bullying, babies, and what's happening in Canada

http://nerdyapplebottom.com/2010/11/02/my-son-is-gay/

If you think that me allowing my son to be a female character for Halloween is somehow going to ‘make’ him gay then you are an idiot. Firstly, what a ridiculous concept. Secondly, if my son is gay, OK. I will love him no less. Thirdly, I am not worried that your son will grow up to be an actual ninja so back off.

Just as it was heartbreaking to those parents that have lost their children recently due to bullying. IT IS NOT OK TO BULLY. Even if you wrap it up in a bow and call it ‘concern.’ Those women were trying to bully me. And my son. MY son.


http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/08/fighting-bullying-with-babies/?hp

“Empathy can’t be taught, but it can be caught,” Gordon often says – and not just by children. “Programmatically my biggest surprise was that not only did empathy increase in children, but it increased in their teachers,” she added. “And that, to me, was glorious, because teachers hold such sway over children.”

“For a program that costs only hundreds of dollars per child, the cost-benefit of preventing later problems that cost thousands of dollars per child, is obvious,” said Santos.

CCC in Haiti?

Is this not the perfect time to implement an agency such as US. President Roosevelt's The Civilian Conservation Corps 1933-42 (nice overview: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/ccc/introduction) to materialize a eco-infrastructure in Haiti? Instead of throwing money good after bad—as if history never repeats—ie. sub-sub-sub-sub contractors of Iraq (Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein) why not employ the unemployed, utilize expert knowledge, and mobilizing locals (especially those that feel disenfranchised*) a new era of stewardship would insure a balanced peaceful future for the plighted Haitians.

*"The tents created an instant appearance of haves and have-nots, a shift from the sense of commonly shared suffering of the recent week. " Government Turns to Long-Term Needs, WSJ.com (from http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704423204575017384160415238.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsTop)

Technical Volunteer Registry
http://dex.cidi.org/
http://www.ewb-usa.org/haiti.php

hurray!

A Promise to Be Ethical in an Era of Immorality

Jodi Hilton for The New York Times

Max Anderson, right, with Harvard classmates and their M.B.A. oaths saying they won’t advance their “own narrow ambitions.”

full article

bait and switch

Hmmmm, another case in point with title tickling.
Click on the little title on wsj.com and you get:


a story about Korean immigrants looking for citizenship.

But what about the readers who don't click for the article?

N Korea spin

For a few years now, I considered myself a fairly avid online reader of news (esp. on the Korean pennisula) and had been pretty satisfied with it—taking it all with a grain of salt. But today I must say that the tilt of the titles of my two main sources threw me for a badas$ brain loop Wednesday morning.

from the New York Times:

full article


from the Wall Street Journal:

unfortunately, I just tried to find the article and got hijacked to a subscription window
to view the article now, so you'll have to trust me that this is an actual screen shot.
Nice touch though with the "N." whether it was intentional or not, it reminded me that
Korea was just Korea before the N. & S. and Corea before that!


inflammatory vs. what I thought journalism is all about...

I can only assume that most do not have time to read every article let alone more than 2 sources and it's the title that sticks. I suppose the war mongers have got their tentacles widespread...

I do hope to see a reunified Korea and I don't think that I'm alone.


ps. here's a third

from Yahoo news:


thanks NiCi for the yahoo link and inspiring me to "put it out there"..

thanks goodness for level headedness

in reportage that is...

from Huffington Post:


"Iran and North Korea appear to be seeking small nuclear arsenals in order to deter potential adversaries from launching an attack upon them -- by threatening them with unacceptable damage in retaliation.

Neither North Korea nor Iran could hope to defeat its most powerful potential adversary -- the United States -- in any kind of direct military confrontation. They cannot repel an actual attack upon them. They cannot shoot American planes and missiles out of the sky. Indeed, no state can."

full article

funny, informative and bit long but well worth it (at least for me)


thanks AzAs! for reintroducing me to the power of Google and leading me to take a second look at HuPo.