Monday, July 31, 2017


I Was Once Transgender. Why I Think Trump Made the Right Decision for the Military

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump tweeted that he wouldn’t allow transgender individuals to serve in the military:

I think he made the right decision—and as someone who lived as trans-female for several years, I should know.

When I discovered Congress voted earlier this month to not block funding for transgender-related hormone therapies and sex change surgeries, I wondered if it considered how devastating this will be to the fitness, readiness, and morale of our combat-ready troops.

In July, the House of Representatives voted down Missouri Republican Rep. Vicky Hartzler’s amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act, which would have banned the military from funding such treatments.

Paying for transition-related surgeries for military service members and their families is beyond comprehensible.

Perhaps they have forgotten that our military was forged to be the world’s strongest fighting force, not a government-funded, politically correct, medical sex change clinic for people with gender dysphoria.

Gender dysphoria, the common diagnosis for one who feels at odds with his or her birth gender, develops from prolonged anxiety and depression. People are not born that way.

The "proof" for a diagnosis of gender dysphoria is having strongly held feelings—but feelings can and often do change over time.

The military is expected to prepare its members in warfare: to kill, destroy, and break our enemies. The most important factors in preparing a strong military are not hormone therapy, surgical sex changes, or politically correct education.

We need psychologically fit, emotionally sound, highly trained troops to protect our nation from its enemies.

While countless homeless vets are currently sleeping under cardboard boxes, or waiting for life-saving care from the Department of Veterans Affairs, we learn that transgender military recruits now qualify for preferential coverage for sex change procedures that are scientifically unproven and extremely costly.

I myself was fully sex-reassigned from male to female, and eventually came to accept my birth gender.

I have over 70 years of firsthand life experience, eight years of living as a woman, 20 years of researching the topic, and 12 years of helping others who, like me, found that transitioning and reassignment surgery failed to be proper treatment and want to restore their lives to their birth gender.

Transitioning can be expensive—up to $130,000 per person for numerous body-mutilating and cosmetic procedures over many months (or years) to fashion the body to appear as the opposite sex.

Yet, no matter how skilled the surgeon, or how much money is spent, it is biologically impossible to change a man into a woman or a woman into a man. The change is only cosmetic.

The medical community continues to recommend this radical "treatment" in the absence of scientific evidence that people are better off in the long run. This population attempts suicide at a rate of 40 percent.

Even after the full surgical change, they attempt to end their lives, or tragically succeed.

Over 60 percent of this diverse population suffer from co-existing mental disorders. Consider Bradley Manning (now Chelsea Manning), a former Army soldier who was so psychologically and emotionally unbalanced that he stole confidential documents from the military and forwarded them to WikiLeaks.

Through my website, sexchangeregret.com, I hear from people who experienced firsthand how damaging and unnecessary reassignment surgeries were. For them, the sex change failed to resolve the emotional and psychological disorders that drove the desire to change gender.

Many write after living the transgender life for years. They write to ask for advice on how to reverse the original surgical change and restore their lives to the original birth gender like I did, a process called detransition.

Some service members will come to regret having undergone the surgery and will want to detransition. Where will the military be then? Will the military pay for the sex change reversal procedure, too?

Failed "sex change surgeries" are not uncommon and will drive up the cost to care for the military transgender population above the projected $3-4 billion 10-year cost.

Beyond the financial cost, there’s the question of the service member’s military readiness during their transition or detransition, as the process often comes with a great deal of anxiety and emotional instability.

I know of many who have struggled to adapt to the new gender role for years after reassignment surgery.

In my view, as a former trans-female who works every day with regretters, allowing the military to pay for sex change surgeries will make a mockery of the U.S. military.

Advocates are relentless in their pursuit of making others, via the government and insurance companies, cover the cost of sex change procedures.

If the military had been forced to pay, the advocates would have used this as leverage to press every other entity—both government and commercial—to pay for sex change surgeries as well.

As a person who lived the transgender life for eight years, I can attest that assisting, affirming, or paying for hormone therapies and genital mutilation surgeries would not have strengthened our military. They would only have brought adverse long-term consequences, both for individuals and for our armed forces as a whole.

SOURCE






Trump wages a broad effort to roll back accomodations for transgenders

The report below is from a Leftist source but includes some interesting facts.  I have deleted most of the contumely

President Trump posted on social media that he intends to ban transgender soldiers from serving "in any capacity,"

Trump’s announcement, in a series of three tweets Wednesday, amounted to a 180-degree shift in military policy and caught the military off guard. The move has been seen by some as an attempt to shore up Trump’s presidency by energizing elements of a GOP base.

"This forces Democrats in Rust Belt states like Ohio, Michigan, and Wisconsin to take complete ownership of this issue," an anonymous Trump administration official explained to the Washington news site Axios, after the president tweeted. "How will the blue collar voters in these states respond when senators up for reelection in 2018 like Debbie Stabenow are forced to make their opposition to this a key plank of their campaign?"

The administration’s efforts to roll back protections for the LGBTQ community go beyond the military. Trump’s Department of Justice filed a legal brief Wednesday arguing that Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 doesn’t protect workers from "discrimination based on sexual orientation," an action branded as discriminatory by gay rights groups and a switch from Obama’s position. Devin O’Malley, a spokesman for the Justice Department, said the brief is "consistent" with the department’s longstanding policies.

And the Department of Education, in February, rescinded an Obama-era ruling that barred schools from discriminating against transgender students.

The country is taking notice. Sixteen states are debating laws in 2017 that would restrict access for transgender people to bathrooms or locker rooms, according to the National Council of State Legislatures. That’s after North Carolina passed a bathroom ban bill, and then repealed portions of it after a new Democratic governor took office this year.

And in Texas, where last week the state Senate approved a bathroom ban for transgender students, advocates on both sides say the president’s intention to ban transgender people in the military helps provide fresh momentum for the legislation.

As of Friday additional lawmakers had signed on — or expressed support — to a House bill. "There is concern that the president is providing folks with quote-unquote cover," said Lou Weaver, with Equality Texas, a group fighting the legislation there.

He said he has seen a wholesale change in the climate for transgender people in the past six months. "People are scared," Weaver said. "People are more worried. ‘Am I going to be able to keep my job?’ I think we’ve definitely seen a different climate."

Groups supporting bathroom bills also believe the president’s words will spill into state-level debates.

"The president of the country is the leader of the free world — I think it will invigorate members of state legislatures to lead on these issues," said Mandi Ancalle, the general counsel for government affairs at the Family Research Council. "And not to worry so much about how they might be attacked or cast in the media."

Trump’s campaign pitch to LGBT voters was quite different. At the GOP convention in Cleveland last year, Trump said that he would "do everything in my power to protect our LGBTQ citizens." He invited Peter Thiel, an openly gay Republican donor, to speak to the delegates. At one point he even said that Caitlyn Jenner, perhaps the highest-profile transgender person, could use any bathroom she wants in Trump Tower.

Multiple transgender service members who were interviewed said they had no idea the reversal was in the works.

Their surprise stems partially from the idea that the military tends to move slowly on personnel policy. Obama ended the Clinton-era "don’t ask, don’t tell" policy toward gays in the military in 2011.

In July 2015, the Pentagon launched a formal process to consider allowing openly transgender service members. By September 2016, the Defense Department issued a 72-page handbook titled "Transgender Service in the U.S. Military," which outlined the new policy.

The policy did not cover whether the military would begin actively recruiting transgender service members. That was initially supposed to be developed by this month, but Secretary of Defense James Mattis announced that he would delay the process.

Still, most believed that existing policies would be left alone.

"The Pentagon is like an aircraft carrier, right? She doesn’t turn on a dime," said Dremann, who is also the president of SPART*A, an organization that includes roughly 500 transgender active-duty service members.

The military also does not make policy via Twitter, he said. "Our leaders don’t operate that way," Dremann said, seeming to ignore for a moment that the message came from the commander in chief. "No matter what was said, there will be a process in a legal and methodical way."

Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, who is chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, issued a memo Thursday saying there will be "no modifications" to the current policy for the time being. "We will continue to treat all of our personnel with respect," he added.

Trump’s order caused some unintended consequences — rallying support for the very population the president is attempting to ostracize.

Daniel Forester, an Army medic, said his parents have not been welcoming about his new status as a man. "My transition didn’t happen overnight," said Forester, who recently returned from a stint in Afghanistan. "I didn’t expect my family to accept my transition."

But as news spread about Trump’s tweets, Forester’s phone began buzzing. It was a cascade of text messages from his mother.

"She was saying, ‘What’s going on? Are you going to be okay?’ " he said. It was one of the few times his mother had even discussed that he is transgender since he started transitioning five years ago.

Then, later in the day, something even more surprising happened. Forester’s father also weighed in with a long post on Facebook — the first time he had ever acknowledged he has a transgender child.

And to Forester’s shock, in the post his father — a Desert Storm veteran — was defending him.

"If you believe in America then you believe in all of it," wrote Sam Forester in the post. "If you don’t agree that is fine. Sign your name on the line. Serve years of your life. Pick up a weapon and make a stand. If not respect the men and women that do and allow them to enjoy the same rights you have."

SOURCE






Why we should tell girls they’re ‘beautiful’ less often

For the past few months, getting my 5-year-old daughter, Emma, dressed in the morning has been a grueling ordeal. She hovers over her open dresser drawers, rapidly pulling shorts and shirts out only to immediately dismiss them.

"I have no good clothes," she’ll announce. I stood by recently as she inspected herself in the mirror. "No! This doesn’t look pretty," she wailed, pulling fiercely at her skirt. "I don’t look beautiful!" I took in her angst, and felt close to tears myself.

It dawned on me that Emma, my almost-kindergartner, is obsessed with her appearance. She hates to wear sneakers because she doesn’t think they complement her attire; she can spend 15 minutes adjusting a headband; she asks constantly about getting pierced ears.

Following her outburst, I felt guilty. I’ve been telling Emma she’s beautiful since the day she was born. And with her blue eyes and wavy brown hair, interspersed with gold strands that middle-aged women pay big bucks for — she is. I love to buy Emma clothes; I draw attention to her dolled up in a new dress, sending her to "show daddy how beautiful she looks." Relatives constantly compliment her appearance.

No wonder she’s already weighed down by the pressure to be pretty.

According to data compiled in 2015 by Common Sense Media, a nonprofit that provides education and promotes safe media and technology for kids, body-image concerns start earlier than most of us might think. More than half of girls ages 6 to 8 think their "ideal body" size is thinner than they currently are. (One-third of boys feel the same way.) Preschoolers have already learned that society judges people by how they look.

Furthermore, a 2015 study published in the International Journal of Eating Disorders found that 34 percent of 5-year-old girls engage in deliberate dietary restraint at least sometimes. Twenty-eight percent of those girls said they want their bodies to look like the women they see in movies or television.

Renee Engeln, a professor of psychology at Northwestern University and author of "Beauty Sick: How the Cultural Obsession With Appearance Hurts Girls and Women" (HarperCollins 2017), tells me that to put the statistics in context, "Developmental milestones for 5-year-olds include the successful use of a fork and spoon and the ability to count 10 or more objects. . . . These are girls who are just learning how to move their bodies around in the world, yet somehow they are already worried about how their bodies look."

In her book, Engeln writes about what she calls "beauty sickness," which is what happens when girls and women get so caught up worrying about their appearance that they are too distracted to be present in other aspects of their lives.

Countless sources will tell our daughters what beauty is. As parents, we’ll never be able to shield our daughters from all those messages. But Engeln maintains that there are steps adults can take to minimize the pressures on kids. And that starts with being aware of how we talk about our own bodies.

"When daughters are very young, parents can start to build them up and inoculate them to have a firmer foundation to stand on when they get out in the world," says Engeln, who points out that little girls might not understand media references, but they certainly know what they hear their mothers talking about.

"If they hear you complain about not liking your arms or wanting to lose weight," she says, "you can bet that’s going to influence the way they think about themselves."

At home, focus on discussions that reflect your values.

"Don’t talk about how people look. Don’t spend time focusing on who looks so pretty because that sends the message that ‘pretty’ is important," Engeln says. Starting when daughters are babies, "Dress her in things that allow her to play and move rather than outfits that look pretty but may not be very comfortable. Don’t treat your daughters like decorations."

It’s OK to point out fixed attributes like intelligence and beauty, says Tara Wells, an associate professor of psychology at Barnard College, but the key is not to focus on them.

"Ask your daughter what she has learned instead of praising her looks and performance," Wells says. "Marvel at her ability to change and solve problems."

As girls get older and become more inundated with cultural standards of beauty, help them understand that there are multiple variations of beauty, says Judi Cineas, a psychotherapist in Palm Beach.

"The most effective way to nurture confidence is to nurture talents," she says. "Encourage your daughter’s mastery in the things she likes. . . . Praise her efforts as well as her successes. She should know that it is OK not to be the best at everything, and more importantly that there are things she is awesome at."

There’s long been debate about the effect on girls of playing with certain toys — Barbie in particular. But rather than forbidding particular toys, Engeln suggests, ask your daughter why she wants to play with them. Be sure she has access to different kinds of toys, activities, and sports — not just typical girl-centric classes like ballet.

For parents with both sons and daughters, try not to interact with them differently based on their gender. In one case, doing so had a positive effect on Kyrah Altman, now 21, who has two brothers and was raised by a single father in Hudson.

"I didn’t feel my dad treated me differently than my brothers. It wasn’t about being his daughter, it was just about being his kid," says Altman, now a junior in college at George Washington University who also runs a nonprofit organization called L.E.A.D. (Let’s Empower, Advocate, and Do).

"Growing up with brothers, I played baseball and hockey and wrestled with the boys. I was sort of forced to get out of my comfort zone." She also loved art projects and cooking. While people commented on her appearance — including dad, who told her she was beautiful from time to time, she said it was never focused on as the most important thing about her. "My dad was always quick to point out that I was [a] good friend, a good big sister," she says.

Be mindful of what other adults are saying to your daughter, making sure they reinforce the message you want to convey, Cineas says.

"For most people, the easiest compliment is to tell a girl she’s pretty," she says. "But when you hear that, you can interject with another more personal compliment to remind her she is more than her looks."

When I ask Engeln if I should stop telling Emma she’s beautiful, she tells me to say it less.

"Don’t tell her when she’s dressed up, with perfect hair. Because that can lead to girls worrying they are only beautiful when they don’t look like their normal selves. Think of the filters on Instagram, how people are always trying to alter their appearance for social media," she says.

"Tell her when she’s her most happiest and at ease, when she’s entirely herself."

That I can do, I think as I watch Emma running around the backyard attempting cartwheels, playing with her brother. We are just home from the beach and she’s in her bathing suit. She’s laughing and singing along with a song blaring from my phone, her hair a stringy mess from an afternoon of swimming. She is radiant.

SOURCE






Australia: Government makes Aboriginal problems worse, not better

According to Race Discrimination Commissioner Tim Soutphommasane, Australia remains a racist country because ethnic minorities are not perfectly statistically represented in the upper ranks of politics, the media, and business.

However, by calling for race-based quotas to end ‘Anglo-Celtic domination’ in these fields and ensure equality of outcomes based on racial-background, Soutphommasane is trivialising the issue of racism.

The real racism we confront in Australia is not how many ‘Asian’ CEOs there are. It is the reverse racism Indigenous children are subjected to in relation to child protection.

Indigenous children who need to be removed from their parents are treated differently to non-Indigenous children in ways that compromise their well-being and prospects in life — a form of racial discrimination about which ‘human rights’ activists like Soutphommasane are silent.

Thanks to our egalitarian values and modern attitudes towards race, we do not have anything that resembles a racial underclass denied equality of opportunity in this country — with one glaring exception.

The exception is the most disadvantaged Indigenous Australians who predominately live in rural and remote ‘Homeland’ communities.

Established in the 1970s under the policy of Aboriginal Self-Determination as implemented by the Whitlam government, the Homelands experiment in separatist development was designed to allow Indigenous people to return to their ‘country’ to live on their traditional lands and practice traditional culture.

In reality, however, these communities have long suffered from a well-known array of social problems — despite the billions spent on Indigenous programs and support services — including major concerns for child welfare due to high levels of child abuse and neglect.

As a result, Indigenous children are removed from their families at 10 times the rate of non-indigenous. Of the 45,000 children living into care across Australia, one-third are indigenous, and total more than 6% of all Indigenous children.

What is less well-known is how Indigenous disadvantage – appalling social outcomes in health, housing, education, and employment concentrated in rural and remote communities – is perpetuated by Indigenous-specific child protection policies.

Under the Aboriginal Child Placement Principle (ACPP) practiced in all states and territories, the preferred option is to place Indigenous children into ‘kinship care’ with relatives or local community members in the name of ensuring children maintain contact with traditional culture.

This is consistent with the separatist principles of self-determination. Yet the complying with the ACCP means that the priority given to ‘culture’ can outweigh child welfare concerns.

In Indigenous communities in which there are more maltreated children needing care than there are functional adults capable of providing suitable homes, children can end up being placed in accordance with the ACPP in unsafe kinship placements that do not meet basic standards, and into which non-Indigenous children would not be placed.

As the last inquiry into child protection in the Northern Territory (the 2010 Bath Report) found, the ACCP had justified "Aboriginal children in care receiving a lesser standard of care than non-Aboriginal children."

These findings have been echoed by the recent evidence given at the Western Australian coroner’s inquiry into high rates of Indigenous youth suicide.

The common threads in 13 cases of Aboriginal children and young people who killed themselves between November 2012 and March 2016 in the Kimberley region include family homes featuring alcohol abuse and domestic violence; long histories of safety concerns ranging from chronic neglect of basic needs to sexual abuse; and "frequent moves between households of various family members and guardians".

This is to say that, due to the ACPP, Indigenous children are taken out of the frying pan of family dysfunction only to be placed back into the fire of broader community dysfunction.

Recognising these problems, and the tragic consequences for many children, the South Australian government recently proposed an amendment to the state’s child welfare laws that would have enabled Indigenous children to escape being caught up in the present system.

The plan was to remove the application of the ACPP if an Indigenous child made an "informed choice" not to identify as Aboriginal in relation to placement decisions. This would, it follows, have allowed Indigenous children to be placed with safe and suitable non-Indigenous foster carers outside their communities.

However, the government dropped this provision from the new child protection act passed this month  in response to protests by offended Aboriginal groups,  who nonsensically argued that allowing children the right to opt-out of the ACPP "reeks of forced assimilation".

The emotive claim that upholding the ACPP will prevent another Stolen Generation may look noble.  But denying the most vulnerable children in the nation the freedom to choose to leave Indigenous communities — such as the notorious APY lands in South Australia — is deeply inequitable, and locks them out of accessing the benefits and opportunities of life in mainstream society that all other Australians take for granted.

Continued compliance with the ACPP is nothing less than a recipe for trapping another lost generation of Indigenous children in dysfunctional communities, and keeping open the gaps of Indigenous social outcomes that remain a blot on our proud national record of delivering a fair go for all.

We should take the issue of racism seriously because racism is inconsistent with the nation’s core values. Eradicating Indigenous disadvantages is the number one social challenge we face. Recognition of Indigenous children’s right to relocate, if they so wish, would protect their human right to equality of opportunity regardless of race.

A Race Discrimination Commissioner serious about eliminating real race-based social disparities should stop fretting about ‘non-Anglo’ CEO numbers, and start focusing instead on fixing Australia’s highly discriminatory child protection regime.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here

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Sunday, July 30, 2017


Why You’re Being Invited to Fewer Weddings

Another invisible elephant below.  Feminist-inspired divorce laws make marriage a mild form of insanity for men. Around half of all marriages break up and that tends to bring with it financial hardship for both parties -- with men  losing so much of their income to alimony and child support that another permanent relationship is simply unaffordable for them.

And the second elephant is how unpleasant feminist women are.  There are a lot of them and again a man would have to be slightly insane to have anything to do with them.  They want the world while offering in exchange only their own embittered and critical selves. Men looking to them for feminine softness will not find it.

And women generally are often very unrealistic about their prospects.  I was sitting in a cafe once when I overheard a conversation between two of the waitresses.  One said, "I'm waiting for my millionaire".  The woman concerned was short, fat, loud and had acne and peroxide blonde hair.  She would be lucky to get ANYBODY, let alone a millionaire,  And it is again feminists who are largely responsible for that sort of unrealism.  Feminism IS unrealism, with its denial of physical attractiveness and its gospel that all women can have it all



Fewer people are getting married, and they’re inviting fewer guests.

You’re not the only one spending fewer summer weekends watching other people get married—but don’t worry, the weddings you’re still invited to might feel a little more special these days.

Fewer Americans are getting married, and the ones who still are have scaled back their weddings. Their nuptials are becoming smaller, though not necessarily cheaper, affairs.

Many couples are waiting longer and longer to schedule their weddings. In 2015, the median first-time American bride was almost 28 years old and the median groom almost 30, according to the most recent data available from the Census Bureau. (Ten years earlier, the typical bride was 25.5, the typical groom 27.)

The U.S. marriage rate—the number of new marriages per 1,000 people—has been falling for decades. It fell especially fast during the recession, in 2008 and 2009, but there’s little evidence that people started getting married again even as the economy recovered. And research firm IbisWorld predicts the marriage rate will keep falling over the next five years.

From a global perspective, that wouldn’t be a surprise. The U.S. marriage rate would need to fall by about a third to reach the marriage rates in other developed countries. The most recent data show a U.S. marriage rate of 6.9, compared with an average rate of 4.6 for countries in the European Union.

In Europe, and increasingly in the U.S., many couples are postponing marriage indefinitely, as it becomes more socially acceptable for couples to live together and have children together outside the bonds of marriage.

The end result isn’t automatically fewer total weddings; even as the marriage rate falls, the population rises. But the number of U.S. weddings did fall last year, by 0.5 percent, to 2.162 million, according to estimates by the Wedding Report, a market-research firm specializing in the wedding industry.

About 310,000 businesses in the U.S. provide services at weddings, according to IbisWorld, and many of them—from florists to bakers to photographers—are feeling the economic pain. Coming out of the recession, the wedding industry’s revenue grew strongly—by more than 4 percent a year from 2012 to 2014, according to IbisWorld. But growth slowed in 2015, and revenue actually dipped slightly last year. Over the next five years, IbisWorld expects an annual growth rate of just 0.3 percent.

Fewer weddings are just one reason wedding-service businesses are struggling, said IbisWorld analyst Anya Cohen. Another is that, with so many new businesses flooding into the market and advertising cheaply online, it’s easier for engaged couples to bargain-hunt. “There’s absolutely been an increase in competition,” she said. Plus, websites such as Pinterest equip couples to go the cheaper, do-it-yourself route for invitations, centerpieces, and other wedding fixtures.

The average wedding cost $26,720 in 2016, according to the Wedding Report, up just 0.3 percent from the previous year—but that average is skewed by a few particularly lavish weddings. The median cost of a wedding was $14,399.

Another way weddings have changed since the recession: They’ve shrunk. Last year’s average wedding had 141 guests, according to an annual survey of couples by the Knot, the wedding website. That’s down from 149 guests in 2009. As a result, many couples end up spending more on each guest; the Knot estimates average spending per guest is up 26 percent since 2009.

One bright spot for the wedding industry is the pent-up demand for same-sex marriages. Since the U.S. Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide two years ago, the Williams Institute estimates about 157,000 same-sex couples have gotten married. About 1.1 million Americans are married to someone of the same sex, the institute said last month, out of an estimated 10.7 million LGBT adults in the U.S.

It’s unclear whether the decline of the American wedding is a permanent trend. American millennials lag previous generations on many metrics of adulthood, from living on their own to buying homes to having kids. Maybe most of them will eventually get around to weddings of their own—but then, it’s possible that many never will, and that they’ll bring the U.S. marriage rate closer to Europe’s.

SOURCE






Trump seeks to ban transgender people from serving in U.S. military 'in any capacity'

Unit cohesion is the holy grail in military readiness and that is at its best amid large similarities between the unit members. So for maximum military readiness and effectiveness Trump's policy is right.  There probably are some keen existing military members who are transgender -- former lesbians, one imagines --  so it would be merciful to group them together in their own unit rather than discharge them
 
President Donald Trump said he will reverse former President Obama's policy that allowed transgender troops to serve openly in the military.

President Trump said Wednesday that the U.S. military will not accept transgender troops into its ranks or allow them to serve in any capacity, reversing a policy that began under the Obama administration – and triggering intense criticism from lawmakers and civil libertarians.

In a series of morning tweets, Trump said that, after consulting "with my generals and military experts," the U.S. government "will not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military."

The U.S. military, he said, "must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail."

Trump's decision was made Tuesday, and he informed Defense Secretary Jim Mattis later in the day, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders told reporters Wednesday. The policy allowing transgender troops to serve was "expensive and disruptive" and affected military readiness, she said.

Democrats disagreed. Rep. Adam Smith, D-Wash., ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, called Trump's announcement "an unwarranted and disgraceful attack on men and women who have been bravely serving their country."

SOURCE






UK: Your bureaucrats will protect you -- NOT

Helpless residents at risk from offender;  Senior manager was also sex criminal;  Regulator kept ‘disturbing’ case secret;  The victim’s mother has despaired of seeking answers

The suspected rape of a helpless autistic man by a high-risk sex offender was kept secret by the official body responsible for his safety, The Times can reveal.

The incident was among a cluster of sex alerts at residential homes owned by a private company that specialised in the care of young adults with learning disabilities.

All were kept hidden from the public by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), which regulates England’s 16,000 care homes and claims to be committed to openness and transparency. The case raises serious doubts about its stated mission to protect people from harm and to “hold providers to account”.

The Times has seen confidential police documents and agency reports linked to the suspected rape and other incidents at three homes

SOURCE






'They'll become terrorists': Millionaire entrepreneur Dick Smith says high immigration will create an angry underclass of unemployed - and likens population growth to cancer

Millionaire entrepreneur Dick Smith predicts Australia will suffer from a spate of terrorist attacks if it continues taking in 200,000 migrants a year.

The 73-year-old businessman and philanthropist told media commentator Mark Latham that high population growth and robots taking jobs could see 40 per cent of the nation living in poverty in coming decades.

'Those really poor people, especially the ones who can't get jobs, they'll be the ones that become terrorists because you have two or three generations without any satisfying work to do and you get angry,' he told the Mark Latham's Outsiders program.

Mark Latham was Labor leader when John Howard as prime minister increased immigration

Mr Smith, the businessman behind Dick Smith Foods and OzEmite, said Australia's population would quadruple from 24 million now to 100 million people by 2100 at the current annual population growth pace of 1.7 per cent.

This would see 40 million 'really poor people' who could potentially resort to violence.

'When you get such incredible difference between the rich and the poor, the pitchforks come out. We'll end up with people being killed,' he said.

In a separate interview with Daily Mail Australia, Mr Smith likened Australia's high annual net immigration rate to cancer which could upend democracy.

'Only cancer cells grow forever and they mostly end up killing their host,' he said.  'We will destroy Australia as we know it today.'

He accused the Liberal Party of being in the pocket of big business and Labor of bowing to the ethnic lobby groups.

Australia's annual net immigration rate stood at 82,500 in 1996 but crept above 100,000 a year in 2003 when John Howard was prime minister. It reached 190,000 a year in 2013 when Julia Gillard was national leader. 

Mr Smith called for the major parties in government to return to Australia's annual net migration rate to 70,000, the average level of the 20th century.

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson is calling for a much more drastic zero annual net immigration pace for Australia.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here

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Friday, July 28, 2017



This new Trump speech sent the media into their worst meltdown ever

A loving and inspirational speech was picked at by the media over a few small details without any mention of its overall character or its enthusiastic reception.  It was alleged that he broke precedent by mentioning current politics and that he used a couple of marginally unpleasant words.  But Trump makes his own rules and always has. It is his strength that he breaks out in new directions and shakes up convention.

It was a great speech and one that the scouts will remember -- regardless of Leftist nitpicking.  I reproduce the first part of the transcript below so you can judge the matter for yourself. Don't trust my take on it or anybody else's.  It speaks for itself.  But I think you will see what I mean

It was a very thoughtful and effective touch that Trump pointed out how many of his cabinet were former scouts.  And he even brought them with him to introduce to the crowd.  That must have been immensely encouraging to the young scouts present.  The American dream is to succeed and excel and Trump showed that dream to be a reality.  No wonder the Left hated it. They described it as a Hitler Youth rally, which did, I suppose, at least recognize the enthusiasm of the audience



President Trump Monday addressed the Boy Scouts’ National Jamboree in Glen Jean, WV. Trump addressed tens of thousands of Scouts, speaking about character, loyalty and the obstacles he faces from the Fake News media.

And it sent the Fake News media into their worst meltdown ever, with liberals incoherently screeching their pre-programmed cries of “white supremacy,” “hate rally” and “Nazi Youth.”

Yes, the media are so afflicted by Trump Derangement Syndrome they now think the Boy Scouts are a paramilitary organization planning to kill them.

While the lying media get fitted for a straitjacket, check out this amazing speech.



THE PRESIDENT: Thank you, everybody. Thank you very much. (Applause.) I am thrilled to be here. Thrilled. (Applause.) And if you think that was an easy trip, you’re wrong, but I am thrilled — 19th Boy Scout Jamboree — wow — and to address such a tremendous group. Boy, you have a lot of people here. The press will say it’s about 200 people. (Laughter.) It looks like about 45,000 people. You set a record today. (Applause.) You set a record. That’s a great honor, believe me.

Tonight, we put aside all of the policy fights in Washington, D.C. — you’ve been hearing about with the fake news and all of that. (Applause.) We’re going to put that aside. And instead we’re going to talk about success, about how all of you amazing young Scouts can achieve your dreams. What to think of — what I’ve been thinking about — you want to achieve your dreams. I said, who the hell wants to speak about politics when I’m in front of the Boy Scouts? Right? (Applause.)

There are many great honors that come with the job of being President of the United States, but looking out at this incredible gathering of mostly young patriots — mostly young — I’m especially proud to speak to you as the honorary President of the Boy Scouts of America. (Applause.)

AUDIENCE: USA! USA! USA!

THE PRESIDENT: You are the young people of character and integrity who will serve as leaders in our communities, and uphold the sacred values of our nation.

I want to thank Boy Scouts President Randall Stephenson, Chief Scout Executive Michael Surbaugh, Jamboree Chairman Ralph de la Vega, and the thousands of volunteers who have made this a life-changing experience for all of you, and when they asked me to be here I said absolutely, yes. (Applause.)

Finally, and we can’t forget these people, I especially want to salute the moms and the dads and troop leaders who are here tonight. (Applause.) Thank you for making scouting possible. Thank you, mom and dad — troop leaders.

When you volunteer for the Boy Scouts, you are not only shaping young lives, you are shaping the future of America. (Applause.) The United States has no better citizens than its Boy Scouts. (Applause.) No better. The values, traditions, and skills you learn here will serve you throughout your lives, and just as importantly they will serve your families, your cities, and in the future and in the present, will serve your country. (Applause.) The Scouts believe in putting America first. (Applause.)

You know, I go to Washington and I see all these politicians, and I see the swamp. And it’s not a good place. In fact today I said we ought to change it from the word swamp to the word cesspool or, perhaps, to the word sewer. But it’s not good. Not good. (Applause.) And I see what’s going on, and believe me I’d much rather be with you. That I can tell you. (Applause.)

I’ll tell you the reason that I love this and the reason that I really wanted to be here is because as President, I rely on former Boy Scouts every single day, and so do the American people. It’s amazing how many Boy Scouts we have at the highest level of our great government. Many of my top advisors in the White House were Scouts. Ten members of my cabinet were Scouts. Can you believe that? Ten. (Applause.)

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is not only a Boy Scout, he’s your former national president. (Applause.)

The Vice President of the United States, Mike Pence — good guy — was a Scout, and it meant so much to him. (Applause.) Some of you here tonight might even have camped out in this yard when Mike was the governor of Indiana, but the scouting was very, very important. And by the way, where are our Indiana Scouts tonight? (Applause.) I wonder if the television cameras will follow you. They don’t like doing that when they see these massive crowds. They don’t like doing that. Hi, folks. (Applause.) A lot of love in this big, beautiful place. A lot of love, and a lot of love for our country. There’s a lot of love for our country.

Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke is here tonight. Come here, Ryan. (Applause.) Ryan is an Eagle Scout from Big Sky Country in Montana. (Applause.) Pretty good. And by the way, he is doing a fantastic job. He makes sure that we leave our national parks and federal lands better than we found them, in the best Scouting tradition. So thank you very much, Ryan. (Applause.)

Secretary of Energy Rick Perry, of Texas, an Eagle Scout from the Great State. (Applause.) The first time he came to the national jamboree was in 1964. He was very young then. And Rick told me just a little while ago, it totally changed his life. So, Rick, thank you very much for being here. And we’re doing a lot with energy. (Applause.)

And very soon, Rick, we will be an energy exporter. Isn’t that nice — an energy exporter? (Applause.) In other words we’ll be selling our energy instead of buying it from everybody all over the globe. So that’s good. (Applause.) We will be energy dominant. And I’ll tell you what, the folks in West Virginia who were so nice to me, boy, have we kept our promise. We are going on and on. So we love West Virginia. We want to thank you.

Where’s West Virginia by the way? (Applause.) Thank you.

Secretary Tom Price is also here. Today Dr. Price still lives the Scout Oath, helping to keep millions of Americans strong and healthy as our Secretary of Health and Human Services. And he’s doing a great job. And hopefully, he’s going to get the votes tomorrow to start our path toward killing this horrible thing known as Obamacare that’s really hurting us, folks. (Applause.)

AUDIENCE: USA! USA! USA!

THE PRESIDENT: By the way, you going to get the votes?

He better get them. He better get them. Oh, he better — otherwise, I’ll say, Tom, you’re fired. I’ll get somebody. (Applause.)

He better get Senator Capito to vote for it. You got to get the other senators to vote for it. It’s time. After seven years of saying repeal and replace Obamacare, we have a chance to now do it. They better do it. Hopefully they’ll do it.

As we can see just by looking at our government, in America, Scouts lead the way. And another thing I’ve noticed — and I’ve noticed it all my life — there is a tremendous spirit with being a Scout, more so than almost anything I can think of. So whatever is going on, keep doing it. It’s incredible to watch. Believe me. (Applause.)

Each of these leaders will tell you that their road to American success — and you have to understand, their American success, and they are a great, great story was paved with the patriotic American values as traditions they learned in the Boy Scouts. And some day, many years from now, when you look back on all of the adventures in your lives, you will be able to say the same: I got my start as a Scout just like these incredibly great people that are doing such a good job for our country. So that’s going to happen. (Applause.)

Boy Scout values are American values, and great Boy Scouts become great, great Americans. As the Scout Law says: “A Scout is trustworthy, loyal” — we could use some more loyalty, I will tell you that.

AUDIENCE: “helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.” (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: That was very impressive. (Laughter.) You’ve heard that before.

But here you learn the rewards of hard work and perseverance. Never ever give up, never quit. Persevere. Never, ever quit.

You learn the satisfaction of building a roaring campfire, reaching a mountain summit, or earning a merit badge after mastering a certain skill. There’s no better feeling than an achievement that you’ve earned with your own sweat, tears, resolve, hard work. There’s nothing like it. Do you agree with that?

AUDIENCE: Yes!

THE PRESIDENT: I’m waving to people back there so small I can’t even see them. Man, this is a lot of people. Turn those cameras back there, please. That is so incredible.

By the way, what do you think the chances are that this incredible, massive crowd, record-setting is going to be shown on television tonight? One percent or zero? (Applause.)

The fake media will say: President Trump — and you know what this is — President Trump spoke before a small crowd of Boy Scouts today.

That’s some — that is some crowd. (Applause.)

Fake media. Fake news. Thank you. And I’m honored by that, by the way, all of you people they can’t even see you. So thank you. I hope you can hear.

More HERE






A feminist who turned out to be a good woman after all

Will my baby granddaughter pay the price of my fight for equality? Sixties feminist JEANNETTE KUPFERMAN sees the emotional emptiness facing women today and despairs

The moment I held Amber Ann in my arms — just minutes after her birth — an unexpected cocktail of emotions nearly floored me; what can best be described as a mixture of unbridled joy mingled with apprehension.

My first grandchild was so perfectly formed, her eyes blinking in the bright hospital lights, her little fingers intertwined with mine. Of course, every baby is an individual miracle — but Amber was something of an actual miracle too, as my daughter-in-law Ewa, who suffered from endometriosis, had never believed she could conceive. Then, suddenly, she’d fallen pregnant, announcing it on my 75th birthday in a West End restaurant. I almost fell off my chair with excitement.

Much as I’d always longed for grandchildren, when I turned 70 I’d almost given up.

Both my son, Elias, a historian, now 52, and daughter, Mina, an editor and photographer, 50, married late in life, and I knew the chances were diminishing. Yet here was Amber Ann, my son’s first child, snuggling into my arms.

But as she did so, the emotions were more complex and bittersweet than the straightforward joy I’d anticipated. Of course, for now we can hold her safe, nurture her talents and encourage her development — but what will her future hold?

Just that morning another headline had caught my eye about schoolgirls feeling pressured to sleep with boys before they are ready. Not to mention the endless stories about the increasing numbers of teenagers experiencing depression, self-harming, eating disorders, atrocious bullying, sexting and gender uncertainty.

It makes me wonder what happened to the Brave New World we’d envisaged for our daughters and granddaughters. A world of unlimited possibilities, choices and equality for girls to become or do anything?

A world I — like many women — fought for in the Sixties.

Has feminism made life worse, not better, for today’s generation of girls?

Certainly, women have never existed in such a bleak emotional landscape.

The porn culture has virtually taken over every area of life, perhaps born from those Sixties cries for sexual liberation that you should have as much sex as you like, with whoever you like.

Today, even the most intimate acts are lived out onscreen. The ITV2 reality horror show Love Island, mercifully now finished, is just the culmination of years of the drip-drip effect of pornography; it’s bubble-wrapped candy floss with poison at its heart. Those involved might as well have been robots as there was precious little ‘love’ on show.

Meanwhile, traditional roles have become ever more ideologically despised — so much so that last week the very act of being a housewife or mother was banned from advertisements for perpetuating ‘outdated’ gender stereotypes.

For all the efforts of feminism, and the enlargement of women’s opportunities, it seems it’s also made that world more painful, complicated and unrewarding.

Burn your bras and wear miniskirts, we cried. Be free!

But aren’t young girls today just as imprisoned by the drive to bear their flesh as the cliched Victorian wife in crinolines? It’s almost as compulsory for a young woman to take a pouting semi-naked selfie today as it was for a teenager in the Fifties to wear bobby socks.

It’s somehow ironic that the one section of society which still dresses modestly — women in ethnic and religious minorities — say they do so to protect their sacred space as females.

Meanwhile, the majority of other young women brutally expose their bodies, catering to every tawdry male fantasy, as a sign of their ‘freedom’.

Who could have predicted such an obsession with thinness or worship of celebrities for the near-Frankensteinian outrages they inflict on their bodies?

The growing sexualisation of children continues with unsuitable tiny ‘bra’ bikinis and make-up and sex education at an unnecessarily early age. TV and the internet expose children to everything from crude language to sexual practices.

The things I worried about as a mother — failing exams, unwanted pregnancy, drinking too much — seem tame. How I fear for Amber Ann, in this age of endless choice and freedom.

The well-meaning battles we embarked on in idealistic youth have somehow robbed young women of the soul of femininity. We’ve lost something precious, distinctive and unique.

My own life — one where loss, hardship and struggle has always played a part — has taught me that simple pleasures matter just as much. And that’s the message I want to now share with my granddaughter’s generation. We’re in danger of losing the essence of womanhood in this brutal landscape.

A war baby, I was born while my mother, Eva, was an evacuee, and only returned to a grim post-war East London after my father, Nat, who eventually became a clothes manufacturer, was demobbed.

Though we had little money, I went to an exceptional primary school where a few inspirational teachers made all the difference, encouraging me to believe it was only education that would make for a better future.

Later, I walked miles alone every day to my grammar school, and had a freedom few young girls today have as they are pressured into extra-curricular activities or hooked on phones: freedom to think, imagine — just be.

Those school years weren’t only about doing well in exams. It was about enabling yourself to reach your full potential regardless of the job you would end up doing.

When boyfriends came along (aged about 14), via the youth club and jiving competitions, there was no compulsion to have sex. We wouldn’t have dreamed of anything more than kissing in the cinema, and sending passionate love letters.

Virginity was still expected until an engagement was announced or some commitment made, and I had the sort of father who would stand waiting for me on the pavement after a date. A boy had to make some effort at courtship even to get that first kiss.

Contrast this with the recent scenes in EastEnders where a teenager agonises over whether to strip off in reply to her new boyfriend’s ‘sexting’ and is given conflicting advice by friends, as if it would be the most normal thing for a young girl to do.

Would I want my granddaughter to think this was normal — even desirable? I feel so sad for young girls who will never receive a beautiful love letter or go on a romantic date with no strings attached.

I didn’t receive any sex education at school, apart from basic biology. I had the rather awkward talk from my mother, but we picked up most of it from our friends and forbidden books.

What we did know was that — whatever the urge — you did not go ‘all the way’ as a pre-Pill unwanted pregnancy was not only a disaster for the girl, but a tragedy for everyone involved.

This attitude appears inhuman now, but I’m not sure it hasn’t gone too far the other way, making for uncaring short-lived relationships with teen girls often the victims.

I suppose the main difference is we had boundaries. We knew what was expected of us, even if we kicked against it. I meet so many young women who don’t and they grow up feeling confused and unhappy. We argued with our parents — often bitterly — but we still listened to them. We threatened to leave home, but mainly didn’t, even if, like myself, you were a rebel.

I annoyed my father with my black eyeliner, long fringe and tendency to associate with ‘unsuitable’ poets and jazz musicians. But throughout, I wanted to please my parents.

There was no ‘diet industry’. Three square meals were put on the table daily, including thick soups, meat, potatoes and two veg, puddings with custard — and jam sandwiches to keep you going in-between.

We ate every bit and, amazingly, kept our tiny waists and figures without gyms or starvation, probably because we walked miles every day, danced a lot and junk food was unknown.

In my childhood, chubby babies were admired and even plump teens were reassured it was ‘only puppy-fat’ (which it usually was).

Back in the era before liposuction, women weren’t made to feel insecure about their figures. Obesity was unknown. How ironic that in our era of juice diets, toxins, and superfoods, women are fatter and unhappier with their bodies than ever.

After studying social anthropology at the London School of Economics, I became a dancer and a model for a while, escaped to New York and briefly worked as a research librarian.Then I made my parents very happy by marrying my late husband, Jacques, a painter, finally returning to London and having two children by the age of 24.

Inspired by my own teacher, the great anthropologist Mary Douglas, with whom I studied at University College London, I could already see that the women banging the drum for equality were going too far.

The spiritual joys and physical pleasures of womanhood had become ‘mechanised’ as I put it then; things that needed rectifying with political schemes to make us more like men, or medical treatment to quell our hormones and control our childbirth pangs.

Even birth has become too dominated by ‘choice’, overly technologised in the extreme.

Once a midwife came to your home to help you through birth. Now, the quest for equality — and medicalisation and male involvement in this once female domain — means many women have lost confidence in their capable bodies.

Although it’s seen as a great advance to involve fathers more in pregnancy and labour, and to have surgical teams on standby to assist in any birth, in some ways this has eroded women’s belief that she can do it alone.

Can it then be any coincidence that a growing number of women are terrified by what was once the natural way of things, and are having induced and difficult labours?

What was once a woman’s space has vanished. I felt so strongly about this that I trained as a National Childbirth Trust teacher and breastfeeding counsellor, teaching at Hammersmith hospital for a time, to try to help women rediscover the joys of this most natural, female act. It was an uphill battle.

I have learned, over the years, that the ‘stereotypical’ roles of femininity can give a sense of identity and security unmatched by anything in the corporate or professional world.

Having babies and showing domestic prowess doesn’t mean you have to be limited or stifled. On the contrary. And not having children — either through choice or circumstance — is no barrier to these nurturing, feminine roles.

After having my children, I got two further degrees, taught briefly and then built up a career as a writer and broadcaster.

Simultaneously, I tried to run a traditional household, cooking, entertaining and finger-painting with my toddlers. I often worked through the night and sometimes succumbed to the strain.

But I was there for my children. The overarching lesson of my life is that the people in it matter, and my ability to be there for them — as a woman, wife and mother, in all the many and varied expressions of both those roles — is vital.

I learned that life turns on a sixpence, and sadly you can lose ones you love. I was widowed young, aged 44, when Jacques died of cancer at 61. As a mother, I did overload my daughter with activities at times, encouraging her to aim high, perhaps placing a bit too much emphasis on work. But that was all part of the ‘Superwoman’ having-it-all ethic, which we now know isn’t true.

I’ve long been happy and secure enough in myself that I will don a pinny, scrub a floor and make jam, not seeing it as a threat to the other professional and public roles I have.

Indeed, I find it relaxing, almost spiritual in a way, to express myself as a woman in these traditional ways.

We’ve forgotten that even everyday tasks can nourish the soul — and you can find contentment in the boring certainties.

I hope my little Amber Ann discovers this, too. Whatever she becomes, she can create a good home-cooked meal, sit quietly in the garden with a book, or enjoy a day at the seaside with her own children.

I hope she has the faculty to be excited by some wonderful music, or transported by a ballet or painting.

I want her to feel euphoria because of the rare richness and uniqueness of life, and because of pride in her own innate womanhood — not be sozzled with booze or worse, ending up destroying body and soul in some demeaning, meaningless sexual encounter.

A rich and rewarding life isn’t one necessarily filled with endless choices. I hope she will have the luxury of more time than most girls today, to have a stillness and peace that will encourage creativity and daydreaming.

I want her not to be imprisoned by all those supposedly ‘equal’ choices out there, but to be loyal to her true self.

As a loving grandmother, my wish for her is not only to be kind, resilient and resourceful, but above all, confident as a woman in every single sense of the word.

SOURCE





Tories promote the right to choose your own sex

Strange British Conservatives

Adults will be able to change their gender legally without a doctor's diagnosis under government plans that will transform British society.

Men will be able to identify themselves as women - and women as men - and have their birth certificates altered to record their new gender.

Ministers plan to tear up the existing rules that mean people have to live for two years as their desired gender before they can officially change sex.

A consultation on the Gender Recognition Bill, to be published in the autumn, will also include proposals to scrap the requirement that people get a formal medical diagnosis of "gender dysphoria" before applying to switch gender.

SOURCE





Atheist's Speech At Christian Church Cancelled Because He Has Condemned Islamic Violence

A progressive radio station in Berkeley, California has cancelled a scheduled appearance by Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist and atheist, because he has previously criticized fundamentalist Islam as oppressive to women and generally violent.

The appearance by Dawkins had been scheduled for Aug. 9 at the First Congregational Church of Berkeley.

The radio station, KPFA, had invited Dawkins to the United Church of Christ-affiliated church to discuss his new latest book, "Science in the Soul: Collected Writings of a Passionate Rationalist."

KPFA had described the 76-year-old British scientist's new book as "excellent," according to Berkeleyside, a local news website.

However, on Thursday, the listener-funded progressive radio station - 94.1 on your FM dial - rescinded its speaking invitation to Dawkins because of some tweets and statements the atheist scientist has issued which have been critical of Muslims he describes as militant and radical.

"We had booked this event based entirely on his excellent new book on science when we didn't know he had offended and hurt - in his tweets and other comments on Islam, so many people," KPFA told ticket buyers in the email.

"KPFA does not endorse hurtful speech," the email also said. "While KPFA emphatically supports serious free speech, we do not support abusive speech. We apologize for not having had broader knowledge of Dawkins views much earlier."

University of Chicago evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne published the email and said KPFA sent it without ever informing Dawkins that was no longer invited to speak.

Coyne called the cancellation "a terrible blow for free speech."

"I'm sure that some of the Perpetually Offended, with perhaps Muslims among them, complained to the radio station, and KPFA caved," Coyne charged.

When Dawkins found out his speech had been canceled, the militant atheist fired back with a statement of his own.

"The idea that I have engaged in abusive speech against Islam is preposterous, which even the most rudimentary fact-checking by KPFA would have made clear," Dawkins said in a statement released on Friday by the Center for Inquiry.

"I have indeed strongly condemned the misogyny, homophobia, and violence of Islamism, of which Muslims - particularly Muslim women - are the prime victims. I make no apologies for denouncing those oppressive cruelties, and I will continue to do so," Dawkins also said.

The Center for Inquiry is an organization that promotes secular education organization. Dawkins is on its board of directors.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here

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Thursday, July 27, 2017



Western Values Are Superior

By Walter E. Williams

Here's part of President Donald Trump's speech in Poland: "The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive. Do we have the confidence in our values to defend them at any cost? Do we have enough respect for our citizens to protect our borders? Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?"

After this speech, which was warmly received by Poles, the president encountered predictable criticism. Most of the criticism reflected gross ignorance and dishonesty.

One example of that ignorance was penned in the Atlantic magazine by Peter Beinart, a contributing editor and associate professor of journalism and political science at the City University of New York. Beinart said, "Donald Trump referred 10 times to 'the West' and five times to 'our civilization.' His white nationalist supporters will understand exactly what he means." He added, "The West is a racial and religious term. To be considered Western, a country must be largely Christian (preferably Protestant or Catholic) and largely white."

Intellectual elites argue that different cultures and their values are morally equivalent. That's ludicrous. Western culture and values are superior to all others. I have a few questions for those who'd claim that such a statement is untrue or smacks of racism and Eurocentrism. Is forcible female genital mutilation, as practiced in nearly 30 sub-Saharan African and Middle Eastern countries, a morally equivalent cultural value? Slavery is practiced in Mauritania, Mali, Niger, Chad and Sudan; is it morally equivalent? In most of the Middle East, there are numerous limitations placed on women, such as prohibitions on driving, employment and education. Under Islamic law, in some countries, female adulterers face death by stoning. Thieves face the punishment of having their hands severed. Homosexuality is a crime punishable by death in some countries. Are these cultural values morally equivalent, superior or inferior to Western values?

During his speech, Trump asked several vital questions. "Do we have the confidence in our values to defend them at any cost? Do we have enough respect for our citizens to protect our borders? Do we have the desire and the courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?" There's no question that the West has the military might to protect itself. The question is whether we have the intelligence to recognize the attack and the will to defend ourselves from annihilation.

Much of the Muslim world is at war with Western civilization. Islamists' use multiculturalism as a foot in the door to attack Western and Christian values from the inside. Much of that attack has its roots on college campuses among the intellectual elite who indoctrinate our youth. Multiculturalism has not yet done the damage in the U.S. that it has in Western European countries - such as England, France and Germany - but it's on its way.

My colleague Dr. Thomas Sowell reveals some of the problem. He says, "Those in the Islamic world have for centuries been taught to regard themselves as far superior to the 'infidels' of the West, while everything they see with their own eyes now tells them otherwise." Sowell adds, "Nowhere have whole peoples seen their situation reversed more visibly or more painfully than the peoples of the Islamic world." Few people, such as Persians and Arabs, once at the top of civilization, accept their reversals of fortune gracefully. Moreover, they don't blame themselves and their culture. They blame the West.

By the way, one need not be a Westerner to hold Western values. One just has to accept the sanctity of the individual above all else.

SOURCE






State Department Lawyers Removing References to ISIS `Genocide' Against Christians, Other Religious Minorities

Obama holdovers

The State Department's top lawyers are systematically removing the word "genocide" to describe the Islamic State's mass slaughter of Christians, Yazidis, and other ethnic minorities in Iraq and Syria from speeches before they are delivered and other official documents, according to human rights activists and attorneys familiar with the policies.

Additionally, Democratic senators are delaying confirmation of Mark Green, Trump's pick to head the U.S. Agency for International Development who has broad bipartisan support.

These efforts guarantee that Obama-era policies that worked to exclude Iraq's Christian and other minority religious populations from key U.S. aid programs remain in place, the activists said.

Richard Visek, who was appointed by President Obama as head the State Department's Office of Legal Adviser in October 2016, is behind the decision to remove the word "genocide" from official documents, according to Nina Shea, an international human rights lawyer who directs the Hudson Institute's Center for Religious Freedom.

"I don't think for a minute it's a bureaucratic decision-it's ideological," said Shea, who also spent 12 years as a commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, or CIRF, from 1999 to 2012.

A State Department spokesman on Monday said he would look into the matter and respond.

The latest moves from the State Department's Office of the Legal Adviser appear aimed at rolling back then-Secretary of State John Kerry's March 2016 genocide determination. Kerry's much-anticipated genocide designation came after months of equivocation and detailed documentation by interested parties that the Islamic State is responsible for genocide against Yazidis, Christians, and Shia Muslims.

It was one of the few times in history that the United States designated ongoing mass murders against ethnic or religious minorities as meeting the legal definition of genocide laid out in a 1948 treaty. That agreement requires signatories, including the United States, to take steps to "prevent and punish" genocide.

A bipartisan group of Capitol Hill lawmakers and activists, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) and Rep. Robert Aderholt (R., Ala.) were hoping the designation would help direct millions of dollars in U.S. relief funds to Christian, Yazidi, and other persecuted religious minority communities.

ISIS murders and kidnappings have decimated the Christian population in Iraq, which numbered between 800,000 and 1.4 million in 2002, reducing it to fewer than 250,000 now. Without action, activists and charities say, Christians could disappear completely from Iraq in the near future.

After meeting with Pope Francis in May, President Trump vowed to do everything in his power to defend and protect the "historic Christian communities of the Middle East."

Activists and Catholic leaders are now calling on Trump to turn the rhetoric into action on the ground and help get U.S. aid to these persecuted communities trying to rebuild their homes and their lives in Iraq.

These advocates want the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and the United Nations to allow church groups and other religious-affiliated relief organizations to receive government aid, a practice prohibited during the Obama administration.

In early May, Congress allocated more than $1.3 billion in funds for refugee assistance and included specific language to try to ensure that at least some of the money is used to assist persecuted religious minorities, including Christians, Yazidis, and Shia Muslims-all groups the State Department deemed victims of genocide in 2016.

Nevertheless, only $10 million is specifically earmarked for Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities. The Trump administration has until the end of September, when the stop-gap funding bill runs out, to ensure it distributes the funds in the most effective way.

"There is congressional legislation . that calls for the U.S. government to stop excluding the genocide-targeted minorities in Iraq," Shea said. "This has been a pervasive problem that this aid has not been getting to them."

"Iraq is home to one of the four largest remaining Christian communities in the Middle East that are about to become extinct," she said. "Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama made catastrophic mistakes that left these communities on the brink of extinction, but it's going to be on President Trump's watch as to whether they survive or become extinct-it's going to be his policies that make or break the situation."

Instead of going through Iraqi government agencies or other internationally recognized groups, activists say the best way to get the aid to Christians and other persecuted minorities is through local Iraqi Catholic dioceses and parishes and other religious organizations, such as the Knights of Columbus, which have spent years on the ground working with these communities.

The money would be specifically designated for relief efforts for these persecuted communities and could not be used for other purposes, such as church-building or more general church operations.

Groups say the special allocation is needed because Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities often do not go to Muslim-dominated refugee camps out of fear they will be targeted, killed, or kidnapped.

After the Iraqi army retook Mosul from the Islamic State with the help of U.S. forces, much international attention has focused on helping rebuild the Sunni community so that ISIS cannot regain its influence there through sleeper cells or other supportive Islamic terrorist groups.

Shea said Christians will also play a key role in stabilizing the area in and around Mosul if they have enough aid to rebuild their homes in the area and other parts of Northern Iraq.

They could also combat Iran's colonization of northern Iraq, where pro-Iranian militias are buying up Christian land in the area to try to broaden their influence.

"Christians and Yazidis need to be able to go back to their towns just to hold them-it's a big national security priority for the U.S.," she said.

In late June, Rubio, along with GOP Sens. John Cornyn of Texas, James Lankford of Oklahoma, and Ben Sasse of Nebraska, sent a letter to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urging him to ensure that the 2017 omnibus appropriations are distributed to "vulnerable and persecuted religious minorities, including victims of genocide designated" by former Secretary of State Kerry.

"It would be a deathblow to pluralism and the prospect of religious freedom and diversity in any future Iraq," the senators wrote, if these victims of genocide don't receive the humanitarian aid Congress tried to direct to them.

In responding to the senators' letter on July 10, the State Department avoided the question of whether it would allow Catholic or other charitable organizations to receive the appropriations in order to help the Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities.

Instead, Charles Faulkner of State's Bureau of Legislative Affairs cited a list of U.S. efforts to help the "plight of religious minorities in Iraq" and said the department "shares your grave concern about the situation facing Iraq's religious and ethnic minorities."

The letter also restates the State Department's policy and that of the United Nation's of distributing U.S. relief based on means-tested need, instead of the genocide designation providing some priority for targeted communities on the verge of extinction.

"The U.S. government has also provided more than $1.3 billion in humanitarian assistance since 2014 for vulnerable Iraqis in Iraq and in the region," the letter stated. "This assistance is distributed according to individual need, and many members of minority groups have benefited from it because of their unique vulnerabilities."

Faulkner said the State Department "makes efforts" to ensure that the needs of "minority community members" are "taken into consideration," when there are concerns that these communities don't have access to assistance.

In addition to U.N. stabilization projects in Iraq, he said State's Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor is managing 22 grants and "interagency agreements" in Iraq, and "since 2004 has been the lead U.S. government entity programming directly to support inclusion of religious and ethnic minorities and other marginalized populations in Iraq."

SOURCE






The Left's backward-looking racial narrative.

Conflating past and present is politically expedient for liberals, but it doesn't help black Americans

President Barack Obama traveled to Alabama on March 7, 2015, to deliver a speech marking the 50th anniversary of "Bloody Sunday," when 600 peaceful protesters seeking the right to vote were beaten and tear-gassed by mounted police as they tried to march across Selma's Edmund Pettus Bridge. It was one of the more symbolic moments of a deeply symbolic presidency - an opportunity to remind the country of how much racial progress had been made over the past half century. But Obama was interested in more than just commemorating a turning point in the civil-rights struggles of the mid 20th century. And so a speech rightly honoring "the courage of ordinary Americans willing to endure billy clubs and the chastening rod" and "keep marching towards justice" was laced with Democratic talking points and comparisons between the problems that blacks faced during legal discrimination and the problems they faced five decades later.

To that end, Obama's remarks invoked "unfair sentencing" and "overcrowded prisons" in the criminal-justice system while making no mention of black-white disparities in crime rates. He also suggested that voter-identification laws threaten the black franchise and suppress turnout. Yet in 2012, blacks voted at higher rates than whites, including in states with the most stringent voter-identification mandates. And in 2014, voter turnout among all groups was slightly higher in Texas, which has a strict voter-identification law, than it was in New York, which does not.

    Parallels between America under Jim Crow and America under a twice-elected black president and two black attorneys general may be tortured, but Obama also knew that such rhetoric plays well politically for the Left and distracts from liberalism's poor track record in helping the black underclass. The goal is to keep black voters angry, paranoid, and content to put the onus on others to address racial disparities and negative black outcomes. The identity politics practiced by liberals today treats blacks not as individuals with agency but rather as a group of victims who are both blameless and helpless. "Liberalism in the twenty-first century is, for the most part, a moral manipulation that exaggerates inequity and unfairness in American life in order to justify overreaching public policies and programs," explained the author Shelby Steele. This liberalism is

invested in an overstatement of America's present sinfulness based on the nation's past sins. It conflates the past into the present so that the present is indistinguishable from the ugly past. And so modern liberalism is grounded in a paradox: it tries to be progressive and forward looking by fixing its gaze backward. It insists that America's shameful past is the best explanation of its current social problems.


    This liberal conflation of the past and present is without a doubt politically expedient - note how Democrats regularly dismiss any Republican criticism of liberal social policies as being motivated by racial hostility towards blacks - but it's hard to see how diverting attention from far more credible explanations of racial gaps today helps blacks advance. "Despite frequent assertions to the contrary, many of the seemingly intractable problems encountered by a significant number of black Americans do not result from racial discrimination," wrote economist Walter Williams in Race and Economics: How Much Can Be Blamed on Discrimination? "That is not to say discrimination does not exist. Nor is it to say discrimination has no adverse effects.

For policy purposes, however, the issue is not whether or not racial discrimination exists but the extent to which it explains what we see today." The political Left wins votes by telling black people that racism, in one form or another, explains racial disparities that only government programs can address. And groups like the NAACP raise money and stay relevant by pushing the same narrative - a narrative that also maintains broad and largely unquestioned support in the mainstream media.

    A few days after Obama's Selma address, National Public Radio aired an interview with the city's mayor, George Evans. The interviewer wanted to know how "what happened in Selma 50 years ago fits into the current conversations about race relations in this country." But Evans, the city's second black mayor, didn't see a clear connection between the problems that blacks faced five decades ago and current obstacles.

    "I'm not sure how it fits," Evans responded. "We have a lot more crime going on in 2015 all over the country than we had in 1965. Segregation existed, but we didn't have the crime. So now, even though we've gained so much through voting rights and Bloody Sunday, we've stepped backwards when it comes to crime and drugs in the jail system - things like that."

    Apparently, that wasn't the answer the interviewer was looking for, and so she pressed the mayor. "What's life like for the average black citizen in Selma," where 80 percent of residents are black, she asked. "I mean, your city does have challenges. You've got chronic unemployment rates. What are the biggest problems from your vantage point?" Still, the mayor refused to do what Obama had done in his speech and make facile historical parallels.

    "Well, from the standpoint of jobs, we have a lot of jobs," said Evans. "It's just that there are a lot of people who do not have the skill level to man these jobs. And that's the biggest problem we have. There are industries and businesses here that are searching for people to come to work. But many times they're not able to get the jobs because they're not going back to pick up that trade or that technical skill that's needed in order to take that job"

    The mayor may not have been telling NPR what it wanted to hear, but his views were perfectly sensible. After having declined significantly in the 1950s, violent crime began surging in the late 1960s. Although it has fallen since the early 1990s, the violent-crime rate in 2014 was higher than it was in 1965 and has since returned to 1990s levels in major cities. Evans's observation that a high unemployment rate can result from factors other than a shortage of jobs also jibes with the social-science research.

Moreover, sometimes the problem isn't a lack of jobs or even job skills so much as a lack of interest in filling jobs that are available. The 2015 Baltimore riots that followed the death of a black suspect in police custody were linked by some observers to high unemployment rates in the ghetto. But a black construction worker at a job site that had been looted told a reporter that in his experience the neighborhood youths who were "protesting" seemed to have little interest in finding legitimate employment. "I see about 30 people walking by here every day, and only about two of them will bother to ask whether we're hiring," he said. "You have some brilliant kids, extraordinary talent, but they don't see opportunity."

SOURCE





Having kids is much more fun than parents make out

A MEMO to fellow parents of young children: I'm starting to worry that we're doing a truly terrible PR job.

Our performance hasn't yet reached catastrophic birth-rate-dropping-off-a-cliff levels but if we were actually being employed to market parenthood to the masses? The termination of our collective contract would be imminent.

Last week I was having lunch with a group of friends, most of whom have kids, when one of our number announced that his partner is pregnant. "Wonderful news!" We all chorused, ordering another round of flat whites to celebrate. Before proceeding to warn our mate of the abject horror that lies before him.

Say goodbye to long luxurious brunches and weekends with nothing in particular planned. Prepare to sacrifice half your income on nappies, childcare fees, and overpriced prams. Forget about listening to music you like, The Wiggles and the `womb noises' setting on the baby sleep app are the new soundtrack of your life.

Welcome to tantrums, latching issues, constant whining and a complete lack of privacy. Sex will become a distant memory because on the rare occasion that one of you is in the mood, the other will be too tired. And speaking of tired . have we mentioned yet that you will NEVER SLEEP AGAIN? EVER.

It was a sick, indulgent pleasure to scare him in this way. We relished the opportunity to complain about how tough parenting can be to an uninitiated newbie. Rolling our eyes at one another in solidarity, smug in the knowledge that our unsuspecting childless mate couldn't possibly get it. Well, not yet, anyway.

A few days later I caught up with a colleague from a previous job. We'd worked together before I became a mum. She hugged me tight when I arrived, looked meaningfully into my eyes and said, "You look really, really well".

It was as if I'd recently recovered from a prolonged illness. There was pity and concern in her expression. It took me a moment to realise she was referring to my not-so-recently-acquired status as a parent.

"How is it going?" she asked, after a suitable period of small talk. "It must be incredibly hard. You know, I've always wanted a family but sometimes I'm honestly not sure if I could do it. Or if I even want to do it anymore."

For as long as the world can remember, bitching about parenting - particularly motherhood - has been off limits. Children were to be cherished, pregnant women protected, and the miracle of life was not a burden but a blessing, and all that.

You weren't supposed to confess that raising a family is actually incredibly hard work. You weren't supposed to complain.

So the mothers of times gone by pushed through, stoic in their silence. When women began entering the workforce in large numbers - and realised that paid work was comparatively easier than child rearing - things began to change.

We started becoming more honest about parenting. The internet created new communities where parents could gather together, joke, bitch and laugh at how tough looking after little people can be. Honesty gave way to camaraderie.

It became socially acceptable to admit that entertaining a child all day can be deathly dull. Complaining about lack of sleep and fantasies of running away to the nearest cocktail bar and never looking back became a method of parental bonding. So we did more of it, and more of it and more and more and more until . many of us simply forgot to talk about the good stuff at all.

I don't write this to be preachy. Becoming a mum is unquestionably the most difficult thing I have ever done.

Less than 14 days into my son's time on this planet, I may or may not have sobbed to my husband that I'd ruined my life. Those first few months made it abundantly clear to me why sleep deprivation is a torture device. There are days when the grind of toddler-wrangling utterly grind me down.

I am most definitely guilty of scaring non-parents about what's to come.

And yes, I've enjoyed doing it.

But becoming a parent has also been the single best thing that has ever happened to me. My kid brings joy and delight to the everyday. I am rediscovering the world through his eyes, finding the exceptional in the ordinary and marvelling at it all.

My husband and I laugh more than we ever did before our kid was born. And speaking of my husband, I've fallen in love with him all over again, watching him become a dad.

So, fellow parents of small people, next time you're having a whine, or a bitch, or a vent to someone without kids: Try to remember the good stuff. Don't pull back on your complaining because gosh dammit, toilet training is the very definition of hell on earth. But just try to throw in some of the good stuff as well.

The parents of the future will thank you for it when it's their turn.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the  incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American "liberals" often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of  other countries.  The only real difference, however, is how much power they have.  In America, their power is limited by democracy.  To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already  very powerful: in America's educational system -- particularly in the universities and colleges.  They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did:  None.  So look to the colleges to see  what the whole country would be like if "liberals" had their way.  It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH,   EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and  DISSECTING LEFTISM.   My Home Pages are here or   here or   here.  Email me (John Ray) here.  Email me (John Ray) here

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