Category: Civil Equality

Domestic abuse: PM vows to end ‘postcode lottery’ for victims – BBC News

~ mcequality

Councils in England will have a legal duty to provide secure homes for victims of domestic abuse under new plans announced by Theresa May.
People seeking refuge from abuse and violence can receive varying levels of support depending on their location.
But Mrs May has vowed to end the “postcode lottery” for victims and their children, creating a legal duty for councils to provide refuge.
One victim described the move as “absolutely momentous” news.

via Domestic abuse: PM vows to end ‘postcode lottery’ for victims – BBC News

Senator Introduces Do Not Track Bill to Block Companies From Collecting Your Data

~ mcequality

A new bill is trying to create a program similar to The Do Not Call list, except it would stop companies from tracking your online activities.

Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, announced on Monday he is introducing the Do Not Track Act. If approved, the bill would allow people to block companies from collecting data on their activity “beyond what is indispensable” for whatever services the company provides online.b

In 2009, internet activists first introduced the idea of putting “Do Not Track” message in HTTP headers, alerting companies that the user denies permission to track activity. The next year the Federal Trade Commission supported a Do Not Track program. But even though millions of people use Do Not Track—it doesn’t do anything, because there are no fines for breaking a Do Not Track request.

via Senator Introduces Do Not Track Bill to Block Companies From Collecting Your Data

How the Healthcare System Fails People Who Don't Speak English

~ mcequality

When Samia Ali worked as a medical scribe in Rhode Island—assisting doctors by writing down what happened during patient visits—she saw everything there is to see about the intimacies of a patient-physician relationship.

Many times, Ali told Splinter in an interview, she saw efficient and thoughtful care. But there was also neglect, mismanagement and, in some cases, open xenophobia.

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“One dynamic that struck me was working with providers who did two things: express impatience when [patients were] not understanding English and [ignore] that most elder immigrants like bringing another person, usually one of their kids, to talk to the provider directly as a translator,” she said.

via How the Healthcare System Fails People Who Don't Speak English

Mississippi State Rep Doug McLeod Allegedly Punched His Wife in the Face for Undressing Slowly

~ mcequality

McLeod, per the incident report, was so drunk that he “had slurred speech and walked slow in a zigzag pattern.” When deputies went into the McLeod’s bedroom, they found blood on the bed and on the floor. Per the Sun Herald, his wife told deputies that “her husband was drunk and ‘just snapped,’ as he often does when under the influence of alcohol.”

Another woman who lives at the McLeod home, presumably a family member, told the sheriff’s department that McLeod’s wife ran up to her room, and shut and locked the door:

via Mississippi State Rep Doug McLeod Allegedly Punched His Wife in the Face for Undressing Slowly

Poly Parents Are Losing Custody of Their Kids In Brutal Divorce Battles – MEL Magazine

~ mcequality

Naomi had been married to her husband David for 15 years when he asked her if she was open to trying polyamory. After some hesitation, she agreed, and the two joined a lifestyle group called True Friends and Lovers in Alexandria, Virginia, in the D.C. area. Although neither had actually slept with another person outside the marriage yet, Naomi, a preschool owner, found that joining the group was a completely transformative experience. “Here I was being exposed to this whole lifestyle,” she recalls, “and I felt like I had probably [wanted to be] polyamorous my whole life.”
Eventually, Naomi (a pseudonym) befriended Eric, a man within the community who lived with his wife and an additional female partner. After a few months, Naomi began seeing Eric romantically. It was around that point that David started to become uncomfortable with her involvement with the poly community, despite the fact that he had also been intimate with other women in the community. “He’d be fine for a couple days, and then he’d say, ‘This isn’t how I wanna live my life,’” Naomi says. “Then he’d ask, ‘When’s the next party?’”

via Poly Parents Are Losing Custody of Their Kids In Brutal Divorce Battles – MEL Magazine

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

UK Police Want Rape Survivors to Hand Over Their Phones

~ mcequality

According to the Associated Press, law enforcement will now ask victims of crimes, including rape survivors, to sign a consent form that asks for their permission to seize their electronic devices in order to access mobile data that might be relevant to the investigation.

“If you refuse permission for the police to investigate, or for the prosecution to disclose material which would enable the defendant to have a fair trial then it may not be possible for the investigation or prosecution to continue,” the form states, according to the AP.

via UK Police Want Rape Survivors to Hand Over Their Phones

Astra Taylor & Natasha Lennard on Anti-Fascism, Women's Protest

~ mcequality

It makes a perverse kind of sense that the election of a gleeful, pussy-grabbing misogynist to the highest office in the land would cause a feminist backlash at the grassroots. Since the 2016 presidential election, women have been rising up: marching in the streets, mobilizing their communities, running for office, and winning a whole lot of them. And many have been explicit about their intention to pull this country’s political center to the left. The two democratic socialists to win congressional seats in the 2018 midterm election were not white guys shaped by the old-school mold of Bernie Sanders, but young women of color, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, who defy the alleged division between economics and identity politics with every breath. They, along with Ihlan Omar, point the way toward a forward-looking, appealing, and effective radicalism that we can only hope will continue to catch on.

via Astra Taylor & Natasha Lennard on Anti-Fascism, Women's Protest