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Sunday, June 29, 2008

[vinnomot] Fight FOX on Facebook



---------- Forwarded Message ----------
Dear MoveOn member,

Great news! Since Friday, over a quarter-million people have signed our petition telling FOX to stop using racism, prejudice, and fear to smear Barack Obama. The energy is so high that we're forming a Facebook group to allow even more people to send a message to FOX. Can you join the group and then invite some friends? Here's the link:

http://www.moveon.org/r?r=3874&id=13026-1682262-ygAlWhx&t=1

Thanks for all you do.

–Adam G., Peter, Anna, Justin, and the rest of the team

P.S. Here's the original email sent Friday:

 


Click here to tell FOX:
"FOX must stop injecting racism, prejudice, and fear into our political dialogue. We intend to hold FOX, its advertisers, and its personalities accountable for FOX's attempts to smear the Obamas." 

Sign the petition


 

Dear MoveOn member,

Right now, FOX is trying to paint Barack Obama as foreign, un-American, suspicious, and scary. They're trying to send Americans the message that our country's first viable black candidate for President is not "one of us."

We've seen this before from FOX. They won't stop until it becomes too painful to continue—until the public calls them out and advertisers start getting worried.

Now is the time to draw a line in the sand by putting FOX on notice that their behavior won't be tolerated. Over 100,000 Americans have already expressed their outrage. Can you make that number even bigger by adding your name to this message?

"FOX must stop injecting racism, prejudice, and fear into our political dialogue. We intend to hold FOX, its advertisers, and its personalities accountable for FOX's attempts to smear the Obamas."

Clicking here will sign the petition:

http://pol.moveon.org/stopthesmears/o.pl?id=13026-1682262-ygAlWhx&t=6

FOX's longtime pattern of smearing Obama and the black community is well documented.1 But the outrageous moments have increased in the last month.

First, a paid FOX commentator accidentally confused "Obama" with "Osama" and then joked on the air about killing Obama.2 Next, a FOX anchor said a playful fist bump by Barack and Michelle Obama could be a "terrorist fist jab."3 And then, FOX called Michelle Obama "Obama's baby mama"—slang for an unmarried mother of a man's child, and a clear attempt to associate the Obamas with negative stereotypes about black people.4

If you know others who'd find FOX's recent actions despicable, please ask them to sign the petition too. The more people who sign, the bigger our impact will be.

Our friends at ColorOfChange.org—an online advocacy group focused on the issues of importance to the black community—are leading this charge. They will deliver thousands of petition signatures as a group to FOX's headquarters (in front of other media cameras, so FOX feels more heat). Here's how they describe the situation:

After each of the incidents mentioned [above], FOX issued some form of weak apology. But what does it mean when you slap someone in the face, apologize the next day, then slap them again? It means the apology is meaningless.

Now is the time to call out FOX for these attacks and their fake apologies. The first stop is FOX. Next will be their advertisers and the FCC. If we don't push back now, we will see more of the same from now until November. Please join us to demand that FOX answer for its behavior:

Add your name to this important cause by clicking here—then tell your friends:

http://pol.moveon.org/stopthesmears/o.pl?id=13026-1682262-ygAlWhx&t=7

Thanks for all you do.

–Adam G., Peter, Anna, Justin, and the rest of the team
  

Sources:

1. "Fox Attacks Obama." Brave New Films at FoxAttacks.com, February 2007
http://bravenewfilms.org/blog/573-fox-attacks-obama

"Fox Attacks: Black America," Brave New Films at FoxAttacks.com, June 2007
http://foxattacks.com/blog/572-fox-attacks-black-america

"Fox Attacks: Obama, Part 2," Brave New Films at FoxAttacks.com, March 2008
http://foxattacks.com/blog/32376-fox-attacks-obama-part-2

2. "Fox News Jokes About Killing Obama," YouTube video posted May 25, 2008
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjYpkvcmog0

3. "Fox News' E.D. Hill teased discussion of Obama dap: "A fist bump? A pound? A terrorist fist jab?" Media Matters, June 6, 2008
http://mediamatters.org/items/200806060007?f=h_clips

4. "Fox News in trouble again over Obama smear: 'baby mama'" Los Angeles Times, June 12, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=3855&id=13026-1682262-ygAlWhx&t=8


Want to support our work? We're entirely funded by our 3.2 million members—no corporate contributions, no big checks from CEOs. And our tiny staff ensures that small contributions go a long way. Chip in here.


PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee. This email was sent to Mohiuddin Anwar on June 29, 2008. To change your email address or update your contact info, click here. To remove yourself from this list, click here.


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[vinnomot] Reality Hazards, Crime and Iconised Economy

Reality Hazards, Crime and Iconised Economy

Troubled Galaxy Destroyed Dreams: Chapter 16

Palash Biswas

http://troubledgalaxydetroyeddreams.blogspot.com/

We are habitual to celebrate the rat race amongst the Generation Next
lost in virtual Reality in an Era of Sovereign Market run by the Post
Modern Manusmriti Apartheid White Zionist Hindu Galaxy Order of
corporate Imperialism.Young people are being tragically corrupted by
a seductive new form of popular entertainment. Oddly enough, this
seems to happen in every generation.

Columbus happens to be the Post Modern Manu Maharaj. The icon of
Hindu Zionist white Galaxy Imperialism Columbus happens to be
Corporate now. The Phenomenon of Genocide is corporate. It is
ultimate silencer as the indigenous people, always deprived of
knowledge, is defeated in a war of Information. The History of
Genocide repeats itself in every part of this Globe.

The Genocide is Iconised! It is Open Market. It is neoliberalism. It
is fashion. It is Reality Show. It is TV clipping, Print Media,
Net,Mobile,Fashion,Ramp,Style,Brand and Vogue ultimate.

Our ancestors could not resist , neither we may!

Bishop Fred Henry exposes the moral bankruptcy of his brand of
Catholicism with his statement on the cervical cancer vaccine. That
he would prefer to risk anyone having this terrible disease over
possibly appearing to condone early sexual behaviour is clearly a
sign of his deeply skewed priorities. Young people are going to have
sex. Shaking your finger at them doesn't help, nor does exposing them
to additional risks from the practice by not preparing them with
proper education and health-care precautions. The same attitude in
Africa was a huge contributor to the spread of the AIDS virus, as
Catholic priests taught people there that condoms did not work. If
you believe this behaviour is wrong, then teach your children that,
but don't make the hazards of sexual behaviour greater just to prove
that you disapprove of it.

Today newspapers in India are full of news of murder committed by
teenagers like Vishal or Chandra. The National Crime Research Bureau
(NCRB) says that 83.7 per cent crimes committed by juveniles in 2006
came under the Indian Penal Code. While Maharashtra reported the
highest number of IPC crimes among juveniles in 2006, Madhya Pradesh
registered the highest number of crimes such as murder, rape,
kidnapping and abduction. The news of teenagers being used to smuggle
marijuana makes almost regular headlines in the dailies.

Sometimes the teenager is a drug addict who is being sent to a mental
hospital. Sometimes it is one accused of murdering his alcoholic
father. At other times it is a teenager committing suicide after
fighting with his parents.

Merit lists are published every year. Photos create symphony of
Iconisation. Interviews are live casted. But we never try to locate
the toppers in different exams during the year followed.What happens
to them?

One of them, Indrajeet Chatterjee from Kolkata surfaced this time to
open our eyes, if we have twosome! Indrajeet was published to have
stood Seventh in the Higher Secondary Exams in 1982, but later
enquiries proved the claims to be false. But Kolkata media
highlighted this so called standing.

In fact, Generation Next is engaged in super rat race. nothing is
enough less than ninety percent in any exams. Toppers often get Full
marks minus two or three.Bulk of candidates get Star. The appear in
different competitive exams. Some of them happen to be lucky to get
admission in IIT or IIM. Many of them get admission in Medical and
engineering Colleges. But thousands of Star students are not lucky
enough to follow up with their earlier success. Liberalisation,
Privatisation and Globalisation have killed the Natural Resources,
Natural Livelihood and Indigenous production system. Job is never
available in Open Market. Reservation wo'nt do any help either.
Campus recruitment is a solution who get admission in suitable
institution with a meat of Donation in lacs. MBAs do work as boys in
five star hotels. engineers struggle to get job.

Graduation, Post Graduation and Research students may have better
knowledge, but have very little scope in job market. Only job
available is marketing. Some bright students get very high salary.
Some get high. Some go abroad. But the rest have to satisfy with
substandard jobs and working conditions.

What option is there for the Rest?

But the Consumer Culture makes them habitual with hi-fie hazardous
lifestyle which they may not afford in along run of time.IT industry
with some spoken English and technical diploma or degree opens doors
of outsourcing. The long working hours and tough schedule create an
environment of depression. The temporary Hire Fire jobs with Hi FIE
salary stays very little.But the style and brand remain. Cyber crimes
are not surprising in India nowadays. The Bollywood films have
innovated ways of perfect crime. They have the lead. And the result,
we know very well.

In the last 12 months, some 10 Indian government ministry websites
have been targets of cyber attacks. Recently, security experts with
Boston-based Core Security Technologies said such attackers
could "gain control of countries' water treatment plants, natural gas
pipelines and other critical utilities".

At the same time, a number of online privacy concerns have surfaced.
Mediadefender, a system designed to spot and prevent copyright
infringement, has come under fire for crippling networks for alleged
piracy. In August 2007, Comcast, the second largest Internet service
provider, or ISP, in the US had drawn flak from advocacy groups
for "actively interfering with Internet traffic", choking bandwidth
to file-sharing networks such as Bittorent. In a phone interview,
Howard Schmidt, an information networks expert and a senior cyber-
security adviser in the Bush administration, talks about the growing
concern over surveillance and monitoring on the Internet.

The Apple iPhone has not officially hit Indian shores, yet spammers
have launched a malicious email spam campaign that employs social-
engineering tactics. Visitors who click on an embedded link
for `presentation' or for `more information,' on the iPhone, could
end up downloading a trojan — malware that transmits a computer
virus, opening up the computer system to fraudsters.

Previously, a similar attack designed around iPhone was discovered by
Sunbelt Software. Windows-run computers were infected by the malware,
triggered by visiting legitimate sites such as yahoo.com or
google.com where an embedded link prompted users to visit
iPhone.com.

Users were redirected to a pseudo site under the control of
fraudsters. Victims were then asked to send payment for their Apple
iPhone through Western Union or Moneygram rather than via a credit
card.

These scams, say experts, are part of a criminal-to-criminal (C2C)
business model. A Finjan (web security solutions provider), report
states: "Owners of malicious sites share their victims with other
site owners in order to leverage the strength of one site and provide
business to the other." Trojan 2.0 attacks use regular Web 2.0
technology and websites to exploit legitimate web services, said
Finjan, which has monitored such attacks through its Malicious Code
Research Centre (MCRC).


Just create Icons! And then, escalate the killingfields! The infinite
Hunting ground! This is Vogue today. Consumer culture needs a Killing
Instict and thus, you don`t feel anything when uprooted! It is
precise surgical operation. Man made calamities play havoc while you
indulge yourselves in Carnivals infinite with Virtual Icons created
to destroy you! Thus, the Zionist Hindu Manusmriti Order has not to
face any resistance and the Brahminical hegemony remains intact. You
are spellbound by the Icons and never feel the pain to react in
revolt!

Iconised economy demands fresh Icons to boost the market. Brand is
the last word. So shining India is a Brand and brand happens to be
the Capitalist Marxist Chief Minister of Left Ruled West Bengal.
Sensex India gets a new set of Icons to boost Sensex india. West
Bengal is facing a rough weather and All local TV Channels focused on
either Indian Idol or Twenty 20 World cup. Wacthing Indian TV
Channels you have to stumble on either Laughter channel, Soft porn
covered crime stories or reality shows. All realities are so
subverted and you have no Chance to get a news update. So it is the
same case with the Print Media which press for more skin, more ramps,
more sensation, more scandals, more crime, more style, eat outs, life
style and Icons. News always overplayed or underplayed!

The established Icons are also engaged in hazardous life style
leading to crime.

Breaking News! Putting all rumors and speculations into rest, the
Noida police finally arrested Arushi Talwar's father Dr. Rajesh
Talwar. Arushi's mother Nupur Talwar and Dr. Rajesh's friend and
assistant Dr. Anita Durrani is also under scanner. The police
confirmed that they have been arrested on charges of murder of Arushi
and Hemraj. The Noida SSP had yesterday hinted at the possible angle
of honour killing.

14-day remand won, CBI expects help's help to seize Arushi, Hemraj's
phones, murder weapon

After getting Durani family help Rajkumar's custody for 14 days in
the Noida double murder case, CBI officials on Saturday said the
suspect has promised help in recovery of crucial evidence, including
Arushi Talwar's mobile phone.

The prosecution submitted Rajkumar's confessional statement, made
under Section 161 of CrPC, in the court of special judicial
magistrate Sapna Mishra Tripathi along with the case diary. The case
diary says Rajkumar has confessed that he had first switched off
Arushi's mobile phone and later allegedly broke it and hid it. The
case diary also says he has "agreed to help the investigation agency
in finding Hemraj's mobile and khukri" used in the crime.

The CBI had arrested Rajkumar on Friday as third suspect in the May
15 murders —Arushi's father Dr Rajesh Talwar and his compounder
Krishna are in judicial custody. In court today, Rajkumar wore a
relaxed look, at times even cracking a smile.

Next Battlefield is the space and you have an Icon to prepare for
that.Cricket Carnival goes on with Reality Shows and Parliamentary
soap opera!

Whatever may be the case, Shinjini is an example of parental
ambitiousness and illusions. Great expectations of parents have
resulted in disasters. Nowadays, from toddlers to teenagers, children
are subjected to tremendous pressure. The media makes things worse.
Even after the publication of Madhyamik or CBSE results, we find the
TV channels arranging interviews with the rank holders, thus rousing
such expectations in the mind of parents of other children. It is
true that Shinjini's family is under great stress. But the family
cannot avoid all responsibilities regarding their daughter's illness.
They should have taken due precaution about Shinjini's sickness
before they engaged her in the reality show.

Only the other day, we got to know the horrid story of little
Biswajit, who was killed with a bat by his own father as he wanted
his son to be the best tennis player. Parents, today, run after the
illusion of money and fame. They make their children the scapegoats
without taking care of their weaknesses and drawbacks.

A city court Tuesday remanded Bengali film producer Indrajit
Chatterjee, arrested for alleged Rs.150 million bank fraud, in police
custody till July 5. Chatterjee's bail plea was rejected by the Chief
Metropolitan Magistrate's court Tuesday. He was arrested Monday from
Howrah district's Kona Expressway.

The police Tuesday arrested Amit Sen, an associate of Chatterjee,
from the Entally area in the central part of the city.

"We have got some important documents regarding the fraud from him.
Another partner-in-crime, Dipankar Chatterjee, was nabbed Monday late
night," city police deputy commissioner (detective department) Jawed
Shamim told IANS.

Chatterjee took loans from several banks against a single property in
2006 and even produced a Bengali film before going undercover. He
defrauded the banks of about Rs.150 million, a police official said.

"Even CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) had filed two cases
against Chatterjee for similar crimes," the official said.

Ban on cellphone in classroom cannot be interpreted as a restraint on
the rights of the learners. Excessive use of cellphones is an
interference into the rights of others in the classroom. It is a huge
distraction. The implementation of the ban is a smart decision.. The
society should have its own disciplines. The academic institutions
expect this kind of restrain from the teachers and the taught.
Schools may have intercom systems and people to search and reach out
to the students in an emergency. Schools are for education, not for
talking/messaging/downloading with a cellphone. Cellphones are a
luxury convenience, not a necessity.

Cell phones and iPods play a big part in a learners life, in the post
graduate and research classes, especially in science subjects. But at
the same time we should not forget that students need motivation to
do work in class. For example, if they have a quiet time, they might
find it easier to complete their work if they listen to music. But it
should not be at the cost of disturbing others.

OF LATE, the Toronto school board has banned cellphones in the
classrooms. Now, in India cellphones must be switched off in schools
and colleges of the North East. In the only autonomous college of
West Bengal, St Xaviers, cellphones have to be kept off in
classrooms. Even in the corridors, the students are not allowed to
use cellphones as it is regarded disruptive to the learning
environment. To be hanging around a cellphone in front of a teacher
is to show disrespect to the teachers.

The family of 16-year-old Shinjini Sengupta landed in Bangalore from
Kolkata on Friday, pinning its hopes on the National Institute of
Mental Health and Neuro-sciences (NIMHANS). While doctors are yet to
arrive at a final diagnosis, they surmise that depression could be a
likely cause.

SHINJINI SENGUPTA, a 16-year old class XI student of a reputed
Kolkata school, participated in a popular dance contest, which is
aired Monday - Wednesday on ETV Bangla channel. During the shooting
of the reality show, Shinjini was rebuked for her lackadaisical
performance by the judges. The incident made Shinjini psychologically
and biologically vulnerable. She was traumatised over being scolded
and suffered a paralytic attack. She slipped into depression and then
lost her speech and finally could not even use her limbs. She is now
seriously ill and has been admitted to the state-run National
Institute of Mental Health and Sciences (NIMHANS).

Shinjini couldn't cope with the "public humiliation" by judges. She
has slipped into depression, has stopped speaking and can't even move
her limbs. She was brought to Bangalore after doctors in Kolkata
couldn't zero in on the exact cause of her condition.

Psychiatrists feel that Shinjini might have been a victim of extreme
form of depression. General physicians ascribed the serious illness
to her biological vulnerability and disorder in the spinal chord. The
neurological disorder led to severe weakness and numbness for
Shinjini. The doctors are not sure if Shinjini will at all be fully
cured. This is simply unfortunate that a talented girl like Shinjini
has become a victim of such incurable sickness. Shinjini has been
subjected to tremendous pressure. The parents as well as the judges
are responsible for the girl's sad state to a large extent.

Days after 16-year-old girl from Kolkata went into coma after being
rebuked on a reality show, opinion is divided over who is to be
blamed for her plight -- her parents or the judges on the show.

In what was a dramatic moment on a reality show, the judgest decided
to oust a young teenage girl from the show, which left her in tears.
However, for 16-year-old Shinjini Sengupta, the rebuke proved to be
devastating. The oust affected her to an extent that she went into
depression.

Within days, she lost her speech and was unable to even move her
limbs. Shinjini is now admitted in a hospital in Bangalore, where she
is under psychatric care. Devastated at what has happened to his
daughter, Shinjini's father said that the line has to be drawn
somewhere. He said, "I am fighting for my daughter's life and death.
So this should not take place for other father's as well. Such kind
of programme's should be stopped."

However, the judges said that it is not their fault, but that of
parents who push their kids too far. Ringo -- one of the judges
said, "It is ridiculous that we are being targeted. Unfortunately
parents push their kids too far, which eventually leads to such an
emotional outburst and trauma."

Shinjini's plight has raised questions on how far televison reality
shows should go in the race for ratings. Well known singer Sonu Nigam
and judge of popular reality shows said, "It is unfair to treat
anyone like this. Just because one can sing well or dance well, it
does not mean that they have to compare themselves to someone in
front of them and not if that person is a child."

Calling such reality shows as a catalyst for channel viewership,
Sonia Mehta a renowned Psychologist said, "This suddent emotional
outburst and over reaction adds to the TRP's and increases the
channel's viewership."

On the other hand, the Union Women and Child Development Minsiter --
Renuka Chaudhary blamed the parents and said, "Why do parents put so
much pressure on their kids?"

Shinjini Sengupta, like any typical teenager loved singing and
dancing, but life on reality television is not all fun and laughter -
a truth that the 16-year-old had to find out the hard way.

Shinjini Sengupta is better than when she was flown in to Bangalore
for treatment, her mother said Sunday.

"Shinjini's condition is much better than what it was before she was
admitted to this hospital late Friday. It was worse earlier. Some
more tests were conducted till afternoon. A medical team is
monitoring her health parametres," her mother Sibani Sengupta told
IANS Sunday at the neuro-centre of the state-run National Institute
of Mental and Health Sciences (Nimhans).

Though Shinjini managed to sleep for longer time during the last 36
hours, investigations were being done to ascertain the main cause of
her paralytic condition and prescribe medication accordingly.

"Doctors and nurses are first trying to improve her response to
liquid food through intravenous (IV) system. They say it will take
another day or two to study the various tests and decide the course
of treatment. Even we (my husband D.K. Sengupta and I) are not
allowed to meet or be with Shinjini when tests and diagnoses are
under way," Sibani said, trying to hide her anguish over the trauma
her daughter was going through.

Doctors on duty declined to comment or give any information on
Shinjini's condition. They are trying to locate and identify the
neurotic order that paralysed her vocal chords and limbs movement -
whether it was due to nervous breakdown, blood clot or deep
depression - a couple of weeks after the reality show performance in
Kolkata.

The much-awaited medical bulletin of the hospital on Shinjini was
neither prepared nor released to the waiting media despite such an
assurance by the hospital resident medical officer (RMO) on Saturday.

"We are hoping for the best with prayers and god's blessing. It is
too early to say when Shinjini will be able to recover fully. Our
priority is to first stabilise her condition. Make her take food and
come out of the depression she appears to have gone into after the
tragic incident at the reality show," Sibani noted.

Shinjini's father could not be contacted as he was inside the special
ward attending to her after a CEG test and where visitors, especially
mediapersons, are barred from entry.

"Two MRIs have been done and more tests will be done on Tuesday.
Doctors suspect it could be due to psychological pressure. Basically,
my daughter is a very shy person and would suppress her emotions.
This could be the cause for her condition and NIMHANS is our last
hope," said her father D K Sengupta.

NIMHANS medical superintendent Dr B N Gangadar said doctors were
still examining the girl and trying to figure out why she slipped
into depression and what could be the consequences. Alluding to the
case indirectly, Dr Gangadar said: "Depression is a disorder of the
mind that can biologically impair patients. Patients stop sleeping,
eating and consequently lose appetite. If untreated, patients with
depression are prone to committing suicide."

When asked whether Sengupta's loss of speech and limb movement was a
result of her psychological condition or depression, Dr Gangadar
said, "We can say at this juncture that she could be suffering from
depression. Depression does not lead to permanent loss of speech or
physical disability. We are diagnosing why that has happened. There
could be complex neurological factors leading to such conditions."

That Sengupta was affected so seriously is shocking considering she
is a highly talented girl. She is a good dancer, has acted in
teleserials and appeared in a Bengali film. Sengupta was affected
when she was rebuked by judges during a dance competition on a
Bengali channel on May 19.

She was taken to Ramakrishna Mission Seva Pratishthan for diagnosis
who then referred her to a psychiatrist.

Children breaking down during such shows because they couldn't win or
because judges didn't say good things about them are a common sight
on TV.

It is not that only one Shinjini has suffered in one reality show.
There are thousands of Shinjinis all around us in this society. The
commodified society measures men and women in terms of money and
material achievement. The stress factor and cut-throat Other Articles
by Dr. Ratan Bhattacharjee

We should remember that without adequate precaution, such rat race
for money and fame can prove to be disastrous. Well, talents are to
be nourished and not to be exploited. Danseuse Tanushree Shankar,
another judge in the reality show said, "Shinjini was a great dancer,
but unfortunately she was eliminated because of her performance on
that particular day. We always want to see her back on stage. We also
pray for Shinjini and other such unfortunate girls that they are able
to recollect their usual self."

Young people are being tragically corrupted by a seductive new form
of popular entertainment. Oddly enough, this seems to happen in every
generation.

In his 1883 book, Traps for the Young, U.S. postal inspector Anthony
Comstock warned of the sinful hazards of reading dime novels. In his
1954 book, Seduction of the Innocent, child psychiatrist Fredric
Wertham warned of the psychosexual perils of poring over comic books.
In their 2008 book, Grand Theft Childhood, Harvard Medical School
psychiatrists Lawrence Kutner and Cheryl Olson warn about video
games.

The gist of their warning: Don't jump to conclusions.

Video games have a dual reputation as harmlessly exciting fun and as
home training systems for mass murderers. Kutner and Olson's book
shows that neither characterization is true across the board,
although one of them is much closer to the truth than the other.

Using a 1.5 million dollars grant from the Office of Juvenile Justice
and Delinquency Prevention, part of the U.S. Justice Department,
Kutner and Olson set out to explore what kinds of video games
children aged 12 to 14 play, how they play them, why they play them,
and what relationships there might be between game habits and other
behavior.

The two researchers, who are also the married parents of a video game-
playing teenage son, surveyed more than 1,200 middle school students
in Pennsylvania and South Carolina, along with 500 parents of those
children. They also conducted focus groups of middle school boys and
(separately) their parents in the Boston area.

Their survey did not directly address serious criminal behavior, in
part to avoid asking kids to incriminate themselves, but their book
uses statistics published by the Justice Department to conclude
that "Video game popularity and real-world youth violence have been
moving in opposite directions. Violent juvenile crime in the United
States reached a peak in 1993 and has been declining ever since."

Mass shootings at schools are the ultimate juvenile crime nightmare,
but Grand Theft Childhood (Simon and Schuster, 260 pp, 25 dollars)
cites a U.S. Secret Service study concluding that only "one in eight
school shooters showed any interest in violent video games."

The couple recently discussed their own study with The Daily Yomiuri
in a telephone interview from their home office in Boston. "What we
were really looking at was the issue of violence and the typical
child. That's something where we don't see evidence of any sort of
worrisome connection," Kutner said. "At least not the big scary
stuff, the going out and shooting or stabbing someone," Olson added.

However, they did find that kids who listed M-rated games among the
ones they had played "a lot" in the previous six months were
significantly likelier to have problems of a less dramatic nature,
such as getting into fights with other kids, getting into trouble at
school or shoplifting.

"It's true, but it needs to be put into perspective, in that the
majority of kids who play them still do not get into trouble," Kutner
said.

A game rated M, or mature, by the Entertainment Software Ratings
Board (ESRB), a U.S. industry group, is suggested for players aged 17
and older. (In Japan, games thought suitable for the same age range
are rated D by the Computer Entertainment Ratings Organization, or
CERO.)

"Different groups are cherry-picking our results. There are a lot of
avid gamers who are saying that we proved there was no relationship,
and that's not true. We actually found that there was some
correlation among normal problematic behaviors and the amount of
gameplay and type of gameplay," Kutner said. "And at the same time,
people on the other side, saying games are evil, were saying: 'Look!
They're showing this.' Back when Grand Theft Auto IV was released [in
early May], we did a lot of interviews, and there were several
stations in Boston that interviewed Cheryl [Olson]. And she told them
essentially the same thing in the individual interviews.

"And that evening one of them set up the story saying, 'Experts say
there's nothing to worry about,' which isn't what we say. And they
showed her quote. And another station said, 'Experts say there's a
lot to worry about,' and they showed the same quote."

"Pretty much the same quote," Olson said.

"There are times when people will not let information interfere with
their preconceived notions," Kutner concluded.

Their survey was conducted at the end of 2004, not long after Grand
Theft Auto: San Andreas was released. It was no surprise that the GTA
games collectively ranked No. 1 in the titles most frequently played
by boys. But they were surprised to see the famously violent game
series come in second on the girls' list (after The Sims, which
didn't even make the boys' top 10).

"Anecdotally, it sounds like [girls] play it a little bit differently
than the boys do," Kutner said.

"We had a couple of young college student research assistants who
were telling us about how they played it," Olson explained. "And they
would drive around and go to the mall and shop for clothes and
things. But I'm sure there must be some girls who are also playing it
to get their anger out, though, and that's what our 'reasons for
play' questions suggested. Many boys are using violent games to
manage their emotions and get their anger out and so on, but there's
a substantial number of girls who may be doing that as well."

Boys who vent their frustrations by shooting monsters are not likely
to do the same with people because they have a better grasp of the
distinction between fantasy and reality than adults sometimes give
them credit for. One finding pointing at this idea is that kissing
and swearing were the two things that boys mentioned most often when
describing why they thought their younger siblings should not be
allowed to play certain games.

Olson said that "swearing and kissing...are things that they or their
little siblings can do in real life. That really struck us as great
evidence of how good they were at distinguishing fantasy versus
reality, if they were zeroing in on the two things that were possible
to do in the real world."

"You know," she joked, "girls are much scarier than zombies, because
girls are real."

Discussing boy-girl relations in a more serious vein, Olson described
a game called Def Jam Vendetta, which features "rappers that are
wrestling or fighting each other. And as you get higher in the
levels, you start to win women as trophies. The sexism is something
that I think Larry [Kutner] and both strongly object to. Were our son
13 or 14 today, I would have much more concern with him playing a
title that glorifies sexism and [shows] women as objects to be won
than a game that has him blasting away at some aliens."

An intriguing sidelight in Grand Theft Childhood is that for boys
(although not yet for girls), playing games together, talking about
games and sharing game techniques has become such a mainstream method
of socializing that it is the kids who don't play who are now de
facto abnormal. Olson cautioned that no real conclusions could be
drawn about this group in the study because their numbers were too
small for statistically significant findings.

But as for the overall results, Kutner mentioned one excellent reason
to have confidence that the kids had reported accurately on the role
of video games in their lives: "Unlike a lot of research that is done
on students, this was something they were interested in."

Juvenile crimes

ONCE MORE the country is concerned over juvenile crimes. There are
not just one Vishal or one Chandra who can be put to prison so that
all juvenile criminals are silenced.

Juvenile crime is the burning question of the day. The number of
juvenile crimes is increasing everyday. In India juvenile crime
occurs chiefly because of parental neglect, narcotic addiction,
boredom, unemployment, the evil influence of Bollywood and Hollywood
potboilers, love- revenges, poverty and the abundance of alcohol.


Juvenile crime has a global dimension. Only a few days earlier Se ung-
Hui Cho's Virginia Tech killings have raised a plethora of questions.
Teenage violence and creative writing have become synonymous. Seung-
Hui Cho in his creative writing classes wrote two dreadful plays.
Teenage sex crime victims are shown fantasizing about killing their
molesters. In Mr. Brownstone, three 17-year-old high school students
sneak into a casino to escape a teacher who they say has sodomized
them. "I wanna kill him," says a character named John. "If he's a
leech, we'll be able to yank it off and squash him beneath our
boots," adds Joe. Jane follows shortly with: "I wanna watch him bleed
like the way he made us kids bleed." Richard McBeef is his second
play in which a teenager is seen accusing his new stepfather of
molesting him and murdering his father.

Some surveys have measured correlation between adolescent crime and
family problems. Ten times as many juvenile delinquents come from an
atmosphere of vulgarity or heavy drinking as from a normal
environment.

Sometimes classrooms turn the teenagers to criminals. In the
classrooms most teachers do not want to pay attention to any comment
from students they have named as `bad'. They treat them like
untouchables in the class. This kind of unequal treatment is often at
the root of all troubles. At times it is seen that the dropouts of
the schools fall prey to drug addiction. The world of drugs is a
lonely world of mental frustration, false happiness and sickness. One
time smoking of marijuana may get one hooked on heroin forever. But
how can these be remedied? Certainly not by punishment. In Imphal
sometimes the feet of the young boys are cut to bleed as a punishment
for smoking hash. But later these boys go astray and they really
become the garbage and spoil the society.

Adolescents in their search of more affection and satisfaction are
often abused by drugs. Some again engage themselves in violence.
Today's youths search more affection and satisfaction than the youth
in the past and the questions remain unanswered. Generation conflict
is not the only answer. The future of the country, nay the whole
world is in the hands of the youth. But if they are not empowered
today, time will take them slowly and quietly and with much anguish
and bewilderment, to a confused society. So the need of the hour is
to love the youths, nurture, develop and give them strength before it
is too late.

While natural calamities do not come so frequently and are anyway
beyond our control it is the man made calamities we must be beware
of! Warning that outer space may become the "battlefield of the
future," India on Monday proposed a "robust" international mechanism
for protection of space assets since they were "vulnerable to
attacks". Whie they come in all forms and intensity – earthquakes,
hurricanes, floods, drought, tornados; even man-made calamities.
Hinduja TMT Ltd, which is being renamed as Hinduja Ventures, and its
joint venture partner UAE's DP World will invest Rs 100 crore each to
enter the healthcare sector.

The superstitious among Indonesia's 200m people could be forgiven for
thinking that the gods must be irate. By almost any standard, 1997
has been a very bad year, bringing drought, forest fires, air
crashes, a currency collapse, stock exchange slump, and riots. But
much of the calamity has been man-made, and it has tarnished the
reputation of President Suharto's regime, at a critical moment for
the ageing president and his supporters.

India will launch its maiden moon mission 'Chandrayaan I' early next
year, Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman G Madhavan Nair
said today.On the other hand, Amid confusion, the visit of a 19-
member British group to Lucknow to commemorate the 150th anniversary
of the first war of Independence in 1857 starts today despite
opposition by the BJP, Samajwadi Party and some Muslim religious
leaders and intellectuals.

Columbus returns. Columbus has the single point agenda to kill the
indigenous people worldwide as he killed some five hundred years back.

Millions of indigenous people lived in the Americas when the 1492
voyage of Christopher Columbus began a historical period of large-
scale European contact with the Americas. European contact with what
they called the "New World" led to the European colonization of the
Americas, with millions of emigrants (willing and unwilling) from
the "Old World" eventually resettling in the Americas.. While the
population of Old World peoples in the Americas steadily grew in the
centuries after Columbus, the population of the American indigenous
peoples plummeted. The extent and causes of this population decline
have long been the subject of controversy and debate. The 500th
anniversary of Columbus's famous voyage, in 1992, drew renewed
attention to claims that indigenous peoples of the Americas had been
the victims of ethnocides (i.e. the destruction of a culture).

Columbus started from Atlantic Coast to get India. He got America.
The rulers established that he was the man who invented America.
Though America existed with high level Maya and Inca and red Indian
civilisations. Columbus destroyed everything without any weapon of
Mass destruction. He exercised genocides without any missile, without
any atom bomb!
Now the Columbus has got full control on World affairs. It is total
dominance in the space. Nature raped and Humanity annihilated. He
robbed natural resources. Now they rob everything we have!

Our ancestors did not welcome Columbus. Though they could not resist
the destiny of eternal slavery.

We welcome Columbus everywhere. Latin America resists. Latin America
which was the killing field , a free hunting ground for Sovereign
Columbus. Our Civil Society is a committed ally of the Sovereign
Columbus now. We have surrounded political borders, cultural roots,
mother languages, national identity, production system, economy,
sovereignty, freedom, democracy, humanity, human and civil rights!

Case Study: Indrajeet Chatterjee

The Detective Department of the Kolkata police arrested Indrajit
Chatterjee from Howrah on Monday for committing fraud against various
banks. He was also wanted by the Central Bureau of Investigation. The
police are on the lookout for his wife Rashika, who was a part of the
racket.

Another accused in the case, Amit Sen was arrested from Entally on
Tuesday. Deputy Commissioner of Police, Detective Department, Jawed
Shamim said several tracing papers and duplicate stamps of the state
government were recovered from him. "He is an accomplice of

Chatterjee and had helped him in forging various documents," added
DC.

With four persons arrested earlier, seven arrests have been made so
far in the case, the police said. "Chatterjee seems to be the kingpin
of a forgery gang," said a senior officer of the anti-bank fraud
section of the Detective Department. Sources said that he was
arrested by the Kolkata police on charges of forgery nearly four
years ago.

The economic offence wing of the CBI was hunting for him, as he had
been duping various banks since 2006. "Chatterjee had cheated UCO
bank and Canara bank with crores of Rupees," said a CBI source. The
Kolkata police had received a complaint to this effect from the
Karnataka bank in last December. "To catch him, we conducted raids at
several places throughout the country," said Shamim.

"He deposited the papers of a flat in the Sayeed Amir Ali Avenue as
security and took huge loans from several banks," added DC.

Rashika was the owner of Ma Karunamoyee Films Ltd, that produced
films and serials, said the police. Chatterjee was the promoter of a
company, Amtech Universal. The duo had recently produced a Bengali
film, Greftar.

Police are now investigating more cases of his fraud. "On Tuesday
morning, a person called us that Chatterjee had duped him. We have
asked him to file a complaint," Shamim added.

Mobile Phones

Mobile phones in classroom cause distraction and kids are unable to
concentrate on learning. Nowadays in colleges, students misuse
cellphones by sending SMS and MMS. Only the other day, newspaper
headlines screamed with the report of obscene picture messages sent
through cellphone by a student. However, he was nabbed later.

But besides cellphones, the pampered children of wealthy families are
gradually getting used to other luxurious ways of life. Air
conditioned cars, costly school bags, pens, watches or shoes are
their regular requirements. This not only creates differences in the
mind of the students but also a kind of complex, which makes the
children lonely and even depressed.

The Meghalaya government has already announced a ban on cellphones in
the classroom and cars outside to prevent the students from being
engaged in too much luxury and show-off. Parents are asked not to
drop their children in cars. In school buses, children develop
community sense. The luxurious ways of life make the children
selfish. This is going on in other states. Use of cellphone by
parents, especially at the time of driving can cause accidents.

Schools are for learning. It is high time that the states step in to
ban the high-tech gadgets, which cause distraction, especially when a
class is in progress. If their parents need to contact them regarding
rides or appointments, they can leave a voice mail and the student
can pick it up later.

Cybercrime threatens Internet economy

Government ministers from across the world have issued a call for
greater vigilance against cybercrime at the close of meeting on the
future of the Internet economy, says Computing.co.uk.

The Seoul Declaration came at the end of a two-day ministerial
conference on the future of the Web in the South Korean capital
hosted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD).

OECD member countries, the European Community and ministers from
Chile, Egypt, Estonia, India, Indonesia, Israel, Latvia, Senegal and
Slovenia affirmed the declaration.

Turkish hacker tips Photobucket

Photobucket, the popular photo sharing Web site, became the target of
a DNS hack on Tuesday, reports The Register.

As a result of the attack, some (but not all) surfers hoping to check
out pictures were involuntarily redirected to a greeting from hacker
NetDeliz and a message in Turkish.

A post to Photobucket's user forum blamed the problem on "an error in
our DNS hosting services". It stressed that users' personal
information was not affected by the redirection.

Verizon speeds up fibre-optic Internet

Verizon Communications is boosting the speed of its FiOS fibre-optic
Internet service in 10 states, says The Associated Press.

The FiOS service areas of California, Delaware, Indiana, Maryland,
Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Virginia and Washington
will see new plans that nearly double Internet speeds, Chief
operating officer Denny Strigl said in remarks to be delivered at a
conference Wednesday.

The faster speeds were already available in New York, New Jersey and
Connecticut, where competition from cable is particularly fierce, and
in Florida, Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

Data glitch stops Mars lander

The Phoenix lander stopped digging soil near Mars' north pole
Wednesday as engineers on Earth worked to fix a glitch that caused
the loss of a day's worth of photos, reports The Associated Press.

The problem was discovered late Tuesday after the spacecraft dug a
trench inside a polygon-shaped surface feature that was likely caused
by seasonal expansion and shrinking of ice.

The lander beamed back pictures of the trench, but an overload of
data prevented it from saving images of the landscape and atmosphere
in its flash memory.

Crimeware developers now supply "crimeware toolkits" to other
fraudsters. These packages guide users to sneak into a system and
then retrieve data for financial gain. But criminals can also go the
old-fashioned way — purchasing data collected by trojans, keyloggers
and other types of crimeware.


SophosLabs, which had intercepted emails with subject lines such
as `Million dead in Chinese quake' linking victims to websites on
a .cn domain, agrees on the increasing complexity of trojans.

Sophos experts predict, "Using the highly-anticipated Olympic Games
due to take place in Beijing in August, cyber thieves would be on
prowl to launch many more trojans that could sneak into systems and
silently track a victim's system and data stream."

The term indigenous peoples has no universal, standard or fixed
definition, but can be used about any ethnic group who inhabit the
geographic region with which they have the earliest historical
connection. However, several widely-accepted formulations, which
define the term "Indigenous peoples" in stricter terms, have been put
forward by prominent and internationally-recognised organizations,
such as the United Nations, the International Labour Organization and
the World Bank. Indigenous peoples in this article is used in such a
narrower sense.

Drawing on these, a contemporary working definition of "indigenous
peoples" for certain purposes has criteria which would seek to
include cultural groups (and their descendants) who have an
historical continuity or association with a given region, or parts of
a region, and who formerly or currently inhabit the region either:

before its subsequent colonization or annexation; or
alongside other cultural groups during the formation of a nation-
state; or
independently or largely isolated from the influence of the claimed
governance by a nation-state,
And who furthermore:

have maintained at least in part their distinct linguistic, cultural
and social / organizational characteristics, and in doing so remain
differentiated in some degree from the surrounding populations and
dominant culture of the nation-state.
To the above, a criterion is usually added to also include:

peoples who are self-identified as indigenous, and/or those
recognised as such by other groups.
Note that even if all the above criteria are fulfilled, some people
may either not consider themselves as indigenous or may not be
considered as indigenous by governments, organizations or scholars.

Other related terms for indigenous peoples include aborigines,
aboriginal peoples, native peoples, first peoples, first nations and
autochthonous (this last term having a derivation from Greek,
meaning "sprung from the earth"). Indigenous peoples may often be
used in preference to these or other terms, as a neutral replacement
where these terms may have taken on negative or pejorative
connotations by their prior association and use. It is the preferred
term in use by the United Nations and its subsidiary organizations.

India's dirty laundry: The murder tearing Indian society apart

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/indias-dirty-laundry-
847914.html

The murder of a teenage girl in Delhi, unjustly blamed on a domestic
servant, has heightened hatred and suspicion at the heart of Asia's
most class-riven society. Andrew Buncombe reports

Monday, 16 June 2008

When 14-year-old Aarushi Talwar was found murdered the police made no
effort to examine the crime scene and assumed the killer was the
family's servant, Hemraj (below left). A day later it was found that
Hemraj had also been murdered. Aarushi's father, Rajesh Talwar
(circled), is now a suspect. Bottom left is Aarushi's mother.

For police in the eastern suburbs of Delhi it seemed like an open
and shut case.

When the body of 14-year-old Aarushi Talwar was discovered in a pool
of blood, her throat cut and the family's domestic servant nowhere to
be found, detectives had only one suspect. Senior officers said they
even had clues as to where the 45-year-old Nepali servant might be
hiding and said that a team of officers was being dispatched to Nepal
to track him down. The police saw no reason to bring in sniffer dogs,
photograph the crime scene or even force open a locked door that led
to a terrace despite the presence of drops of blood on the steps.

An immediate media frenzy erupted. The TV channels and newspapers
were full of lurid details and unquestioningly blamed Yam Prasad
Banjade, also known as Hemraj, the missing servant, for the grisly
killing of the teenager. And then one day later, someone opened the
terrace door and discovered Hemraj's decomposing body lying on the
floor. He too had been murdered, in the same way as Aarushi. Police
were forced to reopen the murder mystery.

The authorities' handling of the high-profile case – Aarushi's
father, Rajesh Talwar, a dentist, is currently the police's latest
suspect – resulted in angry demonstrations by Nepali labourers,
outraged that one of their countrymen had been blamed unfairly for
such a horrible crime. But the case has focused fresh attention on
the uneasy relationship between India's middle classes and the
ubiquitous servants who wash, cook, shop, drive, garden and clean for
them. It has highlighted too, the deep anxiety of many Indians who
live in perpetual fear that their servants will rob them, poison them
or worse. A constant source of conversation among Indians who employ
domestic staff, such fear has now even found its way into a popular
new Indian novel that tells the story of a bitter and disenchanted
chauffeur in Delhi who slits his employer's throat.

"We always get our staff verified by the police and we also try and
get people who are recommended to us. Only then do we let them in our
house," said Rosie Kapoor, a businesswoman from south Delhi, who
employs one full-time and two part-time maids. "But even after all
this I am still very careful."

While in the West servants largely belong to an earlier generation,
in India they remain commonplace. Even families with a modest income
will employ one or two maids; however industrious middle-class
Indians may be in other respects, most have a loathing of domestic
chores. In Delhi alone, it is estimated there are at least 60,000
domestic servants, of which perhaps just a third are registered with
the police.

The maids, cleaners, drivers and cooks usually earn pitifully little
and often live in miserable conditions. Often they are migrants from
Nepal or else impoverished Indian states such as Orissa or Bihar. A
full-time maid can earn as little as 2,000 rupees (£24) a month,
supplemented with a meagre diet and perhaps some cheap clothes given
to them by their employer. For this, the servant will usually work 12
to 14 hours a day, perhaps with one day off a week. Usually, servants
will live in a simple one-roof shack or shed, often built on the roof
of the house – swelteringly warm during the long, hot summers and
bone-chilling in northern India's brief but cold winters. Most
servants' bathroom facilities are probably best left undescribed.

And the relationship between domestic staff and the families they
work for can have additional complications above and beyond the
obvious financial disparity. Often staff will be from a lower caste
than their employer, adding to possible mistrust and resentment.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that some employers treat their staff
well, even almost considering them members of the family. On holidays
such as Diwali and Holi, the staff will get a generous bonus or gift,
they will receive their meals and clothes and time off to go back to
their village or town if a family member is ill.

But there are numerous reports of employers treating their staff as
little more than slaves. An 18-year-old who works as the live-in cook
for a businessman in the Safdarjang area of south Delhi said that his
every move was followed by CCTV monitors that his employer had
installed in the house. The cook, Sushil, said that if he was caught
leaving the house during working hours he was punished. He said that
he, and two teenage girls employed as maids, were often beaten.

"If anyone makes a mistake, the boss beats them. He is dangerous,"
said Sushil, who came to Delhi from the Sultanpur district of Uttar
Pradesh. "He hits the girls as well. He is a really bad man."

Sushil said that he earned 4,500 rupees a month but that he had to
pay for his own food and clothes from this. In the three years he had
worked at the house, his employer had never given him a holiday
bonus.

Given the wretched, impoverished conditions in which India's domestic
servants live it would perhaps not be surprising if servants were to
turn to opportunistic crimes. "The class difference of employers and
the employed is so big and that tempted them to commit crimes," a
Delhi police spokesman, Rajan Bhagat, told the Associated Press.

But despite the widespread stories of chauffeurs routinely siphoning
off petrol from their employers' cars, maids rustling through
jewellery boxes when they should be sweeping the floor and newspaper
cartoons showing Nepali servants chasing terrified elderly women, to
what extent is the middle-class fear of their staff justified and how
much of it is urban myth?

"I think it is real and I think we are hearing a lot less than
actually takes place," said an expatriate living in Delhi who employs
domestic staff and asked not to be named. "It's getting worse.
[Domestic servants] can see the light. They know that money will give
them a way out. It's something new. And people have to be careful."

While the media attention devoted to Aarushi's murder was
exceptional, even the family's lawyer believes such servants are
often responsible for crimes. Pinaki Mishra said there were many
factors behind the phenomenon – increasing economic disparity, the
increasing influx of rural people into India's cities and even mafia-
style groups that force domestic servants to steal from their
employers.

"India is an entire society in transformation," he said. "You have a
middle class of up to 300 million people and below that you have an
aspirational class of up to 300 million ... All the values are
breaking down. No one wants to do menial work."

This view was shared by the family of an east Delhi businessman
killed 10 days ago in his home. In this case too, the family's Nepali
servant – employed for less than a year – has gone missing and police
say he is a suspect. The businessman's hands had been tied behind his
back and he had been strangled by a bed-sheet.

"Globalisation is the problem. Everybody wants a television,
everybody wants the luxury. If they cannot get it by hook then they
get it by crook," said the businessman's sister, her eyes red with
tears. "We want to catch the person who did this to stop it happening
again. We know we are not going to get our brother back but we are
not going to lose our humanity."

Yet while such killings made big headlines, official figures suggest
that the problem is not as great as some may believe. Mr Bhagat, the
Delhi police spokesman, said that five people in the city with a
population of more than 16 million had been robbed or killed by their
servants so far this year. Last year the total was six.

Domestic servants say they are often blamed unfairly by their
employers, the first in line to be accused if something goes missing.
In the aftermath of Aarushi's death and the accusations that were
made by police about the alleged guilt of the family's servant,
dozens of other domestic workers gathered outside the local police
station to complain. "We become prime suspects every time there is a
crime in the house or the neighbourhood we work in," Ram Bahadur, a
labourer, told journalists. "We are poor people trying to earn a
living with dignity. Is it fair to suspect us without evidence?"

Sushil, the cook, said that he too was often accused of things, even
though he insisted that thoughts of committing a crime had never
entered his head. He said he was shocked by the murder of the
businessman in east Delhi. "This is not something I think about," he
said. "How can anyone do this sort of thing if he is a servant?"

The family of the murdered businessman said that they will no longer
employ a live-in servant, even if it means they will have to perform
the chores that their domestic help have traditionally carried
out. "The culture can change. People can learn to adapt," said one of
his sons, standing outside his father's store, talking with friends
and relatives who had come to pay their respects. "They will have to
change."

But are other Indians ready to give up their domestic staff and get
down to scrubbing the dishes? Nishant Singh, a lawyer who works in
Gurgaon, Delhi's Westernised satellite city, said the flurry of
recent headlines would certainly encourage more people to think
carefully about the staff they hire, about getting them verified by
police and perhaps opting for part-time help rather than live-in
servants.

But he doubted that Indians would forgo employing servants
altogether. With the upper part of India's economy booming, more
people had money to spend on help and with increasing numbers of
women entering the workplace there was more demand for people to
carry out the household tasks traditionally performed by
women. "There has long been this concept of having staff," he
said. "It's part of the culture."

View Full Version : increasing teenage crime in dublin...from a
unlucky visitor

http://www.dublin.ie/forums/archive/index.php?t-1807.html
----------------------------------------------------------
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s200030-10-2005, 03:40 PM
I am disappointed to publish this message but I want people to read
my story…..I want people to be more aware of teenager crime in
Dublin. I am from England and a secondary school teacher. I've always
wanted to go Dublin as I hear great things and love Guinness and the
Irish accent. Although we did have a fun time in Dublin, it got
ruined by the "tracksuit" teenagers that loom around the inner city
Dublin streets, causing hassle to vulnerable innocent passer-by.

My story has a sad ending for me but I'm hope things will be positive
from what happened to my friend and I. It was our second and last
night in Dublin as it was short holiday. We have just left a night
club round 1 am to go to another club. As we crossed the traffic
lights on O' Connell Street, two teenage girls, barely 15 yrs old,
snatched my mate's mask as they passed us. (It was Halloween weekend)
We were drunk ourselves; and our natural instinct was to get the mask
back, so I helped my friend to take the masks out of the girl's hand,
which we did.
As we walked away, they swore at us. So we swore back and carried on
walking. When we approached the black statue of Daniel O'Connell,
they followed us, then ran towards us and jumped on my friend. They
started to kick my friend so I shouted them to get her off. Then, one
of the girls pushed me over into the busy road and grabbed my hair
and started kicking me. I tried to fight back but she pulled my hair
tighter and carried on kicking me. I had to roll in a ball as she
would kick me in the stomach. People just stood there and watched us
getting attacked. I felt so embarrassed and helpless. The men who
saved us were this very heroic Asian guy and his Italian friend. They
pulled the girls off us and helped us to cross the bridge to get away
from the girls.
Obviously we were in great shock from the incident. I have never been
attacked or been in any fights before as I always stay away from
trouble. I believe I am an intelligent and sensible person and I
rarely drink. But, naturally, we were enjoying the Guinness too much
and enjoying our holiday in Dublin. We didn't think our long awaited
dream holiday would be ruined by such evil and uneducated people.
It was a blessing in disguise when the girls came back up the bridge
and began to attack me again. She pushed the guy out of the way and
jumped on me, pulling my hair so tight. She was like an animal,
getting pure satisfaction out of causing pain. They had this evil
smile on their face as they approached is again. They even walked
normally across the traffic lights to get to us. It was so surreal.
My friend shouted for people to help me. It took four men to pull her
off me and it felt like it took awhile to do this as she held on to
my hair so hard. Being oriental, I have long black hair but about
fourth of it has been ripped off.
The police arrived very soon after the incident in a big white van.
As the four men held this girl down, My friend told me one Irish guy
told the guys to let her go, not knowing what happened which made my
friend angry. I just wanted to be well away from the situation as I
was so upset and angry. I kept on shouting out "how evil they were".
The police retained the girls. They didn't retaliate. They appeared
to be so calm and emotionless. I was livid. Deep down I wanted them
to suffer the same pain I went through. I just kept shouting at them
and cried. One of the female officers said if I carried on shouting,
I would be put in the van which made me angrier. The police didn't
seem too sympathetic towards us apart from one officer. We were the
ones so distress and in pain. It was so evident in our appearance. My
friend lip was cut; her hair was messed up and cuts on her face. But
I was the one who got attacked twice. I couldn't calm down; I was
just shocked and angry about what just happened. In one way I was
very conscious of the situation as we asked what will happen to the
girls. They told us if it's the first offence, they probably just get
a caution. We were even more livid when we heard this. The trauma and
pain these girls caused us, we felt it was unfair. Two days on and
being back in the safety of my home, my whole body aches and
constantly reminds me of the night. The bruising on my knees prevents
me from even walking now. I have cuts and grazes on my face which
probably will scar. I can't go back to work due to the injuries. But
I know I need to recover mentally as I work with rebellious teenagers
at school. When I see teenagers hang out in groups on the streets, it
does scare me. I reported this incident to the `Irish independent' as
I want public awareness of teenage crime in Dublin.
I found out from the Asian guy who saved our lives that the girls
were under influence of alcohol and one went unconscious in the
hospital afterwards. The first evening, a gang of these tracksuit
teenagers tried to steal my friend's bag. Also, on the night where we
were brutally attacked, this guy in fancy dress had his hat stolen by
these tracksuit teenagers. He tried to get it back and they were just
playing with him.
Its really unfortunate incident that happened to us and I hope no one
else will have to go through the trauma we went through. It was an
unprovoked attack and it made us scared to back to Dublin. I never
walk on my own anywhere, but is it safe to be just in pairs? The
issue I really want to raise is what is the government is trying to
do about these teenagers who loom around the streets in gangs. Too
often we saw them and we were only been there for two days…..

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