Author: mcequality

Revenge porn laws ‘not working’, says victims group – BBC News

~ mcequality

Laws covering so-called revenge porn are not fit for purpose and police still need more training, experts say.
Victims should receive anonymity and laws need to include threats to share images, according to Sophie Mortimer from the Revenge Porn helpline.
Figures from 19 forces in England and Wales revealed police investigations have doubled in the last four years but the number of charges has fallen.
The National Police Chiefs Council said forces take the crime “very seriously”.

via Revenge porn laws ‘not working’, says victims group – BBC News

New Homeland Security Secretary, Same Anti-Immigrant Agenda | American Civil Liberties Union

~ mcequality

Don’t be fooled, McAleenan does not represent a new leaf. He is deeply implicated in many horrors over the last two and a half years. He recommended, and refuses to apologize for, family separations. He led Customs and Border Protection during the Muslim ban and oversaw the agency when two children died in its custody, toddlers were teargassed, and families were held for days in the dirt under a bridge. He stayed silent when Border Patrol abetted militias. No matter his job title, he serves and leads in an administration ideologically committed to dehumanizing immigrants — and that regrettably remains unchanged.

via New Homeland Security Secretary, Same Anti-Immigrant Agenda | American Civil Liberties Union

‘In our culture, you shut up and put up’ – BBC News

~ mcequality

Male survivors of childhood sexual abuse within the black community are being let down by the government, the head of a group of MPs has said. BBC reporter Ben Hunte – who was sexually abused himself – hears from men who say their needs have been overlooked.
“I tried to bury it. I tried to move on, but it stays there,” says Chris – not his real name.
Chris was speaking after the publication of a government report looking into how adult survivors are supported in the UK.

via ‘In our culture, you shut up and put up’ – BBC News

Gay Sex No Longer Punishable by Death in Brunei

~ mcequality

Boycotts do, in fact, work, or at least one did. The Sultan of Brunei has agreed to rescind a law permitting gay sex to be punishable by death, thanks in part to a celebrity boycott of his luxury hotels.

Deadline reports that on Sunday, Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah issued a moratorium on a brutal law that made homosexuality a crime punishable by death by stoning. The law, which went into effect on April 3, was part of Brunei’s new Syariah Penal Code Order, which also criminalized abortion, mandated the amputation of limbs for stealing, and made lesbian sex punishable by “40 lashes with a whip,” according to the Human Rights Watch.

via Gay Sex No Longer Punishable by Death in Brunei

Kamala Harris at NAACP Rally: Midwest Isn’t Just White People

~ mcequality

Many of the 2020 Democratic primary candidates are obsessed with winning the Midwest—and in particular the storied white working-class voter, without whom, the conventional logic goes, they have no chance of taking back the White House. This logic is partly to explain for the front-runner status of Joe Biden, whose central campaign promise is that he can win over blue-collar white voters, as well as the rise of Pete Buttigieg, who regularly emphasizes his Midwestern credentials.

But on Sunday, speaking before a crowd gathered by the NAACP in Detroit, Senator Kamala Harris correctly noted that the Midwest has a sizable population of black voters and voters of color, and argued that winning the heartland will require appealing to these voters as well.

via Kamala Harris at NAACP Rally: Midwest Isn't Just White People

Rumsey Hall Latest Elite Private School to Disclose Allegations of Sexual Misconduct

~ mcequality

Last week, the Rumsey Hall School, a coed K-9 boarding and day school in Connecticut, became the most recent private school to disclose the findings of a wide-ranging sexual misconduct investigation. In a letter sent to alumni, parents, and other affiliates, the school’s current leadership described corroborated allegations of abuse levied against three faculty members since the late 1960s.

In the most recent instance, the school admitted to paying confidential insurance settlements to three alumni based on allegations of “inappropriate contact” from one longtime faculty member and administrator. He remained at the school until 2000.

via Rumsey Hall Latest Elite Private School to Disclose Allegations of Sexual Misconduct

The Racist Roots of Denying Incarcerated People Their Right to Vote | American Civil Liberties Union

~ mcequality

In the 15 years between 1865 and 1880, at least 13 states — more than a third of the country’s 38 states — enacted broad felony disenfranchisement laws. The theory was simple — convict them of crimes, strip away the right to vote, imprison them, and lease them out as convict labor and Blacks would be returned to a condition as close to slavery as possible.

No one tried to hide the intent of these laws.

In 1894, a white South Carolina newspaper argued that amendments to the voting laws were necessary to avoid whites being swept away at the polls by the Black vote. In 1901, Alabama amended its Constitution to expand disenfranchisement to all crimes involving “moral turpitude” — a vague term that was applied to felonies and misdemeanors. The president of that constitutional convention argued that manipulating the ballot to exclude Blacks was justified because of the need to avoid the “menace of Negro domination,” especially since Blacks were inferior to whites.

via The Racist Roots of Denying Incarcerated People Their Right to Vote | American Civil Liberties Union

What Officer Noor’s Conviction Says About Racism in America | American Civil Liberties Union

~ mcequality

The racial aspect of this case speaks volumes about criminal justice and criminal injustice in America today. Noor, who is Black, Muslim, and a Somali immigrant, is believed to be the only police officer in Minnesota ever to have been convicted for killing someone while on duty.

At a crucial moment in the trial, Noor testified that he reacted to Damond as “the threat.” Prosecutors responded by asking him, “The whole blonde hair, pink t-shirt is a threat to you?” This line of questioning was in part about the legal standard required to convict. Under Graham v. Connor, a police officer can use force – including lethal force — if a reasonable officer on the scene would consider the level of force to be “objectively reasonable,” not whether the use of force was actually necessary in light of the various tactics and alternatives available to the officer at the time. Because this standard is so elastic, it is often very difficult to show that an officer violated it.

via What Officer Noor’s Conviction Says About Racism in America | American Civil Liberties Union

Man Who Kept Teen Girl in Sexual Captivity Gets Time Served

~ mcequality

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, in 2017, now-33-year-old Duluth resident Michael Wysolovski was arrested after FBI agents and police raided his home and discovered a 17-year-old girl who had been missing for over a year. Wysolovski reportedly met the unnamed girl in an online anorexia forum, coerced her into meeting up with him, and then held her captive in residences in Decatur and Duluth.

via Man Who Kept Teen Girl in Sexual Captivity Gets Time Served