Are You Low Food Insecure?

Once, when someone returned from war mentally and emotionally wounded and scarred, we called it shell-shocked and treated them as though they ahd something very serious that we needed to be sensitive to and to treat. Now we call it PTSD or post-traumatic stress disorder nad we try to gloss over the true absolute, unspeakable horror suffered by these people.

Now come another word we are watering down. Hunger. Yes, hunger. Now, the U. S. government, in an effort to keep the offiical numbers of people without nourishing food three times a day on a daily basis.......is calling it LOW FOOD SECURITY.

Approximately 12% of U.S. citizens doe snot have nourishing thrice-daily meals, or the economic means to purchase and prepare the necessary food for those meals.

Makes you sick, doesn't it?

From the New York Times:

November 20, 2006
Editorial

Brother, Can You Spare a Word?

First the good news: the government’s annual hunger report shows a slight decline last year in the number of citizens in need of food. Now the bad news: the annual hunger report has dropped the word “hunger.”

Instead, there were 35 million Americans last year suffering from “low food security,” meaning they chronically lacked the resources to be able to eat enough food. Of these, 10.8 million lived with “very low food security,” meaning they were the hungriest among the hungry, so to speak.

Bureaucratic terminology about food security has always been a part of the hunger report, but so was the plain word “hunger.” The Agriculture Department decided that variations of “hungry” are not scientifically accurate, following the advice of the Committee on National Statistics of the National Academies. The specialists advised that being hungry was too amorphous a way to refer to “a potential consequence of food insecurity that, because of prolonged, involuntary lack of food, results in discomfort, illness, weakness or pain that goes beyond the usual uneasy sensation.”

The government insists that no Orwellian plot is in the works to mask a national blight. The goal has been to cut what we’ll call the hungry households to no more than 6 percent of the population. But hungry people persist at nearly twice that rate, despite the slight drop last year. To the extent that more public empathy is needed to prod a stronger attack on low food security, we opt for “hunger” as a most stirring word.

Tear Across the Land, Tears Across the Globe

Can you hear the crying? It is loud and clear across the globe. The tears are coming from the USA. Tear of anger and resentment by Republicans and their supporters because the Democrats are in control of Congress (yes – both Senate and House of Representatives); and tears of joy from people who are relived and joyous about the turnover and the hope it gives that USA can be turned off the path George W. Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney and Condoleezza Rice have taken it on…a destructive and malevolent path that has destroyed anyone and anything its way.

The Democrats had better not mess it up and waste time on things the people who elected them do not want. This is the opportunity. Do it right or you will possibly never get a chance to have power again in the USA. Stop the partisanship and govern like adults with consciences and the remembrance that you are elected to SERVE the people of the USA, not abuse them and then tell them you kow what is best for htem. Undo Guantanomo. Undo the secret rendition flghts and expose them. Undo the unconstitutional Homeland Security/Patriot Act.

The world is watching (and also crying in relief and hope).

Make the USA a proud country from which to hail once again.

Leading helm of this new day is Nancy Pelosi, newly-elected Speaker of the House and a WOMAN for the first time in United States history! Bush must now make nice with the Democrats and especially make nice with Pelosi. Rumsfeld has now resigned (too late in most people’s view, inside and outside the Bush Administration)….but will his arrogant, lying, deceitful ways continue?

Here is a transcript of an interview Pelosi did with MSNBC:

Interview with Nancy Pelosi

Denmark: Using the word "nigger" is acceptable

Walking the streets of Copenhagen........Denmark has a number of free newspapers that are quite popular among those who ride the trains and buses. They all give smilar versions of the same stories and some extend themselves with columnists, features stories, recipes and distinct sections.

The two most popular are MetroXpress and Urban. Last week, in Urban, one of the columnist wrote something on Madonna (the singer) and her in-progress adoption of a child from Malawi. The title of the article?

Madonna har købt en neger

(Madonna has bought a nigger)

It was written in Danish, of course, and the word was "neger" which caught my eye because, frankly, it obviously is what it is. A glance through the Gyldendal's Ordbog, the red "bible" dictionary in Denmark says that "neger" means a Black or African person. Hmmm. Uh huh. Oh yeah. Are we supposed to think there is nothing pejorative happening there with the use of that word?

I asked a friend in Denmark about the use of the word. Without hesitation he said, yes, the writer clearly meant what in English would be "nigger" ; and then said that Danish society "does not have the issue of racism with blacks that the USA does" so therefore calling someone a nigger is not going to be problematic.

Hmmmm. Not problematic for WHO?

He also pointed out that the author is a humorist and the article was allegedly meant to be funny. I doubt any person with dark skin will find it funny if you call them a nigger.

This word is offensive, pejorative, derogatory...

Is this Danish freedom of the press? Is this intelligent writing?

Is this Danish humor?

For the sake of Denmark, one would hope not. First its problems with immigrants and refugees from Asia, South Asia and the Middle East, now it looks the other way when the word "nigger" is printed in its newspapers.

There was recently also in the Danish newspapers an indepth interview article with a Danish woman who talked about how "white women must only have children with white men" to preserve the "purity" of the pale skin. A plain woman, overweight and dressed in a sweatshirt, with her statements/idealogy she could easily have been a membrr of Neo-Nazi white supremicist groups in the USA who advocate the same thing.

It makes this country which is supposed to be so intelligent, educated, developed, civilized and egalitarian seem like a nation of backwoods, low-class, ignorant folk dressed up in finery.

Ethnic discrimination and oppression has been and is leaking out into the streets of Copenhagen like blood dripping from the bottom of a closet where murdered people have been hidden. With each new murder fresh blood bubbles out...and the stains are horrific and indelible....

Denmark: No defamation here

A final(?) ruling in Denmark on the editorial cartoons printed in a newspaper there over a year ago:


AARHUS, DENMARK — A court ruled yesterday that a Danish newspaper did not libel Muslims by printing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed that unleashed a storm of protest in the Islamic world.

Seven Danish Muslim organisations brought the case, saying the paper had libelled them with the images by implying Muslims were terrorists. One cartoon depicted Mohammed with a bomb in his turban.

Jyllands-Posten, which published the 12 drawings in September last year, hailed the ruling, saying any other outcome would have been a catastrophe for a free press.

A Muslim imam said that the plaintiffs would continue to fight in higher courts.

The cartoons were reprinted elsewhere and at least 50 people were killed as angry Muslims rioted in the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

Three Danish embassies were attacked and many Muslims boycotted Danish goods.
Many Muslims consider it blasphemous to depict Mohammed.

“Of course it cannot be excluded that the drawings offended some Muslims,” the Aarhus court said in its ruling. The court ordered the seven organisations to pay the newspaper’s court expenses. The plaintiffs have appealed to a higher court.

The ruling said some of the cartoons did not depict Mohammed or have a religious subject, while others fell outside the scope of defamation laws.

But the court did find that three of the cartoons fell within what the law could deem as insulting.

Ahmed Abu-Laban, a Copenhagen imam in one of the organisations that brought the lawsuit, said: “Freedom of speech has been the issue from the beginning. It is seen differently in Europe than we see it.”

He urged Danish journalists to exercise self-censorship when dealing with sensitive subjects and said he hoped Denmark would pass laws guaranteeing “the dignity of people”.

In March, Danish prosecutors declined to charge the newspaper under blasphemy and antiracism laws.

Reuters

White Is Right, Black Get Back??!!: Modern Socio-political Implications of Skin Color

Traveling over to Sudan today.........This article in the Associated Press today was eye-opening but quite saddening. As much as we think we have moved forward on issue os ethnicity and color, we have not. It is not as open in the West, as in the USA and Europe, but the attitudes revealed here are what goes on the American/Western psyche. The diseased hole in our societal fabric needs to be healed:

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In Sudan, pale is beautiful but price is high
By Mohammed Abbas
Wed Aug 2, 8:25 AM ET

At the crowded Beauty Queen parlor in Sudan's capital Khartoum, beautician Selma Awa says she just cannot understand why so many of her clients want to get their skin lightened.

"One hundred percent of women who come here have it done," she said. "People think it's prettier to look white. In my opinion, dark is prettier. I don't know who they want to look like."

In many countries in Africa, the Middle East and Asia lighter-colored skin is considered prettier and paler women are believed to be wealthier, more educated and more desirable.

This attitude has led to a boom in the use of skin-lightening products in Sudan, a vast country torn by war where skin color also has political connotations.
Rasha Moussa, a maid, pulls some skin-whitening cream from her handbag.
"I use it on my face to make my face shine. The Sudanese see the light color as better than dark. I think it's a complex that we have," she said.

"People judge you here by your color ... If they see me and someone else with lighter skin wearing the same clothes, they would say she is living a comfortable life and I'm a poor woman," she added.

Millions of women throughout Africa use creams and soaps containing chemicals, like hydroquinone, to lighten the color of their skin. But the creams can cause long-term damage.

Dermatologists say prolonged use of hydroquinone and mercury-based products, also found in some creams, destroys the skin's protective outer layer. Eventually the skin starts to burn, itch or blister, becomes extremely sensitive to sunlight and then turns even blacker than before.

Prolonged use can damage the nerves or even lead to kidney failure or skin cancer and so prove fatal.

"It's a very bad problem here. It sometimes kills the patient ... It's bad, bad news," said a doctor at a Khartoum hospital. He said the number of women coming to the dermatology department with problems caused by skin-whitening treatments had grown to at least one in four of all dermatology patients.


MODERN STYLE?
In Khartoum, skin-whitening creams are displayed prominently in stores and on roadside adverts. Products advertised on Arab television channels promise the creams will also make a woman more confident and glamorous.

In one advert, a previously unremarkable female television presenter delivers a stunning report after using whitening cream. Her handsome male colleague, who has previously ignored her, says: "You were great. What are you doing at four?"

In another, a singer leaves the stage with stage fright but returns after lightening her skin and performs wonderfully.

At the Modern Style bridal store, an array of skin-whitening creams adorn the front desk. Next door, a photography studio displays wedding portraits of women with very pale skin.

Modern Style's Egyptian owner Samira Magar tied the growing preference for white wedding dresses, which are not traditional in Sudan, to the desire for pale skin.

"More Sudanese are getting white wedding dresses, so they want to look like Egyptians and Europeans," she said.

"I think it's an inferiority complex. They think that if they're white in color, they are more beautiful," she added.

Magar said some women had resorted to mercury and harsh prescription creams not meant for cosmetic use, leaving their faces disfigured on their wedding day.


SINISTER TONE
Natural methods of skin whitening have been used for centuries, Magar said, but in Sudan the use of chemicals began in the 1980s and has thrived since.
The doctor at the Khartoum hospital, who declined to be named, said the creams now used can cause irritation and infection, blotching, eczema, and that most contain steroids.

The doctor said that rather than ask why women use the creams, men should be asked why they prefer pale skin.

"Here, all men want to sit with or marry a woman with light skin. If any man wants to marry, he says the first choice is for a woman with light skin ... Why is this?"

While a tan can be seen as something of a status symbol in the West, darker skin marks out women in Africa, the Middle East and Asia as poorer people who have no choice but to toil under the hot sun.

In Sudan, Africa's biggest country, over two decades of civil war between lighter-skinned northerners and darker southerners has given skin tone more sinister connotations, and the meaning of the various shades is nuanced.
Northerners, who are mainly Muslims and claim Arab lineage, have traditionally held power. A north-south coalition government now shares power after a peace deal last year.

During civil strife, skin tone often meant the difference between life and death. Southerners, traditionally Christian or animist, complain of prejudice against them in everyday life, and some northerners privately claim superiority over their darker and non-Arab countrymen.