunday.

"We managed to convince many of the employees not to go to work," AFP quoted a human rights activist as saying.

They have launched an open strike in Cairo and other big cities, threatening to escalate their protests unless their demands are met.

The protesters are demanding public trials for ousted president Hosni Mubarak and those behind the killing of hundreds of protesters during the revolution.
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Star of David

Tunisians protest prospect of Israel ties


Press TV
Mon, 11 Jul 2011 14:13 UTC
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Protesters demonstrate against Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali in Tunis in January 2011
Hundreds of people have taken to the streets of the Tunisian capital calling on their government to refrain from establishing diplomatic ties with Israel.

"Death to all Tunisians attempting to normalize relations with Israel,"..."We will denounce them and publish their names," AFP quoted Ahmed Kahlaoui, who chairs a committee opposing the normalization of ties between the countries.

Earlier this month, the authority in charge of political reform following the ouster of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, adopted a "republican pact" meant to form the basis of a new constitution.

The pact rules out the normalization of ties with Israel but some of the body's members reportedly preferred to exclude the issue from the document.

Sunday's demonstrators say they can no longer trust the current government and threatened to oust leaders who support the normalization of ties with Israel.
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Gear

Romance Novels Bad For Women's Health and Psyche, Psychologist Says

Rachael Rettner
MyHealthNewsDaily
Mon, 11 Jul 2011 13:07 UTC
Romance Novels
© Live Science

Romance novels can be a bad influence on women and lead them to make poor health and relationship decisions, says a British psychologist.

The novels give women unrealistic views about what to expect out of a relationship because they, well, romanticize love, said Susan Quilliam, a relationship psychologist based in Cambridge.

"They offer an idealized version of romance, which can make some women feel bad about themselves because their relationships aren't perfect," Quilliam said.

And in some cases, they might lead women to make poor health decisions, including not to use a condom during sex - a scenario often portrayed in the novels.

However, Quilliam stressed, she is not saying women are gullible and don't understand the difference between fiction and reality. Nor is she saying there is no place for romance novels in our culture.

But the novels add to an underlying view in society that in women, emotions and passions trump reason and solid decision-making, Quilliam said. Women should not try to follow their emotions at all costs, but instead balance them with reason.

"The thing that's going to make relationships last is a mix of romance and common sense," Quilliam said.

Quilliam wrote about her views in the July issue of the Journal of Family Planning and Reproductive Health Care.
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Handcuffs

US: Oak Park, Michigan Resident Julie Bass Faces 93 Days In Jail For Vegetable Garden

Steven Hoffer
The Huffington Post
Fri, 08 Jul 2011 09:38 UTC
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© UnknownOak Park, Mich., resident Julie Bass faces misdemeanor charges for refusing to remove a garden from her front yard.
This isn't your typical, garden-variety crime.

After a warning, a ticket and now a misdemeanor charge, an Oak Park, Mich., woman faces up to 93 days in jail for refusing to remove a vegetable crop from her front lawn.

Julie Bass says that she thought it would be "really cool" for the neighbors and kids to see a frontyard garden, but some community members don't appreciate the vegetable plot.

"I think it's sad that the City of Oak Park that's already strapped for cash is paying a lot of money to have a prosecutor bothering us," she told My Fox Detroit.

Bass has since started a blog -- Oak Park Hates Veggies -- to chronicle her battle with the authorities.

"We now find ourselves in a storm of controversy worthy of some high level mischief. Seriously?" she wrote in an entry. "It's a GARDEN. It's not a high crime or treason or murder. IT'S VEGETABLES. And yes, we did throw in a few flowers."
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Attention

Washington, US: Butchered Torso Found on Conveyor Belt at Seattle Recycling Plant; Murder Case is City's 5th in 2011

Philip Caulfield
New York Daily News
Sun, 10 Jul 2011 03:39 UTC
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© Kiro TelevisionWorkers at a recycling plant in Seattle discovered the dismembered body of a man among some construction site debris, launching the city's fifth homicide case of the year.
Workers at a recycling plant in Seattle were horrified to discover the dismembered torso of a man rolling by on a conveyor belt, launching the city's fifth homicide investigation of the year.

The butchered body was mixed in with materials from a construction site, police said.

The case was being investigated as a murder, and cops said the victim did not work at the plant, which is operated by local waste hauler CleanScapes.

"We don't believe that this person was killed here on site, but rather that they were transported here," police Sgt. Sean Whitcomb told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Police arrived at the scene in the city's industrial SoDo neighborhood at around 10:50 a.m. on morning after workers discovered the grisly remains rolled up in a soiled rug.
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Heart - Black

US: Child Porn Link Sought in Teen Phylicia Barnes' Murder

Dean Schabner and Arlette Saenz
ABC News
Sun, 10 Jul 2011 00:00 UTC

The FBI is investigating whether Phylicia Barnes, the star student from North Carolina whose nude body was found in April, nearly four months after she went missing in Maryland, was a victim of sexual exploitation or child pornographers before her murder.

Federal investigators are seeking warrants to gain access to Facebook and email accounts belonging to Barnes, 16, and to four men from Baltimore, according to a report from ABC News affiliate WSOC-TV in Charlotte, N.C.

According to the Charlotte Observer, FBI Special Agent Jacqueline Dougher wrote in the request for the warrants that investigators have "reason to believe" the search will uncover evidence of child sex crimes or child pornography.

An autopsy conducted by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Maryland determined her death to be a homicide, the state police said in May.
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Video

The Chimp Who Became Human

Marlow Stern
Sexy Beast
Sat, 09 Jul 2011 10:35 UTC
Image
© Harry BensonNim Chimpsky, as seen in Project Nim.
Project Nim, in theaters Friday, chronicles a bizarre 1970s project that sought to teach chimpanzees language. Marlow Stern spoke with the Oscar-winning filmmaker James Marsh about the ape

It's been almost 80 years since King Kong dangled Fay Wray from the Empire State Building, but once again, simian cinema is all the rage in Hollywood. There's the Kevin James comedy The Zookeeper, featuring a gorilla voiced by Nick Nolte, and later this summer the ubiquitous James Franco, not to be outdone, will square off against a legion of apes imbued with human-like intelligence in the blockbuster Planet of the Apes prequel, Rise of the Apes. And, outside of the "high concept" Hollywood kingdom, there's Project Nim, the latest documentary from James Marsh, who won an Oscar in 2008 for his awe-inspiring film about Philippe Petit's high-wire balancing act between the Twin Towers, Man on Wire.

"It's one of those things that you don't know when you set out on a film two years ago where it will end up in the culture and the zeitgeist," said Marsh. "I heard the same thing about The Dark Knight and Man on Wire. Take your pick, in a way. Ours is true, ours happened, and you see real human emotions in that, and real animal emotions in that."
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Magnet

Meet 'Magnet Boy' the 11-year-old Brazilian Who is Attracting Attention - and the Odd Saucepan - With a Bizarre Ability


The Daily Mail, UK
Sun, 10 Jul 2011 10:44 UTC
An 11-year-old boy has been attracting worldwide attention... and a load of metal implements.

Knives, forks, spoons, scissors and even large saucepans all seem to stick to Paulo David Amorim, a Brazilian boy who claims to have magnet-type qualities.

His friends have nicknamed him 'Magnet Boy,' while his astonished doctor says he has never seen anything like it in 30 years as a physician.
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© The Associated PressThere's something about Paulo: The 11-year-old Brazilian seems to attract metal objects on his front and back

Comment: H/t to SOTT reader bngenoh for pointing out this video:


Paulo is not alone it seems.

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