Cologne Attacks Raise Major Questions About Arab Men & Women's Safety In Western Countries

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Cologne Attacks Raise Major Questions About Arab Men & Women's Safety In Western Countries

Over the New Years holiday, Germany experienced significant attacks of a wide-ranging nature on women living there. Writing for The New Yorker, Amy Davidson describes the scene -- NPR estimates that 1000 men gathered by Cologne's famous cathedral and central hub train station -- on New Year's Eve in Cologne as reported in Der Spiegel:

That night, as revellers filled the station platforms and—following a dubious German tradition—tossed firecrackers, they were pushed out into already crowded streets. There, groups of men who, according to eye-witness accounts and subsequent police investigations, were primarily foreigners from nations in North Africa, the Middle East, and the Balkans, targeted women and surrounded them. Some of the men groped and taunted them, while others stole their wallets and their cell phones. Women, accompanied or not, literally ran a ‘gauntlet’ through masses of heavily intoxicated men that words cannot describe.” The atmosphere was “chaotic and shameless.” Women reported men grabbing at their breasts and between their legs, among other violent and sexual assaults. With the press of the crowd, there was nowhere for the women to go and, although they screamed for help, the police had no effective response; the report described them as overwhelmed, and some witnesses said that they seemed to stand by in confusion. The police report expressed relief that no one was killed, but that appears to have been a matter of luck, not the result of any actions on the part of law enforcement. The chief of police has already been pushed into early retirement.

"A lot happened on New Year's Eve in Cologne, much of it contradictory, much of it real, much of it imagined," wrote the staff of Der Spiegel, who obtained an internal police document about the night's events. "Some was happenstance, some was exaggerated and much of it was horrifying."

Ringling Elephants Head For Early Retirement In Florida As Key Subjects For Cancer Research

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Ringling Elephants Head For Early Retirement In Florida As Key Subjects For Cancer Research

Studies published in October say elephant DNA holds 20 copies of p53, an important tumor-suppressing gene, compared to only one in the DNA of humans and other mammals.

Fact vs Fiction: TV Distorts the Reality Of Abortion Health Care, Making It A Luxury For White Women

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Fact vs Fiction: TV Distorts the Reality Of Abortion Health Care, Making It A Luxury For White Women

Self-Centered White Women, AKA Feminists

While the study researcher Gretchen Sisson didn't specifically link 'feminism' to the abortion study narrative, she did tell NPR that TV helps "build an interesting social myth, which is that women who get abortions aren't mothers and they don't want to be mothers." The facts of abortion on a wide scale are that "the majority of women getting abortions are already parenting, and the vast majority intend to parent during their lives."

Television characters seeking abortions are depicted as doing no because having a child would interfere with educational or career plans, fueling the mythology of the fabricated, feminist first mentality of women who embrace women's rights and self-actualization.

"Taken together, this pattern of reasons can contribute to the construction of abortion as a self-focused decision, and to the belief that abortions are 'wanted' because of personal desires rather than 'needed' because of circumstances such as poverty," the researchers say in their report on TV depictions." Sisson explains.

In a distortion of facts, about 10% of TV characters die from their abortions, when the real death rate is 0.0015 percent -- or nothing. Republicans and the abortions rights movement has used the ruse of protecting women's health to justify the extreme medical safety requirements placed on abortion facilities in the US.

Karlie's Making Kookies & Not Koding As SpaceX Completes Historic Rocket Landing

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Karlie Kloss Is Venus Bound In Maciek Kobielski SpaceX Snaps For WSJ Magazine December 2015 AOC Fashion & Style

After posing for WSJ's December feature on SpaceX and our analysis of the space race competition between founder Elon Musk (think Tesla Motors) and Jeff Bezos (Amazon), we thought Karlie might be cheering on her team's mega success space flight. No go. The closest Karlie got to hot flames in recent posts was a pic of her Kooking in the Kommissary at Momofuku Milk Bar. 

The South African-born Canadian-American business magnate, engineer, inventor and investor Elon Musk had a really big show yesterday when SpaceX successfully launched a rocket into space and brought the booster back to earth. Being able to recycle and reuse boosters -- which can easily cost $10 million a pop -- is key to making space travel affordable for the rich. 

When we wrote about SpaceX and Karlie in November, Bezos' Blue Origin had its own space rocket success story going on, also focused on reusability. . 

Take a look at yesterday's outstanding Space X launch and return. Read in-depth at WSJ: Elon Musk's SpaceX Completes Historic Rocket Landing

With this mission, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket will deliver 11 satellites to low-Earth orbit for ORBCOMM, a leading global provider of Machine-to-Machine communication and Internet of Things solutions. The ORBCOMM launch is targeted for an evening launch from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla.

A Feisty Adele Lensed By Erik Madigan Heck For TIME, Says Social Media Hurts Creativity

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A Feisty Adele Lensed By Erik Madigan Heck For TIME, Says Social Media Hurts Creativity

Top pop singer Adele covers the latest issue of TIME, lensed by Erik Madigan Heck. Adele joins a growing chorus of stars critical of the false relationship between them and social media. 

“How am I supposed to write a real record if I’m waiting for half a million likes on a f—ing photo? That ain’t real“

She thinks artists should be a “package,” not a “brand.”

 

UN Delegation Visits Alabama, Texas & Oregon, Leaves 'Appalled' At Gender Inequality In America

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UN Delegation Visits Alabama, Texas & Oregon, Leaves 'Appalled' At Gender Inequality In America

American Women Have No Idea How Far Behind We Are Our Pursuit of Gender Equality and Women's Rights

The lack of awareness among American women about our falling status made the greatest impression on the UN experts. "So many people really believe that U.S. women are way better off with respect to rights than any woman in the world," Raday said.

Interviewed about her 2011 book 'Flipside', Phyllis Schlafly, who led the crusade to derail the Equal Rights Amendment by tapping into conservative fears about liberating women with equal rights, said:

It is self evident that American women are the most fortunate women who ever lived and enjoy more freedoms and opportunities than are available in any other country. Armed with the right attitude, they have every opportunity for happiness and achievement. Women should stop feeling they are victims of the patriarchy, reject feminist myths, and follow the roadmap to success and happiness spelled out in ‘Flipside.’

In reality, US women have sunk to 28th place in the world, sandwiched between Mozambique and Cuba, in the latest 2015 World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report. In the area of political empowerment, America ranks a pathetic 72 in the world, with extensive research confirming that the reason we are an even worse 81 on women in parliament -- our Congress -- (as opposed to women in managerial government position) is that we refuse to believe that women can legislate as effectively as men.

EYE | Alicia Vikender Sky Dives Into Vogue US January 2016 As Caitlyn Jenner Says 'I'm Sorry' For Women & Appearances TIME Comments

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Alicia Vikender Sky Dives Into David Sims Images For Vogue US January 2016

Swedish actor Alicia Vikander is styled in a spring 2016 print frenzy by Tonne Goodman.  Alicia is riding a high wave after being nominated for two Golden Globes for her performances in 'Ex Machina' and 'The Danish Girl'.

Alicia plays Gerda, wife to artist Einar Wegener (Eddie Redmayne) as s(he) prepares to undergo one of the earliest sex-change operations. 

Eddie Redmayne (l) and Alicia Vikander (r) in 'The Danish Girl'

Reviews include:

'The Danish Girl': Venice Review David Rooney for The Hollywood Reporter

Review: 'The Danish Girl', About a Transgender Pioneer AO Scott for New York Times

The Danish Girl -- An Opportunity Lost Erica Koppler for Huffington Post

Related French Roast News . . . Anne is reading . . . 

Caitlyn Jenner on Privilege, Reality TV and Deciding to Come Out TIME

To you, what does it mean to be a woman and how have your ideas about that evolved?

Ohhh, that is something. I got to the point where every day I was living authentically, but what does all this mean? What does this thing that you have had in your head for so many years, mean? It’s more than makeup and clothes and all that other stuff. And what is that? I’m working on that. There’s still a lot to learn about being a woman. Honestly, I started getting books, started reading on all that kind of stuff. Have I come up with an answer? Not even close.

Caitlyn Jenner talks 'feminine presentation,' upsets trans community in the process Zap2it.com

Caitlyn Jenner Blogs About Her Time Interview and Sets the Record Straight on Appearance Comments EONLINE

What Is a Woman? Michelle Goldberg for The New Yorker Aug. 4, 2014

The dispute began more than forty years ago, at the height of the second-wave feminist movement. In one early skirmish, in 1973, the West Coast Lesbian Conference, in Los Angeles, furiously split over a scheduled performance by the folksinger Beth Elliott, who is what was then called a transsexual. Robin Morgan, the keynote speaker, said:

I will not call a male “she”; thirty-two years of suffering in this androcentric society, and of surviving, have earned me the title “woman”; one walk down the street by a male transvestite, five minutes of his being hassled (which he may enjoy), and then he dares, he dares to think he understands our pain? No, in our mothers’ names and in our own, we must not call him sister.

Serena Williams Is SI Sportsperson of the Year, Tapped For Athletic Dominance, Cultural Importance & Personal Growth

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Serena Williams Is SI Sportsperson of the Year, Tapped For Athletic Dominance, Cultural Importance & Personal Growth

Always mistress of her own ship, tennis superstar Serena Williams chose to sit on a throne, wearing high heels for her Sports Illustrated cover story honor of 'Sportsperson of the Year'. SI managing editor Christian Stone wrote on SI.com that Serena wanted to express her own ideal of femininity, strength and power."

Hillary Clinton Defies Voters' Anti-Woman Bias In Perceived Competency & Strength

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Hillary Clinton Defies Voters' Anti-Woman Bias In Perceived Competency & Strength

Research always confirms that when voters look at equally experienced male and female politicians, “the man will still be seen as more capable on issues of national security and defense,” Meredith Conroy, a professor of political science at California State University, San Bernardino, wrote to Thomas B. Edsall's inquiry about the current election. But “Hillary is able to overcome this and other gender stereotypes. She turns much of the scholarship on voter perceptions of Democratic candidates, and furthermore female politicians, on its head.”
A late November YouGov survey conducted after the attacks in Paris but before San Bernardino found that Hillary Clinton stood apart from all the men:  Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, Marco Rubio and Carly Fiorina as the only candidate a majority of voters believe
is ready to be Commander in Chief. She is the only one about whom as many people express confidence in her ability to handle an international crisis as say they are uneasy.
There is a striking dichotomy between voters’ evaluation of the Democratic Party’s ability to deal with terrorism and their belief in Hillary Clinton.

Bible Verses Cast Scourge On Women's Vile & Disgusting Nature

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Vogue Italia is always topical and often irreverent in politically incorrect ways. Posting just now the veiled Clara McNair lensed by Léa Nielsen for the December issue -- coming minutes after hearing the American Muslim father-in-law of San Bernardino terrorist Tashfeen Malik said that he had never seen her face, or even met her -- I remembered earlier Anne writing. Malik always lived under her burka. 

Anne of Carversville is filled with essays about the demands of religious men that they control women's bodies and public personas. As Paris and California, Egypt and Tunisia, Nigeria and Yemen reel from recent terrorist attacks, it might be time for a Bible lesson, one that I wrote on Feb. 25, 2010 called Bound Tightly By the Good Book & God's Will. 

Religious fundamentalism dominates women worldwide, not only Muslim women. In order to maintain perspective, it's important to quote from Christianity's Holy book.. Recently, two Dutch 'pranksters' have scored a YouTube sensation in which they asked members of the public to respond to verses in the Qur'an. Reality is that the duo was quoting from the Bible. 

I share also a followup article written by Lisa Brown Women's Bodies Suffer Under the Immoral Gazes of Righteous Men, written March 8, 2011. 

The provocative fashion editorial images used here were shot by Herring & Herring and styed by Mykel C. Smith. Models in ‘Bound’ include: Damaris Lewis, Julia Goncharenko, Anais Pouliot and Clara Settje.


Annie Leibovitz Presents Women of Distinction in Non-Babes 2016 Pirelli Calendar

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Annie Leibovitz Presents Women of Distinction in Non-Babes 2016 Pirelli Calendar

The Pirelli Calendar is noted for its annual issue of female bodies eye candy and also sensual beauty. With few exceptions -- Terry Richardson's calendar, for example -- Pirelli takes the high road in photographing women.

Pirelli's 2016 calendar #43 mines new ground in female imagery, tapping female photographer Annie Leibovitz to shoot 13 inspiring women -- artists, athletes, models, philanthropists and bloggers of every age and skin color. The omission of a Latina woman is noteworthy, unless I have my ethnicities mixed up. This is Leibovitz's second Pirelli calendar, as she shot the 2000 edition.

Leibovitz explains her vision behind this year's calendar, saying:

“I started to think about the roles that women play, women who have achieved something. I wanted to make a classic set of portraits. I thought that the women should look strong but natural, and I decided to keep it a very simple exercise of shooting in the studio,” Leibovitz said in a release. “This calendar is so completely different. It is a departure. The idea was not to have any pretense in these pictures and be very straightforward.” Needless to say, those looking for tropically set nude photos are in for a surprise.

Safa Idriss Nour Is Waris Dirie's 'Desert Flower' In the Fight To End FGM In Somalia

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Safa Idriss Nour Is Waris Dirie's 'Desert Flower' In the Fight To End FGM In Somalia

A simple Facebook share last week elicited more likes than any supermodel has achieved on my page. Meet Safa Idriss Nour, a young girl born in a slum in Dijibouti, Somalia.  Perhaps her gorgeous young-girl face soothed a world under fire in Beirut, Nigeria and Paris. Mali had not blown up yet as my FB friends fell under Safa's spell. 
On Friday I decided to look for information about this young girl, and the truth of her life amazed me. 
 A Young Somali Girl Uncut
An estimated 98% of girls and women in Dijibouti have undergone female genital mutilation, a procedure of varying severity in Somali culture. AOC has a long history of writing about FGM, the cutting off a female's clitoris and some of the labia. The procedure -- executed without anaesthetic -- is designed to protect a girl's purity and represents a sign of commitment to a future husband over a desire for sexual pleasure. In the most severe cases of FGM, a girl's labia is sewn together and only reopened after marriage. The probability of a young woman not being desirable as a bride and commanding no bride price for her family is high. 

 

Star Jones Co-Hosts Hillary Clinton Fundraiser in New York on Dec. 10, 2015

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In 2012, women of color -- and especially Black women -- voted at a higher rate than any other group, representing a key constituency that elected President Obama. Black women voted in historically high numbers, voting Democratic and delivering a victory to the nation's first African American president. 
In the 2008 election, many of these women were split between Senators Clinton and Obama. Now they are united in their commitment to Hillary Clinton. 

Clinton and Sanders Camps Enter New Fight In Nomination Battle

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Why Bernie Sanders Is Calling Out Hillary Clinton on Paid Family Leave

It seems that all hell has broken out with the Sanders campaign this week in two major areas: paid family leave and the cost of Bernie's single-payer health care plan. Bernie's proposed middle-class tax increases for both items are being rejected by the Clinton campaign.
Re the paid family leave, both candidates agree on 12 weeks of paid leave. Bernie supports the Gillibrand bill that would increase the payroll tax by .2% or $1.38 a week for the median wage. Clinton believes she has another way to pay for the bill.
The Sanders campaign is calling Hillary out on not supporting Gillibrand, except that not only has the New York Senator endorsed Hillary but she was sitting in the front row in Iowa Sat night AND Hillary acknowledged her. So OBVIOUSLY Gillibrand knows what Hillary has in mind -- and SHE doesn't feel that Hillary has flip-flopped at all.