“Trust”, starring Clive Owen: Internet Stealing Kids’ Innocence

Contributed By: Lisa Thompson

David Schwimmer, Clive Owen Say Internet Stealing Kids’ Innocence

By Hollie McKay – Published March 29, 2011

David Schwimmer’s directorial effort “Trust,” starring Clive Owen, offers a disturbing look at an Internet sexual predator who slowly, unnervingly seeks out his prey – a typical, well-adjusted and athletic 15-year-old girl who he befriends in a cyber chat room.

Despite an array of warning signs, Annie is still drawn to her “connection” with Charlie, a self-proclaimed grad student. Their real-life encounter subsequently turns into tragedy when she is raped by who turns out to be a 35-year-old man.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2011/03/29/david-schwimmer-clive-owen-say-internet-stealing-kids-innocence/#ixzz1I5rR1zkl

IT’S WHAT YOU SCATTER

Colleen

I was at the corner grocery store buying some early potatoes– I noticed a small boy, delicate of bone and feature, ragged but clean, hungrily appraising a basket of freshly picked green peas.

I paid for my potatoes but was also drawn to the display of fresh green peas. I am a pushover for creamed peas and new potatoes.

Pondering the peas, I couldn’t help overhearing the conversation between Mr. Miller (the store owner) and the ragged boy next to me.

‘Hello Barry, how are you today?’

‘H’lo, Mr. Miller. Fine, thank ya. Jus’ admirin’ them peas. They sure look good.’

‘They are good, Barry. How’s your Ma?’
‘Fine. Gittin’ stronger alla’ time.’
‘Good. Anything I can help you with?’
‘No, Sir. Jus’ admirin’ them peas.’
‘Would you like to take some home?’ asked Mr. Miller.

‘No, Sir. Got nuthin’ to pay for ’em with.’

‘Well, what have you to trade me for some of those peas?’

‘All I got’s my prize marble here.’

‘Is that right? Let me see it’, said Miller.

‘Here ’tis. She’s a dandy.’

‘I can see that. Hmm mmm, only thing is this one is green and I sort of go for red. Do you have a red one like this at home?’ the store owner asked.

‘Not zackley but almost.’

‘Tell you what. Take this sack of peas home with you and next trip this way let me look at that red marble’. Mr. Miller told the boy.

‘Sure will. Thanks Mr. Miller.’

Mrs. Miller, who had been standing nearby, came over to help me.

With a smile she said, ‘There are two other boys like him in our community, all three are in very poor circumstances. Jim just loves to bargain with them for peas, apples, tomatoes, or whatever.

When they come back with their red marbles, and they always do, he decides he doesn’t like red after all and he sends them home with a bag of produce for a green marble or an orange one, when they come on their next trip to the store.’

I left the store smiling to myself, impressed with this man. A short time later I moved to Colorado , but I never forgot the story of this man, the boys, and their bartering for marbles.

Several years went by, each more rapid than the previous one. Just recently I had occasion to visit some old friends in that Idaho community and while I was there learned that Mr. Miller had died. They were having his visitation that evening and knowing my friends wanted to go, I agreed to accompany them. Upon arrival at the mortuary we fell into line to meet the relatives of the deceased and to offer whatever words of comfort we could.

Ahead of us in line were three young men. One was in an army uniform and the other two wore nice haircuts, dark suits and white shirts–all very professional looking. They approached Mrs. Miller, standing composed and smiling by her husband’s casket.

Each of the young men hugged her, kissed her on the cheek, spoke briefly with her and moved on to the casket. Her misty light blue eyes followed them as, one by one; each young man stopped briefly and placed his own warm hand over the cold pale hand in the casket. Each left the mortuary awkwardly, wiping his eyes.

Our turn came to meet Mrs. Miller. I told her who I was and reminded her of the story from those many years ago and what she had told me about her husband’s bartering for marbles. With her eyes glistening, she took my hand and led me to the casket.

‘Those three young men who just left were the boys I told you about.

They just told me how they appreciated the things Jim ‘traded’ them.
Now, at last, when Jim could not change his mind about color or size–.they came to pay their debt.’

‘We’ve never had a great deal of the wealth of this world,’ she confided, ‘but right now, Jim would consider himself the richest man in Idaho ..’

With loving gentleness she lifted the lifeless fingers of her deceased husband. Resting underneath were three exquisitely shined red marbles.

The Moral:
We will not be remembered by our words, but by our kind deeds. Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath.

Today I wish you a day of ordinary miracles ~ A fresh pot of coffee you didn’t make yourself–

An unexpected phone call from an old friend– Green stoplights on your way to work–

The fastest line at the grocery store–

A good sing-along song on the radio–

Your keys found right where you left them–

Send this to the people you’ll never forget. I just did–

If you don’t send it to anyone, it means you are in way too much of a hurry to even notice the ordinary miracles when they occur.

IT’S NOT WHAT YOU GATHER, BUT WHAT YOU SCATTER THAT TELLS WHAT KIND OF LIFE YOU HAVE LIVED!

Slavery of females alive and well in USA

BettyJean Kling

What would be done if black men were being kept as slaves in S.D. in 2011?

Unfortunately the race baiting and false accusations of racism have taken the focus off the real slavery problems still existing in this world and growing in our very country. While black racists have shrouded their exploit of race baiting and successfully pulled the race card for the last three years, growing misogyny towards women has continued to descend in importance to the imagined racism. Indeed, all minorities have become so adept at constantly complaining about their real or imagined current or former plights, leaving little tolerance for sexism as if very few appear to appreciate it even exists. Regardless of proof to the contrary, women are ignored, not taken seriously or they are blamed for any of the problems they encounter. They are berated, humiliated, degraded and never given the benefit of the doubt . Minorities on the other hand are to be treated with kid gloves!

Don’t get me wrong, I for one am not asking for welfare, kid gloves or any special services- keep it, but women are entitled to equal protection under the law and we are not getting the respect, or the protection. We are not entitled to call IT what it is!

SEXISM — MISOGYNY– SLAVERY

What would be done if black men were being kept as slaves in S.D. in 2011?

Human bondage hits U.S. heartland
Illicit trade for labor, sex generates billions in profits
By Chuck Neubauer
The Washington Times 8:18 p.m., Sunday, March 27, 2

People were shocked when federal prosecutors charged the owners of a motel in Oacoma, S.D., a town of fewer than 500, with keeping Philippine women in virtual slavery, forcing them to work 20-hour days under the threat of violence and taking back their paychecks after they had been endorsed to deposit in their own accounts.

Prosecutors said the enslaved women performed cleaning and front-desk duties at the motel and were expected to work second jobs at fast-food restaurants. Every aspect of their lives, according to records in the 2007 case, was controlled, including what they ate, where they lived, what they wore and to whom they spoke.

Human traffickers had crept unnoticed into the small Lyman County community, located on the west bank of the Missouri River 80 miles southeast of Pierre, the state’s capital. But the townsfolk soon learned that Interstate 90, which roars right by Oacoma, is part of the “Midwest Pipeline,” the superhighway used to deliver trafficking victims to cities across the country.

READ MORE: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/mar/27/human-bondage-hits-us-heartland/

It is not what America can do for women but what women can do for America~ Geraldine Ferraro

Barbara

Geraldine Ferraro never backing down– telling it like it is right to the very end. This is one lady that never played the old boys game- she played by her own rules, truthful and true to herself, beautiful inside and out. Way to go Gerry!

“If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position,” she told the Daily Breeze, a newspaper in Torrance, Calif.

 While critics, including Mr. Obama, pounced on her for being RACIST a defiant Ms. Ferraro defended her remarks, saying they were accurate and not racist. She has said that she herself benefited from being a woman because otherwise, she would not have been the vice presidential nominee in 1984.

While working for the Clinton campaign I had the pleasure of meeting her. At a Clinton Mother’s Day brunch in NY, I said to her that “everyone in this room owes you a debt of gratitude thank you”.

She said I know what you mean but here we are in 2008 and we are not discussing the qualifications of a woman but the ankles of a woman, she winks and smiles at Hillary, “and we are discussing pant suits rather than empty suits.”

Geraldine walked the walk refusing to attack Sarah Palin personally she is an example to us all. From her VP acceptance speech “It is not what American can do for women but what women can do for America”

Thank you Geraldine Ferraro and Rest in Peace.

Editorial Note* In appearing with Sarah Palin, Gerry was an example of The Majority United, Women supporting each other and lifting each other up rather than tearing each other apart because of ideology differences.

Geraldine Ferraro dies at 75

SWPAnna

Open Thread:

Please bring comments/thoughts and condolences as well as stories you can recall.

Gerry, stood up to all who gave her reason to do so – she never backed down- not afraid of a fight – she is a true heroine to American women everywhere!

Geraldine, a true trailblazer for women supported Hillary and while she did not agree with Sarah she supported her run for VP. Faced race charged from the Obama camp but never backed away from her convictions or her positions. We will never forget you Gerry.

Noted by MSNBC Twitter as the First Woman and First Italian American to head a major Party Ticket, we are saddened to learn that her passing has been announced.

Thank you Anna:

 

Whoopee pulls the race card and gets caught in a lie: White POTUS candidates are asked for birth certificates

Another Rant by BettyJean Kling

Hey Whoopee – Hey Oprah – Hey you bleeding heart white guilt morons pay close attention! It’s not because he is black! It’s because it’s the law! Take your race baiting, race cad bullshit and shove it- It doesn’t work anymore, it’s wearing thin and it shows the majority of racist in the country lately appear to be black! First this dude had a Keynan father, next he was adopted and raised outside of this country which adds to the fact he refuses to produce the long form birth certificate that ONE the people he works for demand to see and TWO proof of eligibility doesn’t seem to be out of line- it has been requested in the past. It has absolutely nothing to do with his half black ass!

BY LINDA BENTLEY | SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

Ike needed birth certificate to run for president

‘Ike had nothing to hide!’

CAVE CREEK – Glen Fairclough, a reader from Salt Lake City, Utah, sent us an e-mail last week to express his gratitude for publishing the recent article regarding President Obama’s Kenyan birth certificate.

And, while going through digital images online of his hometown newspaper, the Deseret News and Telegram, Fairclough forwarded us a United Press wire article from the Oct. 2, 1952 edition he thought we would find interesting.

The article appeared on page 6A with a dateline of Sherman, Texas. It was headlined: “General’s birth certificate officially filed,” and stated, “A certificate recording Dwight Eisenhower’s birth in Denison on Oct. 14, 1890, was filed Wednesday [Oct. 1, 1952] in the Grayson County Clerk’s office.

“Nobody had bothered to make out a certificate when the Republican presidential candidate was born in a house at the corner of Lamar and Day streets in nearby Denison.

“A copy of the certificate filed Wednesday was mailed to Mrs. Eisenhower in Denver. Eisenhower’s older brother, Arthur, signed the certificate. It was also signed by the Grayson County Judge J.N. Dickson and recorded by County Clerk J.C. Buchanan.”

David Dwight Eisenhower was the third of seven boys born to David Jacob and Ida Elizabeth.

Since he was called Dwight while growing up, Eisenhower swapped his first and middle names when he enrolled at West Point Military Academy.

Elected 34th president of the United States in November 1952, Eisenhower made it through his first 62 years without any need for a birth certificate.

However, the need arose when he became a presidential candidate. Since Eisenhower was the oldest man to be elected president since James Buchanan over 100 years earlier, age was obviously not at issue. Instead, there was protocol in place for presidential candidates to provide proof of eligibility to appear on the ballot.

Eisenhower, whose campaign slogan: “I like Ike” became the most famous in campaign history, won by a landslide with Richard Nixon as his running mate.

Using what the Republicans considered failures of the Truman administration, which was said to be infiltrated by Soviet spies, Eisenhower’s campaign attacked Korea, Communism and corruption.

Republicans also blamed Democrats for the military’s failure to be fully prepared to fight in Korea and pounded the Truman administration for harboring a soaring number of officials accused of crimes.

While it’s difficult not to notice history’s propensity toward repeating itself, Fairclough asserted, “Ike had nothing to hide!”

So cut the crap Whoopee, Oprah and the milk white ass kissing racists that are  race baiting and have taken it so damned far – no one even gives a damned anymore! And this bullshit about never asking a white man for a birth certificate is the biggest pile Whoopie not the crap you tried to push as truth to Donal Trump on national TV. Get your facts straight! Ike wasn’t the only one either!

Evan Bayh Joins Fox News as a Contributor

Senators who have also served as Governors discuss the “leadership” emitting from the White House. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Bayh of Indiana can take positions evolved from both levels of political office. On the Curvy Couch, Bayh gives the President a measure of leeway to deal responsibly with the debt ceiling and the budget. While allowing that Obama is holding out, “Waiting for the critical moment” before stepping in to lead like the Goose Honking from Behind, and begged off criticsm of the OOO with assertions that all be worked out at budget-passing time. Manchin, on the other hand, asks questions about how this is any way to govern?

Daily KOS: Eat This!

Manchin is in the mix at the moment, not retired from it, so he has skin in the blame game. He left the WV Governors’ Mansion for the Senate to impact the process, having rejected the Progressive Agenda, deployed Blow-Away Gun imagery in his campaign to succeed where so many democrats did not in order to be the Voice of Honor the Press cannot.

Bayh, now a Fox Contributor, debuts today with a PR savvy offering of ‘no negative’ to enter the Mix on the Other Side as a melting pot of good government. Unlike many, MANY other democrats who submitted to the craven cash call of the Obama Campaign, Indiana’s former Governor remained faithful to Hillary Clinton as both a Super Delegate and as a Friend. His accomplishments as a governor who succeeded in navigating Indiana to higher ground with Unions and Public Employee pension issues without fanfare asset his substance to viewers of Fox. He elected to leave the Senate and didn’t seek re-election because, like Bart Stupak, had found the ground beneath his feet un-sustainable. Pressures from the Left had become so offensively personal that in order to preserve traditional Democratic Faith, Bayh, LIKE SARAH PALIN, chose an unconventional but self-respecting alternative.

Seeing him on Fox News this morning, I feel reason is returning to the Democratic Party. While half-assed Liberals claim credit for the 40 hour work week, (NO, that was the DEMOCRATS.) Womens’ Rights (No, that was WOMEN getting up on their hind legs and earning it for themselves in the FACE OF OBNOXIOUS REJECTION WITHOUT CONSIDERATION FROM MEN.) and Clean Air, they fail to recognize that the Moderates, Democrats, Independents, Republicans, Constitutionalists, Greens and Libertarians, were able to restrain their personal attacks on those with whom they disagreed for long enough to find common ground and advance in the best interests of ALL by choosing their battles and giving a little everywhere they could.

The Left and those who would have you believe that they are victims of godless Capitalists are nothing more than Psychos terrified of competition. It is inconceivable to them that a mind open to new ideas or views from another perspective is the stuff of which successful lives are made. Instead of endlessly applauding themselves with superlatives about their historic gravitas, they would do well to adopt a measure of – if not humility – then certainly a reasonable recognition of all the support they received (and which they notoriously don’t reciprocate.)

Baye performed functionally (that is to say: WORKED) as Governor of Indiana and left the state better off than when he found it. He did so with the coordinated, RESPECTFUL inclusion of all factions who came to the table and accorded each a portion of his success. The Obama Administration can’t get itself out of the Frat House, off the College Rah! Rah! stage and conducts communication with the Voters as though none of us live beyond the boundaries of the crime-addled inner city.

That “New, Hipper, more Urban” Democrat described by Donna Brazile was nothing more than a white ball in the Fraternity Induction Vote giving the Affirmative Action Candidate a chance. What we of the middle still don’t buy is the notion that the thin resume presented by their Guy was something we were not permitted to question. What Left Wing Wealthy Family hands the recently graduated son the Presidency of their Revenue Stream Company without at least putting the kid through the motions of learning the family business? The Administration’s Honeymoon with Congress is over, the Maid of Honor has been restored to Minority Leader and the time has come for the Bride of the Boogie Men to retire the Veil of Illusion and learn to cook and keep house.

If that isn’t the sort of “Marriage” the Left sought from bedding Mr. Cool, then maybe they should just get him a job and keep him out of trouble, cause he sure ain’t making a serious go of the Union. He leaves all the work to Mom & Dad and heads for the gym, the golf course or a vacation jaunt with zero connectedness to any sort of professional discipline and comprehension of his duty.

I’ll be watching for the real meat of what I expect Evan Bayh has to say, along with the Hope that when her term is up, Hillary Clinton will also join the Fox Network and become a Cultural Warrior or maybe even a regular on Red Eye:)

The Gratitude Campaign

BettyJean Kling

We have service persons all over the world, they are putting their lives on the line in many ways including in ways we never considered. In addition to all their others duties they help other nations with the disasters that befall their people as in Haiti and they are patrolling the oceans during a Tsunami. In Japan for example, they are serving during a possible nuclear meltdown, they do so much more than just fight our wars, and protect our nation.

Whenever I see a service person I always say “thank you” but sometimes they are passing by in a vehicle or out of earshot. Today I learned of a campaign that will allow us all to show our gratitude with a simple sign. I hope you will use it.

How to Sign

“Thank you from the bottom of my heart”:

The sign we are using is intended to communicate “thank you from the bottom of my heart.”

To make the sign simply place your hand on your heart as though you’re saying the Pledge of Allegiance. Then pull your hand down and out, bending at the elbow (not the wrist), stopping for a moment at about the belly button with your hand flat, palm up, angled toward the person you’re thanking.

According to Norman Heimgartner, Ed.D., author of “Behavioral Traits of Deaf Children” and former Professor of Education at the University of Puget Sound, this sign originated in France in the late 1700’s, and was published in “Theorie des Signes”, a dictionary of signs by the Abbe Sicard. The sign was brought to the United States in 1816 by the Reverend Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, founder of the American School for the Deaf, who later modified it to start at the chin rather than at the heart. That sign is now the standard sign for “thank you” in American Sign Language (ASL). The original sign, starting at the heart, is less commonly known today and might now be considered “slang”.

For more information on American Sign Language, please see www.aslta.org.

Using the standard ASL sign for “Thank You” was our original plan for this campaign. We loved the idea that our campaign, in addition to thanking those who serve, might also bring some awareness to the hearing impared, just as an added bonus. But when we considered the context in which this will be used we had some concerns. Unlike other situations where people are using ASL conversationally in public, our sign is used largely at random from one passing stranger to another. It is the only sign being used – there isn’t any other use of Sign to give the receiver a context for the sender using “sign language”. So this sign will come off as a passing gesture all on its own. Our concern was that, if the receiver is not familiar with ASL (which is more likely than not going to be the case) they might mistake the ASL sign for Thank You for another well-known gesture that also uses one hand just under the chin – a rather offensive gesture. We didn’t want those who serve to think that people were telling them to “_____ off.” This is especially of concern because there are those who, even in this day and age, will spit on our Troops or call them offensive names if they disagree with something our Troops have been tasked with doing by our politicians.

So, instead, we chose this sign because it starts at the heart. So even if the receiver doesn’t know exactly what it means yet, they’ll know it comes from your heart, and that it is likely a good thing. And, although the down side is that we are not teaching anyone ASL, the up side is that we are teaching a completely unique sign, with a unique message for a unique audience.

We hope that makes sense…

On the 100th Anniversary of International Women’s Day — What Are Feminists Doing About Honor Killings?

By Phyllis Chesler

Editor’s note: The following is adapted from a speech delivered on March 8 by the author in observance of  Women’s History Month to the New York County Supreme Court.

When my Second Wave generation of feminists started out, Gender Fairness committees did not exist nor did as many women lawyers and judges or the number of feminist lawyers, both male and female, whom I see here today. As many of you know, my or should I say, our generation had the privilege of changing all that.

We also named and exposed the hidden epidemic of physical and sexual violence towards women and children.

Second Wave feminists challenged sexism in advertising, (we still do), the pornography industry, (which has grown), and prostitution which now includes human sexual trafficking.

We also challenged corporations for economically discriminating against women; that work continues. We took on drug companies whose medications caused women to die from cancer. We championed women’s reproductive and sexual rights but we also challenged birth control. We waged a war to save women’s lives. The work continues.

Courtesy of Second Wave feminist activism, more women entered previously all-male professions, and some men became feminists.

Before the Second Wave began making waves, mothers received little child support and less alimony—that has improved although custody battles have, in some ways, gotten harder, more terrible. The 25th anniversary edition of “Mothers on Trial” will be published this summer with eight new chapters.

Our generation had a universalist vision of human rights—one standard for all. I still do. While I believe in cultural diversity, I am not a multi-cultural relativist. Therefore, I have taken a strong stand against the persecution of Muslim women and dissidents. Thus, I now submit expert courtroom affidavits on behalf of Muslim girls and women who have fled being honor murdered and are seeking asylum here.

Those of us who expose the plight of such women, and this includes Somali-born feminist hero Ayaan Hirsi Ali, as well as myself, have been demonized as “Islamophobes” and racists because we do not, in the same breath, blame America, the West, or Israel for their suffering.

In my view, western academic feminists, including gay liberationists, are so afraid of being condemned as “colonialists” or “racists” that this fear trumps their concern for women’s rights in the Arab and Muslim world.

What is Islamic Gender Apartheid? Islamic gender apartheid is characterized by normalized daughter- and wife-battering, forced veiling, female genital mutilation, polygamy, purdah, (the segregation or sequestration of women), arranged marriage, child marriage, first cousin marriage; girls and women are honor murdered if they resist such practices, if they wish to divorce a dangerously abusive husband, and if they are viewed as too independent, too modern.

Today, at its most extreme, Islamic gender apartheid is characterized by acid attacks, public stonings, hangings, and beheading of women in Iran, Afghanistan, Somalia, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia—countries in which girls and women who are raped are further victimized: jailed, tortured, and executed.

Feminists should be crying out from the rooftops against these practices. Some are. I am. Yet, many Muslim men and women, as well as many intellectually “progressive” western infidels, are not. They are demanding or welcoming the imposition of Islamic religious law, Sharia law, not only in Egypt and Saudi Arabia but also in the West.

I have published two academic studies and nearly 100 articles about Honor Killings both in the West and in the Islamic world. How is an Honor Killing defined? An honor killing is a collaborative conspiracy carried out against one victim, usually a young girl, by her family of origin. Both her male and female relatives believe that their “honor” demands her death; that her “impure” behavior has shamed and destroyed her family’s reputation and community status. A battered wife—or one who dares leave her tormentor—may also be “honor murdered” by both her husband, assisted by his relatives, and to an extent, the wife’s relatives as well.

In the West, honor killings are a mainly Muslim-on-Muslim crime. Hindus and Sikhs perpetrate such killings but mainly in India, not in the West.

An honor killing is not the same as western domestic violence or western domestically violent femicide. Many honorable feminists disagree with me. They believe that honor killings are the same as western domestic violence. Understandably, such feminists fear that by singling out one group for behavior which may be common to all groups they will stigmatize the token group and minimize the suffering of all the other groups. They have a legitimate fear—and yet if, for reasons of “political correctness,” we fail to understand a crime, we will never be able to prevent or to prosecute it.

Honor killings are shameful, secretive; they are allowed to flourish and fester precisely because the perpetrators and their collaborators do not want them exposed. Instead, they blame the victim, and they blame those who expose it.

I began writing about honor killings in the United States, Canada, and Europe in 2004. My first study about such honor killings first appeared in 2009 in Middle East Quarterly, the second appeared there as well in 2010. In the most recent publication, I studied 230 victims who were honor—or “horror” murdered on five continents over a twenty year period in 172 separate incidents. (More than one person was murdered in some of the incidents).

A murder is a murder and must be treated as such. However, honor killings are not like western domestic violence or domestically violent femicide.

Unlike Western domestic violence, honor killings are carefully planned by the victim’s own family of origin who have warned her, repeatedly, from childhood on, that they will kill her if she dishonors her family in any way: If she is even slightly disobedient; refuses to veil, veils improperly, rejects an arranged marriage, wants to leave a violent marriage, dresses in too Western a fashion. Worldwide, women are honor-murdered based on mere rumors of inappropriate behavior, for wanting to choose their own husbands, having infidel friends, choosing a non-Muslim friend or husband—or a non-Muslim God.

It is rare for a domestically violent western father to routinely batter, stalk, patrol, and murder his own daughter or to be assisted in this gruesome task by his entire family.

While men are also honor killed, young girls (average age: 17) and older married women (average age: 36) are the primary targets.

In the West, the majority (91%) of honor killings are Muslim-on-Muslim crimes. While Hindus and Sikhs do honor murder, they mostly do so in India, not in the West. Both men and women are honor murdered for marrying someone from the “wrong” caste.

Honor killings are also distinguished by their barbaric ferocity. The female victim is often gang-raped, then burned alive, stoned or beaten to death, cut at the throat, decapitated, stabbed numerous times (10-50), suffocated slowly, etc. This may resemble what western serial killers do to prostitutes.

Worldwide, 54% of female victims were tortured before being murdered; that number was 68% in Europe where the temptation to assimilate must be very great. Hence, a barbaric object lesson, a human sacrifice, is required. In Europe, 83% of the girls under eighteen who were honor murdered were torture-murdered.

Their killers were seen as heroes. In the West, child-murderers, wife batterers and wife-killers are now (courtesy of Second Wave feminism), seen as criminals. Those who commit or assist in the commission of honor killings view such killings as heroic and even view the murder as the fulfillment of a tribal, a family, and, rightly or wrongly, as a religious obligation.

Based on my research, I have increasingly been asked to submit expert affidavits on behalf of girls and women who have fled being honor killed and who are seeking asylum in the United States or Canada. I have, thus far, worked on four such cases in the last 16 months.

My first case was that of an abused Muslim-American teenage immigrant who had secretly converted to Christianity. This was a high profile case. Lawyers in Florida, (she fled there), and in Ohio, (the court returned her), both won her the right to remain in foster care and helped her obtain a green card. The girl now lives in hiding, apart from her family, somewhere in America.

My second case concerns a North African woman who has fled a small European country to seek asylum in America. Just because a Muslim woman lives in Europe does not mean that she lives in a Western environment. Her large, tight-knit, violent, Islamist family inhabits a parallel universe in a country which has viewed such parallel bastions of gender and religious apartheid as “politically correct;” as a convert to Christianity, this woman’s family will hunt her down until they kill her. They will never stop trying. This case is still pending.

My third case concerns a brilliant graduate student from a prominent family in a south east Asian country. She has applied for asylum here. What is her crime? She dared to marry a man whom she loved but who belonged to a different sect of Islam; she did so against her parents’ wishes.

My fourth case concerns a woman who was born and raised in the killing fields of Congo. After her father was murdered, her mother fled to a neighboring African country, where she married a Muslim man who insisted on marrying his new stepdaughter off as the fifth wife to an elderly Muslim man; in turn, her chosen husband insisted that she be genitally mutilated.

Desperate, defiant, this brave soul fled Africa and arrived in the United States with falsified documents. Without going into too much detail, let me say that she has languished in jail in Buffalo, New York for more than three months. Last week, a judge ordered that she be deported to Congo. She has six weeks to appeal this decision.

One must ask: Should the United States and Canada be taking in so many persecuted victims from other countries? That’s certainly what America and Canada are about—but can either country afford to subsidize the wholesale rescue of so many persecuted human beings? Can we afford not to? Whatever our answer, we nevertheless have a responsibility to those immigrants and citizens who already live in our countries.

How should we address the problem of honor killings in the West? Obviously, immigration, law enforcement, legislative, and religious authorities all have important roles to play in terms of education, prevention, and prosecution.

In addition, just as we have shelters for battered Orthodox Jewish women, shelters for battered Muslim girls and women should be established and multilingual staff appropriately trained in the facts about honor killings. For example, young Muslim girls are frequently lured back home by their mothers. When a shelter resident receives such a phone call, the staff must immediately go on high alert.

Perhaps the equivalent of a federal witness protection program for the intended targets of honor killings should be created; England has already established just such a program. British police are uniquely empowered to return British citizens who have been kidnapped to Southeast Asia and married against their will.

We must issue clear government warnings to all immigrants to the West: Honor killings, daughter- and wife-battering, female genital mutilation, etc.—all “culturally sensitive” areas– will be prosecuted under western law. Since honor killings are collaborations, conspiracies, the perpetrators, accomplices, and enablers will all be prosecuted.

European courts have recently begun to do all this. Unlike the United States, they have a large Muslim immigrant population.

In 2006, a Danish court convicted nine members of a Pakistani-Danish clan for the honor murder of Ghazala Khan.

In 2009, a German court sentenced a Turkish-German father to life in prison for having ordered his son to honor murder his sister; the 20-year-old son was sentenced to nine and a half years.

In 2010, a British court, with the help of testimony from the victim’s mother and fiancé, convicted a Kurdish-British father of a 10-year-old honor murder after the police reclassified old, unsolved crimes.”

Like Islamic gender apartheid, an honor killing, is a human rights violation and cannot be minimized or justified in the name of cultural relativism, tolerance, anti-racism, diversity, or political correctness. As long as Islamist groups continue to deny or obfuscate the problem, and as long as western government, police, and judicial officials accept their inaccurate versions of reality, women will continue to be killed for honor, not only in Muslim-majority countries but also in the West.

The battle for women’s rights is central to the battle for Western values. It is a necessary part of true democracy, along with freedom of religion, tolerance for homosexuals, and freedom of dissent. Here, then, is exactly where the greatest battle of the twenty-first century is joined.

This op-ed was adapted from a 2011 women’s history month speech for the New York County Supreme Court.

Princess Dream

By pghpuma

This weekend, I will walk with my Congressman in the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in Pittsburgh. The last time I made this “trek” was in the company of candidate, Hillary Clinton, Catherine Baker Knoll and the Secret Service. I learned about “talent management” and in my Scanner, addended my existing skills in “crowd control.” Ever watch the little girls in the marching units of Americana lore, bedazzled, spangled and pink; cradling the batons they are learning to twirl? Adult coaches and chaperones contain and account for the little ones (some barely three years old) by encircling them with lengths of rope, worked, not unlike marionette strings, to encourage the progress of the talent towards the reviewing stand, their safety abetted.

The crowds cheering Hillary that March morning assured us that Americans would make the responsible choice in the interest of those little girls, and from a spirited campaign, a historic candidacy would result. And
So It Was that Pittsburghers’ preferences were trumped by their “children” to whom the “Hope” was sold wholesale, with zero connection to reason. We get news almost daily, about how the advisors around Obama churn madly to deny us our choice. We ask for Women in leadership, and they let us have Nancy Pelosi, so resolutely willful that the democratic caucus is incapable of replacing her, despite the flat-BANG! Turn over from majorities in the House, Senate and White House to a defeat in the State Houses so devastating as to reveal that virtually the entire country has turned on the Democrats. Throughout two years of Obama’s administration, the Axelrod logic has flipped the bird to the citizens and played games with political tactics disconnected from the issues, challenges and realities facing Americans. The honor of being the first Woman to serve as Speaker of the House is almost secondary – judging from Pelosi’s prosecution of the 111th – to wielding the “ropes” circling the freshman class swept into the Majority in 2008. From a seat in my Congressman’s office to watch the inauguration of Pelosi, I observed her bringing the children and grandchildren, her own and those of members, to the Speaker’s Stand in celebration of the Change a Woman Speaker would hallmark. The first 100 Days grandiose proclamations righting the ship, “draining the swamp” to rid the country of the corrupt Republican Culture.

Her “Parade Style,” begun with a promising step, degenerated utterly with her irresponsible CHOICE to cultivate a “counter-culture” of restricted debate, hand-cuffing those Republicans who survived re-election and commandeering the votes of Democrats with quid-pro-quo trade-outs to embellish her control over the Democratic Caucus. I guess we expected more of a maternal concern for the country than a cynical power play to consolidate her grip on the reigns that kept the Democrats marching by the Reviewing Stand to the Bold Progressive’s Beat. Nancy’s district enjoys phenomenal property values. San Francisco style liberalism made it a magnet for those whose off-beat lifestyles met with rejection in Middle America. 434 other Congressional Districts were suddenly nullified by Progressive Replacement “Golden Rule” equating money with power to the exclusion of any other Force. Foolish, Naughty, Naughty, Nancy. Your Co-Equal Power Wielders expected something much different. Women who represent the Majority had something else in mind by way of leadership from you.

Imagine our shock that you and another “Sister” Oprah Winfrey, suddenly became incommunicado having hooked up with “the One” who changed your brains, not your life. All that aside, nonetheless, we understand, girlfriend. The guy who plays us gets away with it as long as the romance is good, the jewelry gifts arrive regularly and we can brag that passion is sustained. What we don’t get is the Big Sister Act, cutting us out of the Will, manipulating the Family dynamic with something more like Cinderella’s Step Mother Maneuvers.

The Oval Office Occupant back-burners the Country’s challenges, to campaign for re-election, and chooses by handicapping votes. We would do well to lift our chins, look around and see it all. That “Girl Power” tune Pelosi played at the bedside of Gabrielle Giffords worked like a Proverbial Charm: a Snake Charmer’s melody calling the survival instinct out of the basket. We aspire to real authority, not power. Our instincts permit us to forgive, but to unravel the mystery of Women and Power. Where’s the Deal here? When your head hits the pillow tonight, be “programmed” to revisit the history of Women. Review the Spell-Casters, the spies, the Wesleyans, and the “Firsts.”

When our Sovereign Will as Electors became crystallized as either Pro Choice or Pro Life, divided, we were “conquered” by cynical politicians’ concealed true agenda behind the smoke bomb pretense that our Choices are our own. Once they have manipulated our Step Sisters, we’re in for a struggle from which we have no option to demur. That rope encircling our marching troop is tightening ’round us, courtesy of the Secret Service. We sense the Forces maneuvering us to the Right to permit the S.U.V. to drive a little closer to the Candidate. While we carry signs proclaiming our support of Hillary, the guys sporting blue tooth’s tuned into their exclusive channel are employing all the resources of the United States Citizens in their own interest, to advance, armed to the teeth. That Ford Ranger isn’t on hand to provide an escape in the event of an attack, but more to carry the AK-47 and other hardware that shakes out Advantage: Protected.

Rain or shine, I’ll greet my Congressman eye to eye, wearin’ the Green and embracing my own Irish heritage. But this time, I’ll walk the parade route with a knowledge and a wisdom I didn’t have four years ago. I carry the inner Wii Me, programmed to travel to other games, and projecting the ability to process information as I receive it. While I honor the self-evident truth that all men are created equal, I have come to understand that not all men are equal to me. Endowed by my Creator with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, I am also responsible for my choices. It is this responsibility, social, financial, professional, that drives me to lead my life, to choose a path that leads me onward and upward. The “Game” hasn’t changed for those of us who are accountable to our own standards, and the instant I make eye contact with my Representative, my Vote will be caste.