Teen girls get ‘porn star’ treatment - with mum’s help?

 

A couple of weeks ago my local newspaper thought it newsworthy that men are getting Brazilian waxes. Now an Australian paper reports that girls as young as 14 are being accepted for what it euphemistically calls “intimate beauty treatments”.

Apparently their “boyfriends” are demanding it. And, thanks to the sexual liberation won for them by their mothers and grandmothers generations, the girls are saying yes.

Worst of all, it seems that some mothers are going along with their daughters to make it clear that they have permission. One shop owner in Brisbane says:

''Mostly it is girls around 16 but we do occasionally get younger girls in, but they must have a parent with them,'' the store manager said.

Do you get these 'parents'? One, their daughter wants to get what child and youth advocates point out is a “porn star” treatment. Two, this is to please the girl’s boyfriend (real or imaginary). At 14? At 16? Don’t they care that she is making herself a sexual object, or about the likely consequences?

Melinda Tankard Reist, a leading critic of the pornification of culture and the sexualization of girls, notes the harmful effects on young women’s body image:

''They've come to despise their natural bodies,'' she said.

How very sad, that adult women are prepared to sacrifice the happiness and health of girls in this way.

By: Carolyn Moynihan

 

Technorati Tags: parental consent,sexualisation of children

“I felt as if I had been given my country back”

It was all joy. There had been such muddles over the complex ticketing arrangements, and such hostility from sections of the mass media, and such horrible things said by campaigners opposed to the Church’s teachings, and such tragedy over the evil actions of priests who had betrayed their calling.

But now, here was Pope Benedict, arriving at Edinburgh airport and standing next to the Queen for the national anthem.

Pope Benedict is small. And quiet. His voice and manner is that of a gentle, kindly professor, with a warm smile and large intelligent eyes. Long years in public view have trained him in the art of maintaining stillness and dignity while speeches are made and greetings are exchanged, but he still doesn’t look quite at home with military bands and official formality; he walked nicely along the guard of honour but was much smaller than all of them. Things got more relaxed when he was sitting chatting with the Queen (she is small, too) and the Duke of Edinburgh, and everything positively erupted into joy when he cheerfully donned a tartan scarf and went out into the city.

He has a rapport with the young – not unexpected in one who spent years teaching them at universities – and a gentle pastoral style with children. People held up babies to be blessed, waved flags and banners of welcome, and called out greetings – and when he celebrated the first Mass of his visit, at Bellahouston Park, before a vast crowd, with everyone roaring out glorious hymns, the style of the visit was established.

Why were we led to believe that this was a nasty, cruel, ranting figure of hate? People who had never met Joseph Ratzinger, who hadn’t read his books, who knew very little about him, repeated one another’s myths and legends – even though the internet makes available masses of material, videos, books, reports, interviews, and more. When he arrived in Britain, the reality became clear: this is a man who long ago placed his entire life at the service of Christ, and has, down all those years, tried faithfully to imitate Him and to live according to His teachings. And it shows.

I was privileged to be invited to Westminster Hall, where, in an extraordinary moment of British history, the Pope was to address Members of Parliament and a great gathering of men and women in public life from across Britain. These walls have echoed to the great events of British history – notably the trial of St Thomas More, who in this place was condemned to death for refusing to follow a king’s rebellion against papal authority, adhering to God and conscience instead. And now, here was a pope arriving – heralded by trumpeters standing in the arches of the great glowing window of stained glass.

The band of the Coldstream Guards played as we waited seated on gilt chairs set in long rows on the ancient stone flags, above us the great hammerbeam roof, and on either side the old grey walls with their Norman arches. A line of former prime ministers awaited his Holiness, along with the Speaker of the House of Commons who would introduce him. He came with the Archbishop of Canterbury from an ecumenical Vespers in Westminster Abbey, another first for a pope.

He arrived looking small and polite, and there were handshakes and pleasantries. And then came his speech. The voice, low and quiet, with its fizzy accent and precise vowels, takes a moment to assimilate: this is no passionate orator. But he had us spellbound. He drew attention to the central issues of our day – the big questions: by what values do we live? How on earth do we decide? Does it matter what is right and wrong? Have we anything by which we can make decisions and judgements? Are we spiritual and cultural orphans, adrift with nothing to guide us?

With clarity, and delicate precision, this priest who represents an authority dating back in an unbroken line across two millennia, spelt out what Western man knows but has forgotten: we cannot live as though religion does not exist, we cannot live without truth. Man has to use his mind, he has to open himself to what is good and true and beautiful. Attempts to marginalise faith – including Christianity – impoverish all and rob human beings of their dignity. Parliamentary democracy – a gift from Britain to the world, and a heritage of which British people should be proud – did not arise in a spiritual vacuum, and will not flourish in one.

I felt as if I had been given my country back again. For too long we have been told that our ancestors, with their assumptions about God and man’s unique destiny, were ignorant and muddled, and that now we must shake off the nonsense passed on to us. Morality as previously known was dangerous; it could now be reinvented by television pundits and if we were smart we would not challenge their views.

Now, sitting in Westminster Hall, I heard all this challenged, and new and much more interesting vistas opened up: of course we must be allowed to think along large lines, to lift our minds to things that are great and noble, to ponder the things of God, and to connect these with our public life, our common life and the search for the common good.

The Pope was not asking for the Church to have a privileged position, not seeking the reinvention of a Church-dominated society; on the contrary, he was inviting us all to a national conversation, a way of living and serving one another in a country where there are people of many faiths and none, and where the place of faith is recognised and enjoyed and honoured for the contribution it can make and the good fruits it brings.

He was applauded all the way down the aisle – where he stopped to view the plaque that commemorates Thomas More – and afterwards the glorious bells of Westminster Abbey pealed out as people milled about in a wonderful traffic-free area, savouring London in a new way.

Whatever you think about the Pope, there has to be an admission that he wasn’t what most people had expected, and his message was timely.

I expect we’ll ignore it. We have become used to dismissing matters of religion (“Oh, it’s all rubbish”; “Causes more trouble than it’s worth” etc) and we find it easier to sludge along with our culture soaked in TV soap operas and rising crime figures and drunken teenagers hanging around bleak shopping centres shouting at one another on Saturday nights. But we would be stupid to do this. We have been given another vision of Britain – brighter, more interesting , and one that we know is realistic, honest, and attractive. It echoes with our common sense and our desire to get along with one another in a workable way and achieve things. It carries resonance from the best of our past and offers a way forward.

Please, don’t let us marginalise faith in God, or ignore what Christianity offers, or sneer at the possibility that men and women can know about the deepest and greatest things. Perhaps it shouldn’t have had to take a Pope to tell us this. But he has done so, and it is a wake-up call. Often, elderly gentle clergy with quiet wisdom do say wise things.

Joanna Bogle writes from London.

Technorati Tags: Benedict XVI,Catholic Church,Papal visit to UK

Is tolerant Islam a myth?

It appears to be a sign that you’re doing something abundantly right when the leaders of major Arab and Muslim groups demand that your conference be monitored by the thought police to make sure nothing too incendiary is being said.

This happened in Canada recently when the Canadian Arab Federation and the Canadian Islamic Congress insisted that a gathering entitled, “On The Front Line of Immigration, Terrorism, and Ethno-Politics” by investigated by the Toronto Hates Crimes Unit.

We’ll never know if the boys and girls in blue in the True North Strong and Free –- a quote from the Canadian national anthem that only just still rings with an authentic tone -- responded to these somewhat hysterical cries.

But one of the speakers, internationally renowned author Bat Ye’ or, is more than used to such persecution. This diminutive, gentle and brilliant woman in her late 70s seems to positively terrify her critics. Being deported because of Arab anger would, however, be nothing new to the author of a host of internationally acclaimed historical works on the history of Islam and its treatment of Jews and Christians.

She and her family were forced to leave their native Egypt in 1957, part of the more than a million Jews who were exiled from Muslim states after the Second World War and the foundation if Israel. Bat Ye’or’s name roars the horror of it all. It is a pseudonym, meaning Daughter of the Nile in Hebrew. Her given name is Gisele Orebi.

The persecuted Jews of the Middle East. The silenced catastrophe. A wave of innocents whose existence in Arab lands pre-dated the birth of Islam. Their numbers were greater than those of Palestinian refugees and they were frequently treated far more harshly. Yet the world said very little and today the Islamic bloc and their allies in the United Nations and elsewhere pretend the post-Biblical exodus did not happen.

“It is, I suppose, deeply ironic that I was told that I was not allowed to live in Egypt when I was a girl and now as a grown woman I’m told, in part by people from Egypt, that I shouldn’t come to Canada either. As for Israel, they’d like that to disappear,” she says, more bemused than bitter.

“Where ought I to go? No matter. The story has to be told, the true story of how Islam has treated and still does treat its minorities.”

It is her collection of work on the Islamic conquest of the Christian heartlands of Egypt, Palestine, Syria and North Africa that have caused so much frustration from Muslim opponents. She writes in detail of Dhimmitude, the method in which Jews and Christians were subjugated and humiliated.

“As late as the early twentieth-century in some Muslim countries Jews had to remove their shoes when they left their own quarter, were not allowed to ride a horse, were treated as second-class citizens. This idea of equality is nonsense. Their numbers were restricted, especially in the Holy Land, and the same was true of Christians. There were periodic pogroms, right up till the 1940s.”

A pause, searching for the right words. “What occurred back then is history, but history has to be understood and accepted. What we have now is revision, denial. Muslim immigrants are taking this false idea of the past to Europe and North America, along with a culture that does not share the Western notion of tolerance, equality, criticism of religion and freedom.”

The concept of dhimmitude is little known in the West but Bat Yeor is doing a great deal to correct that state of affairs.

“The whole notion differs fundamentally from the Western, Christian idea of tolerance” she explains. “Obviously Christians have not always lived up to this idea but modern pluralism is a direct result of Christian thinking. Islamic ideology, on the other hand, aspires to something entirely different. At best it is a paternalistic tolerance for a despised minority but often outright persecution. This is what has happened in contemporary Egypt.”

Indeed so. Christians enjoyed a relatively open and equal citizenship under more secular Cairo governments but under a more aggressive Islam they are persecuted, attacked, forcibly converted, exiled and killed. “Part of the horror is the pain they suffer,” she explains. “The other is the denial we see and hear from Egypt and from Muslims throughout the world. The same applies to Pakistan, Sudan, Turkey and so many other Islamic societies.”

So the idea of Islamic tolerance is untrue?

“Completely so. Dhimmitude is the natural consequence of the jihad mindset. As a Muslim you conquer, dominate and convert because Islam is to triumph. That you would then respect those who do not become Muslim is self-contradictory. Those who reject Islam are considered immoral and the immoral are never to be trusted. This is why it is so difficult to form a working relationship between the West and genuine Islam, even when it appears to be moderate. We have to question motives, we have to understand intentions.”

This thesis of the spread of such ideas is discussed at length in what may be her most famous and controversial book, Eurabia: The Euro-Arab Axis. In it she argues that Islamic fundamentalism has found its way to Europe because most Muslim moderates are frightened of speaking out and European intellectuals and activists have been seduced by its anti-American dynamic.

“I cannot stress enough the incompatibility between the concept of tolerance as expressed by the jihad-dhimmitude ideology, and the concept of human rights based on the equality of all human beings and the inalienability of their rights. In Europe there is a connection between local socialism, communism and neo-fascism with the judeophobia and anti-imperialism of the new Muslim communities.

“There are courageous Muslims who do resist but it is difficult and dangerous. There is an underground of sharia law across Europe, with terrible treatment of women. This is combined with the threat of violence aimed at anybody who speaks out against what is going on. Censorship through fear. We even see this to a mild degree in Canada, an example being the attempt to stop me entering the country.”

The cause of Palestine, she emphasises, is at heart about the triumph of Islam. “Most of Palestine is in Jordan but we do not hear cries for Jordan to return land. This isn’t about the rights of the Palestinians but about the refusal to accept a non-Muslim state in the region. Palestine has become the fashion of the West, without them understanding the deeper issues of the conflict.”

Paradox wrapped around irony packaging hypocrisy. Untied by a brave and wise woman who wants only peace and juctice but who is still being persecuted for what she is and what she says. A daughter of the Nile, a teacher for the world.

By: Michael Coren is a broadcaster and writer living in Toronto, Canada.

Technorati Tags: dhimmitude,Islam,tolerance

A new battler for Britain

Defying dreary weather and drearier protests, the state visit of Benedict XVI to England and Scotland was, by all accounts, a smashing success. Although only about 5 million of 60 Britons are Catholic, the enthusiasm of the crowds bowled over a sceptical media.

London’s saucy tabloids ran interviews with star-struck teenagers under punning headlines like “Bene’s from Heaven”. One young woman gushed to the News of the World, "English Catholicism needs a bit of oomph and this is our chance to give it some welly. I have got a feeling that I've not had for a long time. He should come more often."

No doubt the Pope appreciated the devoted crowds, but he had come with a message, not an applause meter.  British Prime Minister David Cameron picked that up. In his farewell remarks, he thanked the Pope for raising searching questions. “You have really challenged the whole country to sit up and think, and that can only be a good thing.”

Think about what?

Five themes impressed me about Benedict’s subtle and subdued addresses.

Remember 1066 and all that. Even in Britain it’s easy to forget how yoked we are to our past. Voldemort Dawkins and his disciples seemed unaware of how much they owed to generations of anti-popery campaigners. Different costumes, same script.

Benedict, on the other hand, has a knack for placing messages in an historical framework. In Westminster Hall, he said, “The angels looking down on us from the magnificent ceiling of this ancient Hall remind us of the long tradition from which British Parliamentary democracy has evolved. They remind us that God is constantly watching over us to guide and protect us. And they summon us to acknowledge the vital contribution that religious belief has made and can continue to make to the life of the nation.”

Britain, he reminded his hosts time and time again, is incomprehensible without its faith. Even its first history was penned by a Saxon monk, Bede the Venerable. “The Christian message has been an integral part of the language, thought and culture of the peoples of these islands for more than a thousand years. Your forefathers’ respect for truth and justice, for mercy and charity come to you from a faith that remains a mighty force for good in your kingdom, to the great benefit of Christians and non-Christians alike.”

In short, democratic values of freedom, equality and solidarity have Christian roots. The greatest triumph of British democracy in the 19th century, the abolition of the slave trade, was due to the work of reformers like William Wilberforce and David Livingstone, both staunch Christians.

And, taking a leaf from the tormented history of his own homeland, Benedict reminded listeners that atheist regimes, like the slavers, denied a common humanity to Jews and other subject peoples. “As we reflect on the sobering lessons of the atheist extremism of the twentieth century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus to a ‘reductive vision of the person and his destiny’.”

What lies ahead if secularism erases religion from civic life?

Reason and faith are compatible. Benedict could easily have side-stepped the enormous tensions of this trip. Nowadays beatifications are normally proclaimed by local bishops. But the life and work of Cardinal Newman offered him an opportunity to take the battle against aggressive secularism into enemy territory. Without ever mentioning He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, he pounded his contention that “There is no logical pathway from atheism to wickedness.”

A schoolboy knowledge of the 20th century shows how dumboundingly daft that is but Benedict put it more eloquently:

“Without the corrective supplied by religion, though, reason … can fall prey to distortions, as when it is manipulated by ideology, or applied in a partial way that fails to take full account of the dignity of the human person. Such misuse of reason, after all, was what gave rise to the slave trade in the first place and to many other social evils, not least the totalitarian ideologies of the twentieth century. This is why I would suggest that the world of reason and the world of faith – the world of secular rationality and the world of religious belief – need one another and should not be afraid to enter into a profound and ongoing dialogue, for the good of our civilization.”

Young people need challenging ideals. The last 40 years have thrown a soggy blanket of booze and sex over youthful idealism and generosity. One of the leaders in the Pope’s Unwelcome Committee, the Commissar of the British secularist commentariat, Polly Toynbee, exemplified this in a recent column when she wrote that repression of “sex lies at the poisoned heart of all that is wrong with just about every major faith”. What Jack and Jill need is more safe sex, in other words. 

Benedict, on the other hand, offered young Britons the demanding challenge of creating a civilisation of love, rather than a civilisation of indulgence. “There are many temptations placed before you every day - drugs, money, sex, pornography, alcohol - which the world tells you will bring you happiness, yet these things are destructive and divisive. There is only one thing which lasts: the love of Jesus Christ personally for each one of you.”

The Pope has a vision of life as demanding commitment to dignity, friendship, wisdom and truth – like John Henry Newman – instead of the frantic pursuit of “the glittering but superficial existence frequently proposed by today’s society”. The eruption of petulant nastiness in the media before the visit made a shabby contrast with the Pope’s invitation to reach for the stars.

Religion has a place in the public square. Nowhere in the Western world is religion more on the back foot than in Britain. But as Prime Minister Cameron pointed out, Christianity is challenging: “For you have offered a message not just to the Catholic Church but to each and every one of us of every faith and none. A challenge to us all to follow our conscience to ask not what are my entitlements, but what are my responsibilities? To ask not what we can do for ourselves, but what we can do for others?”

Faith has a role in political life, Benedict insisted. Politics is not just a matter of administrative effectiveness or balancing interests, but of ethics. “Substantially politics came into being in order to guarantee justice, and with justice, freedom. Now justice is a moral value, a religious value, and hence faith, the proclamation of the Gospel, is linked to politics at the point of ‘justice’, and from here are born common interests.”

The 20th century has shown that that governments are constantly tempted to tyranny. It is faith that protects citizens from being swallowed up by Leviathan:

“Each generation, as it seeks to advance the common good, must ask anew: what are the requirements that governments may reasonably impose upon citizens, and how far do they extend? By appeal to what authority can moral dilemmas be resolved? These questions take us directly to the ethical foundations of civil discourse. If the moral principles underpinning the democratic process are themselves determined by nothing more solid than social consensus, then the fragility of the process becomes all too evident - herein lies the real challenge for democracy.”

The foundation for tolerance is respect, not relativism. The Pope’s critics accuse him of being deaf to dialogue but they were in no mood for dialogue themselves last weekend. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named told a rally of supporters that he was “a leering old fixer” and “an enemy of humanity, of children, of gay people, of women, of the poorest people on the planet, of truth, of science, of education”. Isn’t Britain’s Pope of atheism capable of civility or tolerance?

By contrast, Benedict pulled no punches but gave no offence. In Westminster Hall he reminded the great and good of British society that Thomas More had been martyred for his loyalty to Rome. In Lambeth Palace, the residence of the Anglican Primate, he made a veiled reference to the ordination of homosexuals and women and Newman’s conversion from the Anglican Church. In Westminster Abbey, he described himself as the successor of Peter. He met Muslim leaders and alluded to the lack of religious freedom in Muslim-majority countries. Everywhere he spoke with courtesy and respect and without insolence or irony. But everywhere he sought out common ground for promoting human dignity and religious freedom.

More with deeds than with words he gave a memorable lesson in tolerance. On the one hand, it is not forbearance, or ignoring points of difference. On the other it is not minimising differences as if they did not matter. Benedict showed that tolerance is possible without being a relativist. Is it because he is sure that reason will ultimately triumph that he has the courage to dialogue?

Read the speeches yourself. It is not for nothing that MercatorNet nominated Joseph Ratzinger as one of the great champions of human dignity.

By: Michael Cook is editor of MercatorNet.

Technorati Tags: Benedict XVI,Christianity,UK

The Rwandan genocide: a revisionist history

Political wars around the history of genocide are most evident in controversies over the Holocaust (see "The Holocaust, genocide studies, and politics", 18 August 2010). But they are also sharpening around Rwanda, where in 1994 the “Hutu Power” regime killed hundreds of thousands of Tutsis as well as moderate Hutus (see Gérard Prunier, The Rwanda Crisis, 1954-94: History of a Genocide [C Hurst, 2nd edition, 1998]).

The political context of this development is that the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) government headed by Paul Kagame - which ended the genocide when it seized power - is both determined to use the west's guilt at failing to stop the 1994 genocide to entrench its own impunity, and trade on the victims of the Rwanda genocide in order to deflect criticism of its domestic authoritarianism and external aggression.

This strategy is diminishing in effect. A real momentum is growing behind the recognition of the RPF's own responsibility for massacres of civilians, mainly Hutus, leading to accusations that it too has committed genocide. Until now most attention has focused on massacres inside Rwanda, during the RPF's invasion in 1994 and subsequent consolidation of power, most notoriously at Kibeho in 1995.

These events led some Hutu propagandists to propound the theory of the “double genocide”. This is a simplistic and distorting idea because RPF massacres were localised, with neither the national scope nor the consistent targeting of the huge Hutu Power murder-campaign. Nevertheless, there is no doubt that the RPF committed genocidal massacres of Hutu civilians.

The spotlight now, however, is on the aftermath of the 1994 genocide, when the RPF pursued Hutu génocidaires into what was then Zaïre (now the Democratic Republic of Congo), initiating the devastating wars which engulfed that country until 2003 and continue in some regions to this day. In these wars, a changing (and to the uninitiated, bewildering) array of states and Congolese armed groups have both fought each other and committed atrocities (including systematic rape) against civilians.

A new report

Gérard Prunier, in his monumental study of the Congo wars - From Genocide to Continental War: The 'Congolese' Conflict and the Crisis of Contemporary Africa (C Hurst, 2009) - explains that Rwanda's RPF regime remained the most consistent and determined external participant throughout these conflicts, and that its responsibility for massacres has long been known (see Gérard Prunier, "The eastern DR Congo: dynamics of conflict", 17 November 2008).

For their part western governments, especially the United States and Britain’s, have consistently deferred to Rwanda's “victim” status, in some cases defending it against serious charges of having perpetrated crimes for which there is real evidence.

But a detailed report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights - leaked to Le Monde - maps “the most serious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law” committed within the DR Congo in 1993-2003: namely, charges that civilians were systematically attacked on a large scale. A summary on paragraph 512 reads:

“These attacks resulted in a very large number of victims, probably tens of thousands of members of the Hutu ethnic group, all nationalities combined. In the vast majority of cases reported, it was not a question of people killed unintentionally in the course of combat, but people targeted primarily by [Rwandan and allied] forces and executed in their hundreds, often with edged weapons. The majority of the victims were children, women, elderly people and the sick, who posed no threat to the attacking forces. Numerous serious attacks on the physical or psychological integrity of members of the group were also committed, with a very high number of Hutus shot, raped, burnt or beaten. Very large numbers of victims were forced to flee and travel long distances to escape their pursuers, who were trying to kill them. The hunt lasted for months, resulting in the deaths of an unknown number of people subjected to cruel, inhuman and degrading living conditions, without access to food or medication. On several occasions, the humanitarian aid intended for them was deliberately blocked, in particular in Orientale Province, depriving them of assistance essential to their survival.”

The report therefore carefully argues (paragraphs 514-18) that the attacks on Hutus could have amounted to genocide.

This is an explosive conclusion for the Rwandan government (which has predictably reacted by threatening regional peacemaking arrangements). The United Nations and western governments will also find it embarrassing and inconvenient - to the extent that there is doubt as to whether the report will ever be published officially.  

A great denial

All this is also welcome fuel for a determined group of Rwanda genocide-deniers. A new book by Edward S Herman and David Peterson focusing on the use of the term “genocide” in the media and academia - The Politics of Genocide (Monthly Review Press, 2010) - argues that the western establishment has “swallowed a propaganda line on Rwanda that turned perpetrator and victim upside-down” (p.51); the RPF not only killed Hutus, but were the “prime génocidaires” (p.54); there was “large-scale killing and ethnic cleansing of Hutus by the RPF long before the April-July 1994 period (p.53); this contributed to a result in which “the majority of victims were likely Hutu and not Tutsi” (quoted with approval, p.58).

Herman and Peterson state that “a number of observers as well as participants in the events of 1994 claim that the great majority of deaths were Hutu, with some estimates as high as two million” (p.58). But a check of the reference for this shocking statement finds no more than a letter from a former RPF military officer and personal communications from a former defence council before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (n.127, p.132) - both participants rather than “observers”. That is enough for these authors to dismiss the idea of “800,000 or more largely Tutsi deaths” as RPF and western propaganda (see Adam Jones, "On Genocide Deniers - Challenging Herman and Peterson", AllAfrica.com. 16 July 2010).

This book deserves attention for the fact that it opens with a lengthy foreword by Herman’s long-term collaborator, Noam Chomsky. Chomsky remains for many an exemplary champion of human rights; a quote from him even emblazons the respectable academic website on which the leaked UN report has been published.

Many others, however, reached a very different view after examining his comments on the Khmer Rouge record in Cambodia, his indulgence of Holocaust-denying writers, and his encouragement of Bosnian genocide-denial. But even in this gruesome context (to use one of Chomsky’s favourite words) his endorsement of The Politics of Genocide - with its denial of genocide in Rwanda as well as Bosnia - goes further.

A dead zone

This book and Noam Chomsky’s foreword inadvertently show just how multi-directional the politics of genocide have become. It is true that official western propagandists minimise “our” crimes and represent those of “our” enemies in over-simplified ways, and that such legerdemain merits exposure. But it also clear that anti-western propagandists - Herman, Peterson and Chomsky among them - are guilty of the same evasions and distortions from the “other” side.

They argue that in official western narratives, “our victims are unworthy of our attention and indignation, and never suffer ‘genocide’ at our hands” (p.104, italics in original). Yet in anti-western, Chomskyan narratives, an identical process occurs: the west's enemies, whether Serbian nationalist or Rwandan “Hutu Power”, have never committed “genocide”, and their crimes are always of less significance than those of western-supported forces.

The journalist John Pilger endorses The Politics of Genocide on its cover by saying that Herman and Peterson “defend the right of all of us to a truthful historical memory”. This important right can never be exercised by treating the men and boys of Srebrenica, the massacred and expelled Kosovo Albanians, and the slaughtered Rwandan Tutsis as “unworthy victims”. 

For scholars of genocide studies, this book is rich source-material. It is not a serious contribution to analysis in the interest of “truthful historical memory”.

By: Martin Shaw is professorial fellow in international relations and human rights at Roehampton University, London, and an honorary research professor of international relations at the University of Sussex. His website is here This review has been reproduced from openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence.

Technorati Tags: genocide,international relations,Rwanda

United Nations demands inquiry into mass rapes in Congo

Mass rapes of women and children strongly condemned

A United Nations Security Council has strongly condemned the mass rapes in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo, or DRC and urged the DRC government to immediate launch an inquiry into the tragedy, which also involved children victims.

The latest victims of sexual violence in the eastern Congo include 21 girls between seven and 21 years old, and six men.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Claude Heller, the Mexican United Nations ambassador spoke to reporters in his capacity as the chairman of the Security Council Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict.

"We expressed our strong condemnation of the tragic events which occurred in Walikale territory beginning late July and the following weeks in the Kivus involving minor victims," Heller said. "A total of 32 cases were reported. Thirty two cases of rape against children, 31 girls and one boy."

Heller's statement came at the end of a meeting of the working group, which reitereated a previous comment by the U.N. Security Council which strongly condemned the mass rapes in the eastern DRC in late July and early August.

It's estimated that 500 women have been raped by rebel soldiers in eastern DRC. Since U.N. officials first revealed that large numbers of women had been gang-raped, the number reported has grown to 242 victims from at least 150 concentrated in 13 villages in North Kivu province, including 28 minors.

"We recall the firm commitment of the Security Council Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict in fight against impunity, in particular for sexual violence crimes," Heller said. "We call upon all parties to cease immediately violations of international humanitarian law and human rights law, in particular sexual violence.

"We urge the government of the DRC to immediately launch an inquiry, arrest, and prosecute the perpetrators of such attacks," he said. "We encourage the U.N. to take all of the necessary measures to improve efficiency, to help prevent and to respond to such attacks and to better coordinate its actions."

The Security Council convened an open meeting to hear the briefing from Atul Khare, the U.N. under-secretary-general for peacekeeping operations, and Margot Wallstrom, the UN secretary-general's special representative on sexual violence in conflict.

The latest victims include 21 girls between seven and 21 years old, and six men, said Khare, who then told the Council that the U.N.'s actions "were not adequate" in preventing the mass rapes of women and children.

"While the primary responsibility for protection of civilians lies with the state, its national army and police force, clearly we have also failed. Our actions were not adequate, resulting in unacceptable brutalization of the population of villages in the area," Khare said.

Margot Wasstrom called for "collective responsibility" in the U.N.'s failure to prevent the brutal sexual attacks in the war-torn African country.

"At this moment, we are all compelled to look in the mirror and face our collective responsibility for our inability to prevent the mass rapes in Kibua," Wallstrom told the UN Security Council.

By: Catholic on Line

 

Technorati Tags: Congo,Africa,rape,inquiry,violence

Reaping the whirlwind

“It began on Saturday 7th September 1940 at around tea-time… That Saturday was a warm, sunny Autumn day. In the late afternoon we of the Auxiliary Fire Service, stationed at the London Fire Brigade Station … [were] watching from the window towards Greenwich, across the Thames, we suddenly saw aircraft approaching, quite low, their shapes black against the bright sky. We watched, mesmerised, until someone said, uneasily, ‘I think we’d better go downstairs, these blokes look like they mean business’ They did. We closed the window and were walking, unhurriedly down the stairs when suddenly came loud rushing noises and huge explosions. Bombs! we were being bombed! “ ~ Doris Lilian Bennett 

This month marks 70 years since the German Luftwaffe began its systematic bombing of English cities, killing 43,000 Britons in nine months of bombing. Nazi Germany adopted this tactic after failing to gain the air supremacy needed for a full scale invasion of Britain, and in retaliation for earlier limited bombings of German cities. “The Blitz” failed to defeat British morale; but the tactic of “terror bombing” became a central feature of the Second World War.

From 1942 onward, Britain’s Royal Air Force began the systematic bombing of German cities, under the direction of Air Chief Marshal Arthur “Bomber” Harris:

“Attacks on cities like any other act of war are intolerable unless they are strategically justified. But they are strategically justified in so far as they tend to shorten the war and preserve the lives of Allied soldiers. To my mind we have absolutely no right to give them up unless it is certain that they will not have this effect. I do not personally regard the whole of the remaining cities of Germany as worth the bones of one British Grenadier.”

Harris’ rationale is the epitome of “whatever it takes”, the principle of military expedience. But there is also a hint of vengeance in his words: “The Nazis entered this war under the rather childish delusion that they were going to bomb everyone else, and nobody was going to bomb them… They sowed the wind, and now they are going to reap the whirlwind.”

Estimates of German civilian casualties suffered under Allied bombing range from 300,000 to 600,000 killed. The RAF were far more effective than their German counterparts.

In the Pacific region the Japanese military made no secret of their contempt for the rules of warfare. The numerous war crimes and atrocities committed by Japanese forces were more like natural extensions of the perverse Imperial ideology, rather than concessions to military expedience.

But the US firebombing of Tokyo from February 1945, and finally the use of nuclear weapons on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, are the epitome of doing “whatever it takes” to shorten the war, forestall invasion, preserve the lives of Allied soldiers, and let enemy civilians “reap the whirlwind”. The lessons of military expedience culminated in the most direct and effective violence ever inflicted upon an enemy population.

In the past few decades, Western democracies have shied away from the targeting of non-combatants. A narrative has emerged affirming the “exceptional” nature of World War II, that increased civilian mobilisation according to the principles of “total war” removed the distinction between civilian and military. Yet this “straw man” argument does not tell us why it should suddenly become morally licit to intentionally target enemy non-combatants; for it is the “combatant/non-combatant” distinction that determines the moral use of force, not the “civilian/military” dichotomy. Medics and chaplains may be military non-combatants, while civilians will become legitimate targets if they enter into combat.

The value of this distinction is most apparent in the two wars that have engaged Western democracies this past decade. In Iraq and Afghanistan, the enemy is not “military”, yet he is most definitely a combatant. At the same time, the enemy has embraced whole-heartedly the principle of expedience, doing “whatever it takes” to achieve his goals. This principle is made explicit in the self-serving justification of al-Qaeda:

“Muslim scholars have issued a fatwa [a religious order] against any American who pays taxes to his government. He is our target, because he is helping the American war machine against the Muslim nation.”

Another al-Qaeda leader offered justifications for the killing of non-combatants that read almost like a parody of arguments for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki:

“The citizens in democratic Western countries become full participants in governmental decision-making by voting in elections and therefore they are no longer considered ‘non-combatants’ as in past wars.”

Islamic terrorists and “insurgents” have even displayed an astonishing degree of callousness toward the lives of their fellow believers:

“The killing of infidels by any method including martyrdom [suicide] operations has been sanctified by many scholars even if it means killing innocent Muslims… The shedding of Muslim blood... is allowed in order to avoid the greater evil of disrupting jihad.”

We have returned to a point where Western nations uphold the ethics of warfare, while our enemies will do “whatever it takes” to win. Yet the temptation will always exist for us to abandon our self-imposed rules of warfare for the sake of a quicker, easier, or more vengeful victory.

To avoid this temptation, we must confirm that we are truly acting in accordance with the ethics of warfare, and not simply responding to the demands of the present era. It is clear, for example, that domestic and international politics will not condone the targeting of non-combatants as it did in the past. But is this opinion based on the fact that it is always wrong to target non-combatants? Or is it based on a pragmatic sense that such actions are not yet justified? We do not know what challenges the future holds, so we cannot predict how our judgment will be tested and warped by coming events.

Many people believe that war with Iran or North Korea are very real possibilities, and the threat of nuclear weapons from these nations cannot be ignored. How would we respond in such a terrible scenario? Would we view their non-combatant populations as worthy of protection? Or would we find some rationale to let them “reap the whirlwind”?

By: Zac Alstin works at the Southern Cross Bioethics Institute in Adelaide, South Australia.

 

Technorati Tags: terrorism,utilitarianism,World War II,9/11

NYC Imam says 'No Deal' after Florida Pastor Cancels Burning of Quran

Pastor Terry Jones announced earlier today that he was cancelling the burning of copies of the Quran in response to a decision by the Imam in New York City to relocate the mosque. He also stated he would be traveling the NYC to meet with the Muslim leader. In quick response, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf refuted the report saying all was moving ahead as planned.

UPDATED  (Catholic Online) - Not long after Rev. Terry Jones announced he was cancelling the buring of the Quran and meeting with NYC Mosque leaders, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf of the planned city worship center issued his own statement, indicating he was surprised by the announcement and that he would not barter.

As was reported earlier, Imam Muhammad Musri, president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, said to the Associated Press after a news conference, "I told the pastor that I personally believe the mosque should not be there, and I will do everything in my power to make sure it is moved. But there is not any offer from there (New York) that it will be moved. All we have agreed to is a meeting, and I think we would all like to see a peaceful resolution."
It is still unclear whether a meeting is to take place. ABC News reported that a statement from SoHo Properties indicated, "The Muslim Community Center called Park51 in Lower Manhattan is not being moved."

"We are, of course, now against any other group burning Qurans," Jones said earlier today during the news conference. "We would right now ask no one to burn Qurans. We are absolutely strong on that. It is not the time to do it."
President Obama, members of Congress and General Patraeus and others have condemned to action of burning copies of the Quran. They had indicated that such an act would put troops in harm's way and intensify the determination of Islamist extremists. While most of them chose to communicate to Jones only by way of the public media, it was Secretary of Defense Robert Gates who actually called the pastor personally and discuss the situation.

Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said, "Secretary Gates reached out to Pastor Jones this afternoon. They had a very brief phone conversation during which the Secretary expressed his grave concern that going forward with the Quran burning would put at risk the lives of our forces around the world, especially those in Iraq and Afghanistan, and he urged the Pastor not to proceed with it."
Federal, state and local law enforcement agencies had increased security for the pastor and his church, Dove Outreach Center, an independent Pentecostal church in the firestorm of controversy surrounding the proposed activity. Counter-demonstrations had already begun to take place in other parts of the world as news of the burning spread. In Kabul, Afghanistan, hundreds of protestors burned an American flag while chanting, "Death to Christians."
President Obama received a letter from Indonesian President Susilo Bamban Yudhoyno  requesting that he stop "this hideous act." Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, issued a warning that Muslims would react harshly to the burning. He went on to blame Washington for failing to protect the rights of American Muslims.
*****
WASHINGTON, DC (Catholic Online) - Rev. Terry Jones, the controversial pastor who announced his intentions to publically burn approximately 200 copies of the Quran on September 11 has called it off. He stated that the reason for his change is that the leader of the proposed NYC mosque has agreed to move locations.
News agencies were not able to confirm that report but a Florida Imam, Muhammad Musri, told The Associated Press that what he offered was a meeting with Jones, the New York imam planning the Islamic center and himself to discuss the location of the mosque.
The AP went on to report that Musri, who is president of the Islamic Society  of Central Florida told Jones that he does not believe the mosque should be built near the World Trade Center site and would do everything in his power to make sure it is moved. The pastor has indicated he trusts Musri's sincerity and willing to participate in this new plan.
Jones, who pastors a church with less than 50 members, drew international attention with his "Burn the Quran" day protest. Objectors to this event publically urged the minister to cancel, calling his actions irresponsible, outrageous and dangerous. The President, members of Congress and the Military warned Jones that he would be putting the US military overseas in harm's way. The Vatican also condemned the proposed action.

- - -
By: By Randy Sly.

Deacon Keith Fournier asks that you join with us and help in this vital mission by sending this article to your family, friends, and neighbors and adding our link (www.catholic.org) to your own website, blog or social network. Let us broadcast, we are PROUD TO BE CATHOLIC!

Technorati Tags: Imam,Florida,Mosque,New York,Jones,Musri,Congress,Obama,Pastor,Feisal Abdul Rauf

Hard questions

 

As Operation Iraqi Freedom morphs into Operation New Dawn, we cannot forget that at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians have died violent deaths.

After seven and a half years, the United States has ended its combat mission in Iraq. Only 50,000 American troops remain there to assist Iraq’s Security Forces, support Iraqi soldiers in targeted counter-terrorism missions, and protect American civilians. “Now, it’s time to turn the page,” President Barack Obama told the nation in an Oval Office address on August 31.

But turning the page to the challenge of a rickety economy should not mean allowing memories of this war to slide into a black hole. There are many questions about the invasion of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, but surely the most important is: was it a just war? This was the question when the war began and it is still the question now. How can we move on without confronting it squarely and honestly?

Back in 2003 there was a fierce debate over whether toppling the repulsive regime of Saddam Hussein could be justified ethically. Pundits debated the four traditional criteria for a just war: success must be probable, the cause must be just, war must be the last resort, and the benefits of victory must be proportionate to the evils of war.

By the end of 2003, we were already in a position to answer the first three of these questions. Had there been a reasonable chance of success? Absolutely. Before, during and after, there was never the slightest doubt about the immediate outcome. On May 1, when President Bush stood on the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln under a banner announcing “Mission Accomplished”, Operation Iraqi Freedom was an overwhelming victory with minimal casualties for the Allies.

Had it been a just cause? True, the Iraqi people were no longer in thrall to a barbaric dictator – but that was a side-effect of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The main aim of the war had been to defang and dethrone a mortal threat to world peace. But despite Saddam’s insane bluster, and to the embarrassment of President Bush and Prime Minister Blair, he possessed no weapons of mass destruction.

Had there been other effective avenues to confront the danger? Probably. Since there was no imminent danger of the deployment of those fabled WMDs, it is conceivable that United Nations sanctions would have eventually toppled the regime without an invasion.

Now that the war is over and we can do a balance sheet of its debits and credits, we also need to apply the fourth criterion: did recourse to arms produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated?

Most of the media coverage of the conclusion of Operation Iraqi Freedom in the past week has failed to face this essential issue. Are the Iraqi people better off?

By some criteria, the answer is Yes. It may be surprising to readers of Western media who shudder at the appalling news of suicide bombers in markets and police stations, but Iraq’s economy has improved substantially. The estimated GDP growth in 2009 was 4.5 percent.

Before the war, there were 4,500 internet subscribers in the whole country. In January, there were 1.6 million. Before the war, there were 833,000 telephone subscribers; in January there were 1.3 million landlines and 19.3 million cell phones. Direct foreign investment in 2004 was running at about US$10 million per month. By late last year, it was about $100 million per month.

Iraqi optimism about the future has grown. In February 2009, a survey showed that 84 percent of Iraqis thought that security was “good” or “very good”. In the same month, 64 percent thought that Iraq should be a democracy, compared to only 19 percent for an Islamic state, and 14 percent for a “strong leader”.

On the debit side of the quality of life ledger, of course, fewer than half of Iraqis are satisfied with their supply of electricity, clean water and medical care. Education and justice are shaky.

But surely the main index of whether Iraqis are better off must be how many perished in the wake of the invasion. The website Iraqi Body Count estimates that between 97,700 and 106,600 Iraqi civilians have died violent deaths since 2003. More than 20,000 of them are still unidentified.

The actual number is disputed, but IBC’s figures are based on documented deaths, not statistical estimates. They include only civilians, not combatants. It is probably the most reliable – and conservative -- of all the estimates and has been quoted by relief agencies, WHO, UNHCR, the World Bank and the IMF, the BBC, Economist, and other media. Even the report of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction to the US Congress used its figures.

These numbers are almost impossible for us to grasp in comfortable countries like the US and Australia. A figure of 100,000 Iraqi civilians out of a population of 29 million is roughly equivalent to 1 million Americans in a population of 307 million. A million violent deaths in seven years in the US are simply unimaginable. Only 3,000 people died in the 9/11 attacks and this was the cause of unparalleled grief. For every death in Iraq, there were mothers and fathers and wives and children rent by sorrow and despair.

How can this figure be ignored? As the staff of Iraq Body Count put it in a letter to the British government’s inquiry into the lessons of the war:

“One of the most important questions in situations of armed conflict and in the laws of war is whether the use of force has been a proportionate response to the threat that prompted it. It is impossible to establish the wisdom of actions taken - even if in hindsight and without a view to apportioning direct blame – if the full consequences in human welfare are not taken into account. Casualty data are perhaps the most glaring indication of the full costs of war.”

For the most part, the invading troops were not directly responsible for these deaths, but the power vacuum after regime change was a trigger for internecine slaughter. These calamities were foreseeable, but the Bush Administration’s horizon had only been regime change. After that was a new dawn of free elections and an orderly parliamentary democracy. If this was optimism, it was ignorant optimism. If it was naïveté, it was reckless naïveté.

A soberly-written report from the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction to the US Congress, Stuart W. Bowen, Jr, suggests that the Bush Administration had been negligent in basing its skimpy planning on a “liberation model”:

“From the outset, the Pentagon’s leadership believed that victory would be swift and that a new interim Iraqi authority would quickly assume power. They planned on Iraq’s police providing postwar security and anticipated that Iraqi oil revenues would fund most relief and reconstruction projects. When Iraq’s withering post-invasion reality superseded these expectations, there was no well-defined ‘Plan B’ as a fallback and no existing government structures or resources to support a quick response (page 324)”

Politically, it is too divisive for President Obama to state clearly that the Iraq War was unjust. But somehow, sometime, America’s share of responsibility for those civilian deaths must be acknowledged. Until then, the sombre and statesmanlike words in Obama’s address last week will be hollow: “Throughout our history, America has been willing to bear the burden of promoting liberty and human dignity overseas, understanding its links to our own liberty and security.”

Does anyone really believe that 19 million cell phones are ample compensation for 100,000 civilian deaths?

By: Michael Cook is editor of MercatorNet.

Technorati Tags: Iraq,just war,Quran,Imam,Mosque,New York,Florida

Younger working class miss out on jobs, marriage, religion

Younger working class people are drifting further away from middle class America and traditional values because they cannot find work in the changing job market. The social and political implications may be drastic.

That’s the gist of an article in the Wall Street Journal last week by sociologists Andrew J. Cherlin and W Bradford Wilcox. I am a week behind with this but the trends are not going to disappear any time soon.

Wilcox and others have drawn attention to the dilemmas of the working class before, noting for example how the “mancession” could increase the “divorce divide” between middle America and those further down the socio-economic scale.

(BTW, we are using “working class” here as shorthand. Cherlin and Wilcox say that that the real class divisions in society today are based on education.)

Now he and Cherlin point out that because younger members of this class can’t earn enough in the lower-skills jobs still available, they are not even getting married. That’s because, like most Americans, they believe that a couple isn’t ready to marry until they can count on a steady income.

Thus, in the early 1990s, 10 per cent of working class women were cohabiting when they gave birth; by the mid-2000s that figure had risen to 27 per cent -- the largest increase of any educational group. Since cohab relationships are more likely to break up, their children will pay the price.

Unmarried and without steady incomes, working class men and women are abandoning religion as well. The drop off has been greatest among whites. “In the 1970s, 35% of working-class whites aged 25-45 attended religious services nearly every week, the same percentage as college-educated whites in that age group. Today, the college-educated are the only group who attend services almost as frequently as they did in the 1970s.”

Some observers might say that there's nothing alarming about the working class's retreat from marriage and organized religion. It's true that not everyone wishes to marry or to worship, and that family and religious diversity can be valuable.

But the working class is not a cultural vanguard confidently leading the way toward a postmodern lifestyle. Rather, it is a group making constrained choices. For the most part, these are people who would like to marry before having kids but who don't think they are economically ready.

In contrast, college-educated Americans—the winners in our globalized economy—are now living more traditional family and religious lives than their working-class peers. More than 90% of college-educated women are married when they give birth.

What will be the effects of this working class drift?

Will their social disengagement leave them vulnerable to political appeals based on anger and fear? Will their multiple cohabiting unions and marriages prevent their children from developing a sense of attachment to others?

This, surely, is a gap that has to be bridged -- in other countries as well.

By: Carolyn Moynihan

 

Technorati Tags: employment,marriage,religion,working class

Can you hear us now?

When Melinda Tankard Reist’s latest book, Getting Real: Challenging the sexualisation of girls, was published last year, a reviewer described it as a “collective shout against the pornification of culture”. “I liked the phrase so much I decided to give it to a new grassroots campaign I’d been thinking about,” says the Australian advocate for women and girls. Here she talks to MercatorNet about the impact that campaign is having.

Mercatornet: What is your overall aim in confronting the pornification of culture?

Melinda Tankard Reist: The aim of Collective Shout: for a world free of sexploitation is to name, shame and expose advertisers, corporations and marketers who objectify women and sexualise girls to sell products and services. We are at the forefront of nation-wide action to pressure them to recognise their corporate social responsibility not to depict women and girls in ways that harm them.

Our overall aim in confronting various forms of objectification is to make them unacceptable. We want companies to think twice before using exploitative, hyper-sexualised imagery of women. We also want them to think twice before marketing inappropriate sexualised toys, games, clothes and other products to children. We want them to recognise what the research says about the connections between over-sexualised imagery and negative physical and mental health outcomes in young people and children especially.

We also oppose the ultimate outworking of repackaging little girls as sexually interesting, which is the global trade in their bodies. We challenge anything that treats the bodies of women and girls as appropriate elements of sexual commerce and fuels the global industries of pornography and prostitution.

How long have you been fighting this issue personally? Who else are you working with?

I have been interested in this issue for a long time. It is connected to so many human rights violations against women around the globe. Last year my book on the subject, Getting Real: Challenging the sexualisation of girls, was published (Spinifex Press 2009). One of the contributors described it as a “collective shout against the pornification of culture”. I liked the phrase so much I decided to give it to a new grassroots campaign I’d been thinking about. I felt it was time to harness the widespread concern on the issue into an organised and strategic campaign.

Collective Shout’s team comprises researchers, child advocates, eating disorder specialists, academics, journalists and campaigners and advocates. We join forces and collaborate with other groups working on the same issues, both in Australia and internationally. We also have the support of prominent experts in the field.

What have been some of your main campaigns, and what success have you had?

We have had a combination of ‘instant response’ campaigns against certain products and advertising, as well as more thought out, longer term campaigns which are ongoing. The former include successful campaigns against sexualised clothing (Best&Less push up bras for tween age girls, Cotton On’s sexualised baby clothing), a bus advertising a strip club using a large image of a prone semi-naked woman, and an on-line rape simulation game for boys. Other campaigns have been against Supre for a range of sexual slogans on tween girl t-shirts and against menswear store Roger David for t.shirts depicting women bound, gagged and semi-naked.

We regularly campaign against sexualised advertising. Our members post various action items on the website. We have an on-going campaign against porn in corner stores, milkbars, 7-11s and petrol stations, much of it containing illegal content which promotes sex with under-age girls, rape and incest. We are calling for an overhaul of our classification system, which has failed us.

We are about to launch a campaign against Lynx (LynxStynx) for its highly offensive sexualized depictions of women as mindless sexual robots. We will highlight the hypocrisy of Lynx being owned by Unilever which also owns the Dove ‘real beauty’ campaign. We will also soon launch a campaign called ‘Bye Bye Bunny’ to expose the mainstreaming of Playboy, and another called “Crossed Off” which will be a list of brands and products not to purchase this Christmas – ie cross them off your Christmas list.

How useful has the internet and social networking been?

Our campaigns are run through an interactive website, which is the lynchpin of our operations. Our Collective Shout community ‘gathers’ there, finds out what is happening and is empowered and equipped to act. We are heavy users of new forms of social media and social networking sites. Collective Shout has a twitter account and FaceBook page. I write on the issues regularly on my own website as well, and am active on twitter and FB also. Many new members find us in these ways and our message reaches a broader audience. We have been asked to establish CS overseas as a result.

Are the news media helpful?

We have a significant media profile, with media seeking comment from us most days. I am a regular on morning television. There appears to be heightened interest in and awareness of the issue.

Do you think much of the public is with you? What are the signs? Any surveys on this issue?

We don’t have statistics, however I believe much of the public is with us. Many people tell us how they are now emboldened to take action because they know they are backed by an organisation. We have had a significant sign up to Collective Shout in a short period of time. Our members are from a diverse range of backgrounds. We receive encouraging emails most days. I can barely keep up with the request for speaking engagements on the issue. I think for a long time many people held their concerns to themselves, and perhaps thought they were the only ones who felt this way. But now they feel they can express their views because they know they are not in a minority.

Are politicians taking the issue seriously? Are they taking any effective steps against sexploitation?

Some of them are, but not enough of them. We are working on educating them. There was a Senate inquiry into the sexualisation of children in 2007. Most of the recommendations have not been acted on. We will continue political engagement and lobbying until real action is taken. The (so far – could change any moment!) opposition leader committed to reviewing the classification system if elected, so we will make sure that happens. The Prime Minister (again, this could change) also indicated some concerns about sexualisation in a recent media interview, so we would hope to meet with her and take this further as well.

"The standard you walk past is the standard you set." This is one of your favorite quotes and it's a telling one. However, porn is so prevalent that tackling everything we see could be a full time job. Do we need to be selective? What can the average mum or dad do to raise standards?

That’s true. We just have to do what we can to expose the globalization and proliferation of sexual imagery and do what we can to make known the harm it is causing. I’m co-editing a new book on the subject called Big Porn Inc to be released next year.

Parents of course have a role to play in trying to protect their children from porn exposure and to talking about it with them in age-appropriate ways. But the task is much too difficult for parents on their own. We need our regulatory bodies and governments to act as well, for example on ISP filtering. There is a growing body of research on the harms caused by pornography. In Australia we are seeing a rise of child-on-child sexual assault, which the Australian Crime Commission has linked to exposure to sexualized imagery. We need Governments and regulators to acknowledge this and act.

The porn industry is largely a male affair -- right? Is this also true of the wider sexualisation of the culture? What role are women playing in this trend?

The porn industry is primarily operated and run by men. It is certainly men who produce the most hardcore, violent and degrading pornography. In terms of the broader sexualisation of culture, yes of course women are involved, especially in fashion, women’s magazines and the beauty industry. Women can participate in their own objectification and in the objectification of other women. We are trying to help them see the harm this is causing and make the necessary changes within the industries they are involved in.

Is there a need for a Collective Shout initiative from men?

Collective Shout is open to men and we have many male members. It would be great to see men refuse the pornography industry’s plan for their lives. Just last the weekend after addressing 2000 young adults at a conference in Sydney, three young men approached me and said they wanted to do all they could to battle the industry and help other young men avoid its grip.

By: Melinda Tankard Reist is a Canberra author, speaker, commentator, blogger and advocate for women and girls.

Technorati Tags: Australia,pornography,sexualisation of children

Marry, pray, love

In a book of self discovery so popular that it has been made into a movie -- Eat, Pray, Love -- the American writer Elizabeth Gilbert took herself to India to learn to pray. That was after bingeing on food in Italy and before stumbling on a new love in Bali.

Gilbert set the stage for the voyage around herself by getting a divorce. But if she had prayed with her first husband they might never have parted, as research on marital happiness shows that the couple that prays together is more likely to stay together.

This has been confirmed by a new study from the National Marriage Project based at the University of Virginia: "The Couple That Prays Together: Race and Ethnicity, Religion, and Relationship Quality Among Working-Age Adults," appears in the August issue of the Journal of Marriage and Family.

Co-authored by sociologists Christopher G. Ellison , W Bradford Wilcox and Amy M. Burdette, it is the first major study to compare religion and relationship quality across America's major racial and ethnic groups. It finds that for all groups, shared religious activity - attending church together and especially praying together - is linked to higher levels of relationship quality.

African-Americans derive the most benefits from that connection because they are significantly more likely than whites or Latinos to pray together and attend church together, offsetting other socio-economic factors tied to lower relationship quality - a finding dubbed the "African-American religion-marriage paradox," says Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project and a professor of sociology at the U of V.

Narrowing the racial divide

"Without prayer, black couples would be doing significantly worse than white couples. This study shows that religion narrows the racial divide in relationship quality in America. The vitality of African-Americans' religious lives gives them an advantage over other Americans when it comes to relationships. This advantage puts them on par with other couples."

The same is true, to a lesser extent, for Latino couples, says Wilcox.

But religion may not always benefit couples. Couples holding discordant religious beliefs and those with only one partner who attends religious services regularly tend to be less happy in their relationships, the researchers found. Being on different pages religiously is a source of tension for couples across racial and ethnic lines. "That may be due to less time spent doing things together," Wilcox says, "or having different values about child rearing, alcohol use or any number of things."

A substantial body of research has shown that relationship quality tends to be lower among racial and ethnic minorities, and higher among more religious persons and among couples in which partners share common religious affiliations, practices and beliefs, explained the study's lead author, Christopher G. Ellison, a fellow of the National Marriage Project and a professor of social science at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

The study uses data from the National Survey of Religion and Family Life, a 2006 telephone survey of 1,387 working-age adults (ages 18 to 59) in relationships, funded by the Lilly Endowment and designed by Ellison and Wilcox. The overwhelming majority of respondents were married (89 percent), with a somewhat lower rate among the racial and ethnic minorities.

The respondents reported high levels of relationship satisfaction (4.8 on a 6-point scale), but African-Americans reported being significantly less happy than whites. However, after controlling for age, education and income, the racial differences disappear.

Blacks reported higher levels of church attendance, both with and without their partners. Forty percent of black respondents reported that they attended services regularly as a couple, compared to 29 percent of whites, 31 percent of Mexicans or Mexican-Americans and 32 percent of all respondents.

Home life

Blacks were also significantly more likely than the other groups to report shared religious activities like prayer or scriptural study. That difference is probably driving the relationship improvements more than shared church attendance.

"The closer you get to the home, the more powerful the beneficial effects," says Wilcox. "It makes sense that those who think about, talk about and practice their beliefs in the home, those who bring home their reflections on their marriage, derive stronger effects from those beliefs, especially compared to those who simply attend church weekly.”

One practical effect seems especially important, Wilcox suggests: "I think forgiveness is probably a pretty key dimension to the link between shared religious practice - prayer in particular - and success in the relationship." In past studies, forgiveness has been found to be a key influence on the success of relationships, home life and even workplace happiness.

Previous research linking religious involvement to improved relationship quality has ascribed the connection to three factors.

First, religious communities typically promote ethical behaviour (the Golden Rule, forgiveness) that helps define appropriate relationship conduct, encourage partners to fulfil their familial roles and responsibilities, and handle conflict in a constructive manner.

Second, family-centered social networks found in religious communities offer formal and informal support to couples and families, from financial help to models of healthy relationships, to advice from an elder about how to discipline a difficult child.

Third, religious belief seems to provide people with a sense of purpose and meaning about life in general and their relationship in particular, which increases resilience to stress.

That's particularly important for blacks and Latinos, says Wilcox, because they are more likely to experience "poverty, xenophobia, racism, neighborhood violence, underemployment, or similar factors that can stress a relationship."

None of this has anything to do with learning meditation techniques in India and is therefore unlikely to be the stuff of bestsellers and movies. But it is the stuff of real life and happiness, so people deserve to know.

This article incorporates a press release from the University of Virginia. Carolyn Moynihan wrote the introduction and the ending.

Technorati Tags: marriage,prayer,race

Welcome to the Club of Ancient Wrongs

With one war in Afghanistan, another in Iraq, a possible war with Iran, and an environmental disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, it seems bizarre that the biggest political issue in the US is whether to build a mosque near Ground Zero, the former site of the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan.

Muslims overseas are puzzled. “The mosque is not an issue for Muslims,” says Abdul Rahman Al-Rashid, a leading Arab journalist based in Dubai, “and they have not heard of it until the shouting became loud between the supporters and the objectors, which is mostly an argument between non-Muslim US citizens!”

First of all, some facts.

Only part of the US$100 million Cordoba Initiative is a mosque which will accommodate about 1,000 for Friday prayers. The rest of it is a community centre with a library, gym, auditorium, restaurant, 9/11 memorial and so on. Second, it is not a “Ground Zero Mosque”. It is a full two blocks away from the place where more than 2,700 people died.

Third, it is not a gathering place for radical Muslims. The Kuwaiti-American imam organising the project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, may have sent mixed messages, but he claims to be promoting dialogue between Americans and Muslims. He has even written a book titled, What's Right with Islam is What's Right with America. Since we have George W. Bush’s word for it that Islam is “a religion of peace”, at least New Yorkers should believe in Mr Rauf’s good intentions.

There are two strands in the commentary defending the proposed Islamic centre.

The first is that Muslims have a right, like other Americans, to build places of worship wherever they like. In the words of President Obama, "Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country." Rabbi Arthur Waskow, a prominent Jewish leader, says: “it is not only the constitutional right of the peace-committed Muslims of the Cordoba Initiative to build a community center in Lower Manhattan, but they are ethically right and profoundly wise to lift there a beacon.”

The other is that “Demonization of the Muslim religion is what this brouhaha is all about.” It is “as irrational an act of scapegoating as blaming all ethnic Germans for the acts of Nazis,” in the words of one left-wing pundit, Robert Scheer. Even the usually sensible Economist says that “The campaign against the proposed Cordoba centre in New York is unjust and dangerous.”

But the right to free commercial activity and the right to freedom from discrimination and vilification are very blunt instruments for dealing with a “sacred site”. His opponents may be using the controversy as a way to weaken President Obama (when 20 percent of Americans think he is a Muslim) but the source of the opposition is more an inarticulate sense of sacredness than bigotry.  

If New Yorkers were really that prejudiced, why is the current Islamic centre in downtown Manhattan located ten blocks away in the basement of a Catholic Church?

Today, in most Western countries, the concept of reverence for the sacred is often dismissed or ridiculed or simply viewed with perplexity. But even a secularised sense of the sacred is a tenuous link to transcendence and an important element in forging a personal and national identity.

To take a non-political example, would Walmart ever build a mall and parking lot in Yellowstone? Will California ever sell off Redwood National Park to timber companies to balance its budget? Such proposals somehow violate places revered for their awe-inspiring beauty. Or if Mr Rauf somehow managed to shift his centre to the battlefield of Gettysburg, would the ensuing protests be due to hatred of Islam or to outrage at the violation of this hallowed ground?

And for Americans Ground Zero has been hallowed by senseless deaths, heroic sacrifice, national humiliation and an outpouring of grief.

It is hard to find words to explain why a plot of ground should be revered for memories like these. That is what poets are for. But part of being human is to be connected to places and spaces and memories. Analysing the conflict in terms of constitutional rights is utterly inadequate. Something more ancient is at work which disappears in sterile political battles over rights.

It is not pandering to prejudice to recognise that America, like other societies with a long and deep history, now has its own taboos which ought to be respected even if they are legally indefensible.

A Pakistani professor Islamic Studies at American University in Washington DC, Akbar Ahmed, understands this. A former ambassador to the US, he has a deep knowledge of both cultures.

"I don't think the Muslim leadership has fully appreciated the impact of 9/11 on America,” he says. “They assume Americans have forgotten 9/11 and even, in a profound way, forgiven 9/11, and that has not happened. The wounds remain largely open. And when wounds are raw, an episode like constructing a house of worship – even one protected by the Constitution, protected by law - becomes like salt in the wounds."

Protectiveness and anger are typical of disputes over sacred sites in the Old World. Perhaps the passions in this controversy mean that America is growing up, or at least growing older. What could be more characteristic of an Old World society than fights over sacred sites?

In newer countries like Australia passions seldom run so high. I used to live in Tasmania where the indigenous people, the Tasmanian Aboriginals, had lived in complete isolation for perhaps 15,000 years. Within two generations after contact with Europeans they had all perished. It is one of the darkest chapters of Australian history, even of world history. Yet there is no fitting memorial to them, just a few wretched plaques and a hiking track named after Truganini, the last of her people.

Ancient cultures have deep feelings. Why is Jerusalem the world’s most volatile city? Because Christians, Jews and Muslims would all die to defend their sacred places. The Babri mosque in Ayodhya was destroyed in 1992 by a mob of 150,000 Hindus who believed that it had been built over the birthplace of their god Rama. Serbia fought a war rather than grant independence to Kosovo partly because the Field of Blackbirds, north of the capital Pristina, is hallowed ground where the Serbs made their last stand against the Ottoman Turks in 1389.

It is easy for unscrupulous politicians to exploit sacred sites for their own political gain, as Slobodan Milosevic did in Kosovo to rally Serbs against separatists, and perhaps Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin are doing now. But that doesn’t mean that ordinary Americans’ attachment to a sacred site should be dismissed as redneck prejudice. It’s more like the anger and exasperation you might feel if an intruding stranger made a scene at your mother’s wake.

And, to draw on the Australian experience, a sacred site can draw Western and Muslim cultures together. Arguably, Australia’s most sacred site is not on the island continent at all, but in Gallipoli, a Turkish peninsula in the Dardanelles Straits. There in 1915, thousands of Australians and New Zealanders died in a doomed attempt to capture Istanbul. Now it is a place of pilgrimage for both Australians and Turks who remember their forebears’ sacrifice and heroism.

Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey and the Turkish commander, later wrote a touching memorial which displays far more magnanimity and sensitivity than anything uttered by American politicians in the past few weeks:

“You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side now here in this country of ours... you, the mothers, who sent their sons from faraway countries wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land. They have become our sons as well.”

Michael Cook is editor of MercatorNet.

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