Man rapes woman over the phone?!?! May 5, 2008

I saw this on someone elses blog, and felt the need to share it,…. this is INSANITY.

What the hell? A man rapes a woman over the phone? He took her virginity over the phone? Read this madness!

Was woman raped on telephone?

TUNIS, Tunisia, April 27 (UPI) — A Tunisian family alleges their daughter was raped during a telephone conversation with a man, a lawyer for the family said.

The 30-year-old man said he never touched the young woman. But he acknowledged he heard her scream while they were “totally into” an erotic telephone conversation — and that she reported bleeding, Al Arabiya reported.

Maha al-Metebaa, a lawyer representing the family, told the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Qabs the case needs careful investigation because of its unprecedented allegations. He said a medical examination had determined that the woman, 20, was no longer a virgin.

“The intercourse did take place with all its details but verbally only,” he said. “The sexual act did not really happen because the physical proximity factor is not there, yet it happened because there is a direct physical impact – the loss of virginity.”

News cartoons April 28, 2008

Japan Suicides April 28, 2008

Rash of 50 detergent suicides in Japan; chemicals could hurt bystanders

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Saturday, April 26th 2008, 11:45 AM

TOKYO - At least four people killed themselves Friday by inhaling fumes from a detergent mixed with other chemicals amid a wave of similar suicides that has reportedly claimed about 50 lives this month in Japan.

Authorities are alarmed by the sudden rise in such incidents - an average of two a day were reported in April - because the chemicals are easy to get and the fumes could spread to affect bystanders or rescuers.

A 47-year-old man killed himself Friday in a Tokyo luxury hotel, said Fire Department official Toshiyuki Miyake.

Officials said emergency workers also found a 29-year-old man dead in his Tokyo apartment; a man in his 50s at a public gymnasium in northern Tokyo; and a man in his 30s in an apartment in nearby Yokohama. All died after inhaling hydrogen sulfide gas, produced by mixing detergent and a bath lotion.

A riot policeman at the Narita International Airport near Tokyo also shot himself in the head in an apparent suicide Friday, said airport police spokesman Masaru Miyamoto.

The government has been battling to contain the country’s alarmingly high suicide rate. The government said 32,155 people killed themselves in 2006. Japan has a population of 128 million.

“Suicides using hydrogen sulfide have surged in April,” said Eri Okuda, a spokeswoman for the country’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency. “It’s so easy to obtain the ingredients and anyone can use them.”

Fire Department spokesman Toshiyuki Miyake said the trend “initially started from Internet sites, where people exchanged information about how to do it.”

“We haven’t found an effective way to prevent it,” he said.

The Kyodo News agency said its tally of such deaths reached at least 49 in April - after a monthly average of 3-4 earlier this year. No police figures were available.

The 47-year-old man found at The Peninsula Tokyo hotel had left a sign reading “beware of hydrogen sulfide” on the room’s door, which was locked from inside, police and fire department officials said. Bottles of cleanser and liquid bath lotion were on the bathroom floor.

In the Yokohama suicide, the man was found dead in a bathroom. Rescuers rushed to his apartment after a neighbor reported an odor from the gas, which slightly sickened three neighbors and forced 70 others to be evacuated, said city Fire Department official Hiroatsu Fujii.

Hydrogen sulfide is colorless and characterized by an odor similar to rotten eggs. When inhaled it can lead to suffocation or brain damage.

Alarmed by the growing trend, the Japan Pharmaceutical Association instructed drugstores across the nation to avoid the bulk sale of the chemicals that could produce the deadly gas and to ask customers their intended use.

Annual suicides in Japan first surpassed 30,000 per year in 1998, near the height of an economic slump that left many people jobless, bankrupt and desperate.

The government has set aside $220 million for anti-suicide programs to help those with depression and other troubles.

 

My question is: What are they so depressed about?

France May Ban Promoting Extreme Thinness April 16, 2008

FINALLY, someone is doing something about this. I knew Paris was my most favorite city for a reason.

The French parliament’s lower house adopted a groundbreaking bill Tuesday that would make it illegal for anyone — including fashion magazines, advertisers and Web sites — to publicly incite extreme thinness.

The National Assembly approved the bill in a series of votes Tuesday, after the legislation won unanimous support from the ruling conservative UMP party. It goes to the Senate in the coming weeks.

Fashion industry experts said that, if passed, the law would be the strongest of its kind anywhere. Leaders in French couture are opposed to the idea of legal boundaries on beauty standards.

But Boyer insisted in her speech to lawmakers Tuesday that the legislation was much broader and could, in theory, be used against many facets of the fashion industry.

It would give judges the power to imprison and fine offenders up to $47,000 if found guilty of “inciting others to deprive themselves of food” to an “excessive” degree, Boyer said in a telephone interview before the parliamentary session.

Judges could also sanction those responsible for a magazine photo of a model whose “excessive thinness … altered her health,” she said.

Skinny or not skinny?
Boyer said she was focusing on women’s health, though the bill applies to models of both sexes. The French Health Ministry says most of the 30,000 to 40,000 people with anorexia in France are women.

Didier Grumbach, president of the influential French Federation of Couture, said he was not aware how broad the proposed legislation was, and made no secret of his strong disapproval of such a sweeping measure.

“Never will we accept in our profession that a judge decides if a young girl is skinny or not skinny,” he said. “That doesn’t exist in the world, and it will certainly not exist in France.”

 

Marleen S. Williams, a psychology professor at Brigham Young University in Utah who researches the media’s effect on anorexic women, said it was nearly impossible to prove that the media causes eating disorders.

Williams said studies show fewer eating disorders in “cultures that value full-bodied women.” Yet with the new French legal initiative, she fears, “you’re putting your finger in one hole in the dike, but there are other holes, and it’s much more complex than that.”

Remembering Virginia Tech April 16, 2008

A white candle lit at the stroke of midnight began a day of mourning Wednesday on Virginia Tech’s campus, exactly one year after the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history left 32 people and the gunman dead.

More than a thousand people gathered in darkness on the main campus lawn to begin the day’s remembrances. The solemn strains of taps and soft sobs were all that could be heard as the wounds of a community still trying to heal broke open once again.

A ceremony to remember of the lives of those who perished during Seung-Hui Cho’s rampage was planned for later in the morning in front of the memorial where 32 memorial stones honor the dead. The candle lit at midnight will burn there for 24 hours.

While this close-knit campus has worked hard to move on since last year’s violence, the anniversary of the killings has left many struggling to cope.

Many weren’t sure how to observe the anniversary of a tragedy that was as unifying as it was shattering. It drew a university already known for its school spirit even closer as the depth of the loss registered with students and faculty.

“Just in interacting with people, you can tell,” said Heidi Miller, 20, a sophomore from Harrisonburg who was shot three times and was one of six survivors in a French class. “It’s like a big question mark. Should we be in mourning all day, or should we try to do something normal?”

Some small, reflective gatherings were to take place during the day, with a candlelight vigil scheduled for the evening. One group of students planned to lie down in protest of Virginia’s gun laws in the afternoon.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine ordered state flags flown at half-staff, and a moment of silence at noon followed by the tolling of bells.

Some of the families of those killed said they couldn’t bear to attend the official events and planned to grieve privately.

Bryan Cloyd, whose daughter Austin was killed, hopes to plant an oak tree with his wife Renee to honor their daughter’s life. It is a way of looking toward the future, he said, rather than reflecting on the horrors of last April 16.

Remembering his daughter
As a Virginia Tech professor and Blacksburg resident, Cloyd has faced reminders of his daughter every day. He feels her presence often, in different spots on campus, and in the butterflies that he believes carry Austin’s spirit and seem to follow him everywhere since her death. He believes Austin would want the community to honor her life, but then move forward.

“I won’t be able to walk my daughter down the aisle at her wedding. I won’t be able to bounce her children on my knee,” he said softly. “And I don’t think it’s helpful to dwell on that, because where that leads is just more sadness. I think what’s helpful to do is to dwell on what can be. What can we do with what we have?”

Would love to start a conversation about what you all think.. why do you think someone would do this? Do you think there are certain factors/traits that makes a person act this way, and murder others needlessly? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Thanks.