This Time, Change Will Happen

Why wait for change when you can start it?

[playboydreamz]

I almost forgot…..Nevada State Senator Kelvin Atkinson comes out as a black gay man today

[fymodernfamily]

[invisiblelad]

perpetual reblogging

[changesadvocate]

Georgia Police Kill Man That Help Was Requested For

Police are expected to help those that call for help, no matter the condition, and to prevent as much harm as possible from happening.  It is a very sad day when the complete opposite happens.

On October 4, Jack Lamar Roberson, (a forty-three year old, black man) was shot multiple times in front of his mother, fiance, and eight year old daughter by Waycross, Georgia Police.

It was claimed by the Waycross Police Chief Tony Tanner that his officers were responding to a suicide threat and that along the way the updated situation was that a man had become destructive and was breaking items in the home.  Police at the scene claim that Roberson lunged at them, armed with two items as weapons, and when told to put them down did not, and shot Roberson in self defense.

This is about as far as one can get from Roberson's fiance's claim.

Alicia Herron, Roberson's fiance, stated that the call to 911 was because she was concerned about Roberson's diabetic condition and wanted an ambulance.  Instead, police came to the home.  Herron also states that Roberson's hands were empty and in the air when the police came in, that no words were exchanged, and that police shot Roberson multiple times in the chest.  Roberson's mother claims the exact same thing, adding that Roberson had come out of the kitchen, saw police, raised his hands, and they shot him then.

In 2012, a similar incident happened in Waycross.  Police shot Andrew Poole, a twenty-six year old, black male, in the stomach in his home.

[changesadvocate]

Naval Base Shooting In Tennessee

On October 24, a Navy recruiter who had been relieved of duty opened fire at an armory on Navy property in Tennessee.  The gunman was a sergeant first class who had been working for the guard for at least the past six years.

One man was shot in the leg, the other in the foot.  The two were the gunman's superiors, Major William J. Crawford and Sergeant Major Ricky R. McKenzie, who had been working for the Tennessee guard for more than fifteen years.  Major Crawford and Sergeant Major McKenzie were injured in the process of disarming the gunman.

This occurring just over a month after the Washington D.C. Navy Yard shooting, where twelve people were killed before the gunman turned the gun on himself, making the total thirteen.

[changesadvocate]

Cannabinoids Lead To Possible Cure

There has been the ubiquitous presence of marijuana in the fight against cancer, but mainly for the purpose of aiding the patient in eating to keep their weight up.  However, there has currently been a possible break through in terms of a cure.

In London, research has been conducted using six chemicals from marijuana, known as cannabinoids, and has shown that these chemicals stop the cancer cell growth yet not the healthy cells.  Research has also shown that these chemicals together produce an even better result.

So far, the research has shown positive results for leukemia cells.  It is also just the chemicals itself, there is currently no direct evidence saying that smoking marijuana provides the same benefits as the chemicals alone.

Europe is on the front lines for cancer research using cannabis, mainly Spain, Italy, and the United Kingdom.  Due to the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, the United States has a lot of federal involvement in blocking research from being conducted.

[godlessheathenhippie]

How Jock Culture Supports Rape Culture, From Maryville to Steubenville | The Nation

[invisiblelad]

Your 14-year-old daughter is dumped on your freezing front lawn in a state of chemically induced incoherence with her shoes off and frost stuck in her hair. She tells you she was raped. You hear her 13-year-old best friend was also raped that same night. Your daughter is then bullied as a tape of the incident passes around her high school. You wait for the indictments and some semblance of justice, but they dissipate, as one of the accused is a football star from one of the area’s most prominent and politically connected families. The county prosecutor drops the charges, stating that your family is refusing to cooperate even though you are begging to be heard. Then it gets worse.

You are fired from your job without warning and the violent threats against your family through social media increase. You have to pick up your family and leave town. After your departure, your house is burned to the ground. But you refuse to be intimidated.

A public outcry develops, spurred by the decision of your family to come forward and speak out. Now, eighteen months after the incident, a special prosecutor is looking into the case.

This is the story of Melinda Coleman, her daughter, Daisy, her friend Paige, and Daisy Coleman’s alleged rapist, Matthew Barnett, the grandson of a longtime member of Missouri’s House of Representatives.

There are other young men as well who are under scrutiny: athlete Jordan Zech, who allegedly filmed the assaults, and a 15-year-old whose name we do not know—who admitted to police that 13-year-old Paige “said no” several times, yet he refused to stop.

I do not know how Melinda Coleman has had the wherewithal to go public, be strong, and even have to serenity to say, in advance of a demonstration called for her family, “I do not condone violence in our defense I don’t want others terrorized as we have been.”

I am amazed by the composure of the now 16-year-old Daisy Coleman, choosing to go public, standing up for herself and writing essays online where she shares:

I sat alone in my room, most days, pondering the worth of my life.{… I burned and carved the ugly I saw into my arms, wrists, legs and anywhere I could find room. On Twitter and Facebook, I was called a skank and a liar and people encouraged me to kill myself. Twice, I did try to take my own life.

Yet I am the most stunned that here we are, six months after a similar case in Steubenville, Ohio, and still not talking openly about the connective tissue between jock culture and rape culture.

According to the Campus Safety Magazine website, in their statistical analysis:

College men who participated in aggressive sports (including football, basketball, wrestling and soccer) in high school used more sexual coercion (along with physical and psychological aggression) in their college dating relationships than men who had not. This group also scored higher on attitudinal measures thought to be associated with sexual coercion, such as sexism, acceptance of violence, hostility toward women and rape myth acceptance.

But forget the studies. The jock culture/rape culture dynamic should be obvious to anyone with any connection to organized sports. I saw it on the teams on which I played and I saw it on the team’s I’ve covered. I’ve heard the stories from athletes I’ve interviewed and from women with detailed descriptions of rape that go unpunished if someone with sports-related status is accused. I have seen it in the story of Lizzie Seeberg and the ways people still pretend that Notre Dame football is a bastion of morality.

The fact is that too many young male athletes are taught to see women as the spoils of being a jock. These young men are treated like gods by the adults who are supposed to be mentoring them—like cash cows by administrators who use their on-field exploits to extract money from politicians and alums.

No, I am not arguing that a majority of young men who play sports become people who engage in sexual assault. But hell, yes, I am arguing that in most male team sports, athletes are conditioned to look the other way if they see an assault about to take place. It is the exception when a teammate stands up at a party and says, “This cannot happen.” To take it even further, it the exception, for anyone, male or female, at a jock party to do the same.

The most distressing detail in the many articles I have read about Maryville was the story of a young girl at the high school who wore a homemade shirt when charges were not filed against Mr. Barnett. It read “Matt—1, Daisy—0”. To her, it was a sports score, a pep rally and just a big game. It’s time to change the game. Jock culture left to its own devices is rape culture. If you are a coach or parent not trying to intervene in this culture to teach young men to not rape, then you are doing everyone a grave disservice. Talk to other coaches. Bring in speakers. Seek out curriculum. Be someone who uses sports to actively build a movement against rape culture. To do nothing is to just ensure more Steubenvilles, more Torringtons and more Maryvilles to come. Not everywhere will have survivors as brave and heroic as Daisy Coleman. But you can be a hero now by walking into your locker room and standing up to this shit today.

The more I read about Maryville and Ms. Coleman’s ordeal, the more putrid of a place it sounds. 

[sandandglass]

[changesadvocate]

Opinion: Why The Hell Is There So Much Violence In Schools?

Note: All opinion posts from changesadvocate.tumblr.com will have at least two links about the topic.

So within the past four days, there have been two acts of violence at schools, another act was prevented.  In Nevada, a twelve year old boy brought in a gun, shot two classmates who survived, shot a teacher who died, and then turned the gun on himself.  In Massachusetts, a student stabbed his math teacher with a box cutter then left her body in the woods nearby his school.  An eleven year old in Washington brought in four-hundred rounds of ammunition, multiple knives, and a handgun.  True, that with the Washington incident, the child claims that he heard voices in his head.  But if so, why was attention not drawn to it before?

But really, why so many school violence cases?  There was also Sandy Hook last year.  Some say gun laws are too lenient, which is true in some cases.  Some say television and movies are too violent, which isn't exactly true either since there are much worse horrors in the current world and the past.  There is the possibility of mental illness, but not every single child has a mental illness.  Even bullying isn't a 100% right answer.  So what is?

Really, it's a combination of everything; no one factor controls this entire situation.  Mental illness, gun laws, television, movies, music, etc., none can be entirely blamed for the amount of school violence, along with violence in general.  Evil is created, not born.  Even the students own problems at home contributes to aggressiveness.

Society as a whole needs to recognize mental illness, and with acceptance; half of Americans will have a mental illness at some point in their life.  Forty-two percent will have two mental illnesses at the same time in their life.  Mental illness is here to stay, and we have to recognize it. 

Society as a whole also needs to recognize that something needs to be done about guns.  Hell if I know what to do about guns.  No matter what, someone can get a gun, legally and illegally.  Getting that gun should be harder, but on how to make it harder to get I'm at a loss.  The NRA believes that if teachers are pointing a loaded gun at their students, they won't do anything.

Society as a whole needs to recognize that while the media (television, music, etc.) have an impact, reality contains so many more horrible truths.  If you stop reading a book, watching television, listening to a podcast, then it ends; you don't know what happens.  In history, we know hat the atomic bomb has done; we know what mustard gas has done; we know what the Iraq War has done; we know what happened on September 11, 2001.  And none of those can ever be stopped or given an alternate ending.  People of America, the world, have not recognized that the world we are in contains the people who come up with horror films, horror TV series.

Society as a whole needs to change.

Sources:

http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/24/justice/washington-school-gun-arrest/index.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/10/24/us-usa-massachusetts-shooting-idUSBRE99M0L120131024

http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/22/justice/nevada-middle-school-shooting/

http://www.theonion.com/articles/nra-calls-for-teachers-to-keep-loaded-gun-pointed,34336/?ref=auto

[changesadvocate]

Danielle Fishel: A Role Model For Women

Danielle Fishel played the spunky, witty, confident Topanga Lawrence on Boy Meets World from 1993 to 2000 and is about to begin the sequel series, Girl Meets World.  Danielle Fishel stands at five-one and one-hundred-seven pounds and recently got married.

And some people have the audacity to go off calling this woman fat in her wedding photos.

Naturally, like anybody else would, Fishel took to Twitter to fire back at her critics stating how she will continue being 'the happiest me while you keep being the rudest you' and also how people that call others 'fat' are the reason that anorexia exists.

More often than not, celebrities (both male and female) are criticized for their bodies.  Too much here, not enough there, too small, too big, etc.  Apparently, men just absolutely have to have a six pack; apparently, women just absolutely have to have big boobs.  No, they don't.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and sadly, society's idea of beauty has changed for the worse.

Those of us at changesadvocate have this to say:

While having your own idea of beauty is fine and dandy, no one has any fucking right to tell someone they are 'fat' or 'ugly' or whatever for not meeting that standard.

[glaad]

Google’s autocomplete reveals sexism and anti-LGBT animus. Learn more @ http://www.glaad.org/blog/googles-autocomplete-reveals-sexism-anti-lgbt-animus

[changesadvocate]

Arkansas Teacher Fired For Marrying Partner

Arkansas Catholic school teacher Tippi McCullough was fired from Mount St. Mary's Academy literally right after her and her partner of fourteen years were married.  The school secretary first called to tell McCullough that if she got married, she would be fired.  The second call was from the school principal, first getting confirmation that the wedding went through, then telling McCullough that she could either resign or be publicly fired. 

McCullough began teaching at Mouth, St. Mary's Academy fifteen years ago, one year before meeting her now wife Barb Mariani.  The school cited the 'morality clause' in their policy which also includes dismissal over engaging in premarital sex and supporting abortion.

Multiple groups have stood up for Mrs. McCullough.  President of the HRC Chad Griffin stated 'at a moment when Pope Francis is urging the Catholic hierarchy to put side judgement and a decades-long campaign targeting devoted LGBT Catholics, it's shameful that this school is ignoring that hopeful message in favor of explicit and baseless discrimination'.  Last month, Pope Francis had stated that the church focused too much on abortion, contraception, and gay marriage and that instead of condemning people for it, to go back to the 'original intent' of the church which was for it to be a home for everyone; everyone meaning everyone, no matter the situation.

Pope Francis, one.

Mount St. Mary's Academy, zero.

[shortformblog]

Good news: In what may be his last high-profile move as Newark’s mayor, Senator-elect Cory Booker (D-NJ) married a number of couples in the city early this morning, as same-sex marriages are now legal in the state.

Bad news: When asked if there were any objections to the union, a protester loudly shouted, “This is unlawful in the eyes of God and Jesus Christ.”

Better news: The protester was escorted out and the marriages went along as planned. (photo by John Munson/The Star-Ledger)

[laughterkey]

'Cause Jesus was real into the law of the land.

[changesadvocate]

Concussions: How Much They Can Truly Cost People

Despite common belief that concussions are not serious and do not have a large impact on the individual, that is completely false.  The brain is made of what is similar to a wet tissue and a concussion is a bruise on that tissue.  What people don't consider is that for a concussion to happen, it has to hit into the skull; which takes approximately 1,300 pounds per square inch to break.  That is over a third of the weight of a car.

Not only that, concussions do have a tendency to change a person's personality.  Changes in personality is a symptom of concussions, however it can be a long-term symptom after the bruising has healed.  Whenever the brain has trauma inflicted, the actual chemical balance can change.

Little known fact: potential complications from concussions include epilepsy and if two concussions occur within a small time frame, PCS (post concussion syndrome) and second impact syndrome.  Post concussion syndrome is where another concussion occurs before the previous has completely healed resulting in an even longer healing time.  If enough concussions occur, the healing time could be as long as years.  Second impact syndrome (SIS), however, is always after the second concussion but doesn't always occur.  SIS is where the brain rapidly swells after a second concussion and is typically fatal. 

[changesadvocate]

New Jersey: Fourteenth State To Allow Gay Marriage

Despite New Jersey currently having a Republican governor, Good Ol' Garden State now allows gay marriage!  However not through the governor's means.  The Supreme Court of New Jersey ruled that the state may begin issuing marriage licenses to same sex couples at 12:01 AM on October 21.

Same-sex marriage is now allowed in California, Connecticut, Delaware, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Washington D.C.  Massachusetts was the first state to recognize it, November 18, 2003. 

A little food for thought: a tort is a wrongful act or an infringement of a right (other than under contract) leading to civil legal liability.  Technically, technically, depending on how a state defines 'marriage', states could be sued for denying same sex couples the ability to get married with an upper hand than they do currently.  Also, naturally not allowing a certain group of people to marry based on their sexual preference is no different than the discrimination against blacks where they were not allowed to marry purely because of their race.

And to think some people claim everyone is treated equally in America.

[fakenewsjunkie]

[changesadvocate]

Public Schools: Why Are Nearly Half of Students From Low-Income Families?

It is not a lie that money is a major factor in education.  The more money, the better of an education there is available.  In order for a country to run properly, they must have educated citizens.  So what happens when nearly half of those in the public school system are from low income families?

America happens.

In 2011, the national average of students per state from low income families was forty-eight percent.  The state with the lowest percentage, New Hampshire, had 25.2% of their public students coming from low income families; nearly one third of Mississippi's 70.6%.  This is a startling statistic when compared to the thirty-eight percent from 2000.

So why are so many students from low income families?

There is no one, solid answer but rather multiple answers each of which definitely can be linked to this problem.  Multiple reports have shown that lower income families are having more children than high income families, also there is the nature of the 2008 recession still having an impact. 

Lastly, research has shown that when raised in a low income family, you are more likely to become the parent of a low come family than someone from a high income family.  The amount of money parents make truly has an impact on generations to come after them.

So how does America fix that?

We are still waiting for the answer that is actually executed rather than talked about and not followed through on.

[changesadvocate]

Elle Magazine: Not Showing Enough Skin?

Once again, a magazine cover has outraged the public.  Melissa McCarthy was featured on Elle's latest cover and her outfit is drawing more and more attention by the hour.  However, not for reasons you'd typically think.

Usually magazines are criticized for how little they have the person on the cover wearing.  This time, it's for how she was wearing too much.

McCarthy can be seen on the cover of Elle with a large, gray-green trench coat with her hair and makeup beautifully done.  It's no secret that McCarthy is a big girl, however, people have taken this cover as Elle telling bigger women to cover up.

In other magazines, McCarthy has been seen mostly with a bust view, readers claiming it's because of her not being skinny.  Readers have taken to social media, mainly Twitter, stating how this cover of McCarthy is 'depressing'. 

McCarthy herself, however, has stated how she loved the cover.  Also, what readers have failed to take into account is that it is now reaching the winter season, where people wear trench coats with the low temperatures coming on outside.