GUN CONTROL? or is it?

In West Virginia, Jared Marcum, an eighth grader, was suspended and astonishingly arrested in April after he refused to remove a t-shirt supporting the National Rifle Association.

 

Now in what I would say and most people would agree as very courageous, the 14-year old Jared returned back to Logan Middle School in, West Va., wearing exactly the same shirt, which depicts a hunting rifle with the statement “Protect your right.”

 According to Fox News, other students across the rural county showed their support for Marcum by wearing similar shirts to school as well. “There’s a lot of people wearing this same exact shirt, great support and I really appreciate it,” Marcum said that morning outside the schoolhouse door, according to a local NCB affiliate WBOY-TV.

 Marcum’s attorney, Ben White, said that school officials are sticking by the eighth grader’s one-day suspension because, they say, he caused a disruption. “Their version is that the suspension was for disrupting the educational process, not the shirt,” White told Fox News. I'm pretty sure time and effort could have been used in a better manner to prevent a further disruption with the incident than a so-called suspension of "the problem". Maybe that's why I'm not getting paid to serve as an school official, huh? LOL.

 White has as well called the school’s position into question. He argues that his client was exercising his free speech rights. Marcum’s version of events is that he had worn the shirt for several hours already without incident. So at lunchtime, a teacher confronted him about the shirt. When Marcum said that he would not take off the shirt or turn it inside out, the teacher began yelling, which caused an unnecessary scene in the cafeteria.

 

 

As what I would think most of my readers would agree, this is the catalyst that ensued the event from the start. I mean, a pile of wood isn’t a fire until you strike a match to it, right? I believe the teacher was acting beyond the perspective of his employment and was promoting his/her personal agenda. As the school did contain cameras, the video shows students stepping up on benches and the tables in the lunchroom as kids started jumped up and clapping, when they eventually escorted Jared out of building.

The police chief in Logan City, E.K. Harper, said that Marcum was arrested for the disruption he caused at school: “His conduct in school almost incited a riot.” Not too sure about you guys, but when was the last first time you heard of some eight graders inciting a riot? White, the lawyer, added that Marcum wore the shirt to express his support for the Second Amendment. So in light of not officially breaking any school regulations or inciting any disturbance, who would be observed as the wrongdoer?  White also said the school’s dress code does not forbid such shirts. A straightforward reading of the dress code would seem to leave that interpretation out. Although, the dress code, which is posted online, does forbid certain kinds of clothing. For example, the dress code prohibits messages that support violence, discrimination and alcohol use, but nowhere are displaying constitutional rights mentioned.

So as Marcum and his supporters returned back to school the following Monday, they were not arrested or suspended for wearing the pro-gun shirts. I wonder how is that more individuals doing the same thing are somehow any less of a threat than one student. White still expects the charges to be dropped, and he says a civil lawsuit is forthcoming.

Marcum’s arrest and suspension is the latest incident of anti-gun hysteria to erupt in a school setting, but there have been many others in the last few months.

Here are a few: Junior high teacher tells kid to remove Marines t-shirt or get suspended

http://www.inquisitr.com/562581/toy-soldier-cupcakes-confiscated-at-michigan-elementary-school/

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-03-04/local/37423071_1_toy-gun-pastry-welch

http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/03/maryland-school-suspends-six-year-old-boy-for-making-gun-gesture-saying-pow/

 

 

 

SHE GOT TIME FO DAT

Move Over, Antoine Dodson! The Ironically Racist Internet Presents Sweet Brown Because She ‘Got Time For That’: Sweet Brown Sues Apple For $15 Million

Internet sensation Sweet Brown is now suing software giant Apple for profiting from her YouTube success without permission, say many who are following her story. Kimberly “Sweet Brown” Wilkins is suing Apple, a radio program called The Bob Rivers Show, and a handful of other parties for unauthorized use of her likeness, according to court documents.

The basis of the lawsuit stems from a song called “I Got Bronchitis.” The Bob Rivers Show, according to Sweet Brown’s complaint, produced the song with samples from Wilkins’ interview with the local TV-news station. The song sampled phrases like, “Ain’t nobody got time for that,” “Ran for my life,” and “Oh, Lord Jesus it’s a fire.”

The suit claims that in April 2012, the defendants started selling the song on iTunes for profit. It also claims the radio program and its owner falsely advertised that Sweet Brown had given her consent for the radio station to use her voice in the song.

At that time in June 2012, Wilkins wanted $15 million from the defendants. It has since moved to the District Court of Oklahoma. It looks like “Sweet Brown’s” bank account is about to grow if this reaches the courts.

Her theatrical retelling of the moment she realized there was a fire was uploaded onto YouTube and has been viewed by over a million people.  Well just like her predecessor, Antuan Dodson, Sweet Brown is capitalizing off her fifteen minutes of fame just as any of us would, at least ide lke to think so.

Let’s take a walk down memory lane shall we. Introducing Mr. Antoine Dodson.

"Well I woke up to go get me a cold pop, and then I thought somebody was barbacuin' and I said oh Lord, Oh Jesus, it's a fire. Then I ran out, I didn't grab no shoes or nothin,' Jesus. I ran for my life, and then tha smoke got me. I got bronchitis. Ain't nobody got time for that." No way that you can say you don’t find humor in any part of this…? Numerous people have taken to social media in praise of Sweet Brown, writing on Facebook walls and on Twitter that they want the Oklahoma mother to narrate their life.

I can’t help thinking that Dodson’s new-found popularity is not about shared frustration over crime or violence against women. On threads and post around the net, Dodson is dubbed as “hilarious.” But what is so funny about Antoine Dodson? Part of the Dodson meme is laughing at mannerisms that the mainstream American knows nothing about but can associate with the blackness, gayness and poverty that he has been surcummed to. Because there is nothing amusing about a young woman assaulted in her home right?  So I assure myself that people are laughing at Antoine about his flamboyance and perceived gayness; his use of black mannerisms, like “run tell dat,” plus grammar and accent...

I believe Sweet Brown found a place on every gawked at site and show for nearly the same reasons. It’s her bright head scarf, her gold teeth that keep flashing as she speaks, her emotionalism. It’s the way she says Lord Jesus, it’s faahr! in a drawl that speaks of the backwoods. It’s her very name: Sweet Brown. Sweet Brown is so country. So poor. So uneducated and “black!”  For most video watchers, this does not make her a recipient of any sympathy but ridicule. The knee-jerk amusement of watching this may keep us from asking critical questions that in any other pre-tense, we might!

For instance, what other witnesses did news producers overlooked to bring us Sweet Brown? In a book, Reality Bites Back, Jennifer Pozner writes about how reality TV producers seek out characters that provide drama, including those that increase stereotypes about race and gender. In a rapidly shifting media landscape, has this thinking made it into the newsroom, affecting the way reality is really presented?

When bad things happen to poor, country, uneducated, stereotypically black people, is it not still a tragedy? Or just funny? Because what the folks who forward this video to you probably won’t add is that the fire at Brown’s apartment complex burned five units and left 44 without electricity. The Red Cross has set up a shelter for residents. No laughing matter at all. But for the sake of entertainment we all got a flashback of things or people that we might have met along our way that reminded us of people, just-like-her.

 

'DOUBLE TOP' JEANS

Rihanna can pretty much get away with wearing anything or should I say use to be able to rock anything... except maybe this.

On Monday night Rihanna hit the runway of her River Island launch party in London rocking a pair of her own fashion creations, “double top” jeans, it had heads turning for all the wrong reasons.

The unique waist – which is made to look like two pairs of jeans layered on top of each other – is a cool take on mixing denim. With a huge take on a spring trend, these ready-made double top jeans have an innovative spin on casual dressing to say the least.

But, then again, what do we know?
Jay McCarroll, who won the first season of “Project Runway,” says that “double top” jeans, while not his personal design aesthetic, are already a popular street trend, and that Rihanna’s idea “comes across , refined and actually sort of cute. At the end of the day you can't knock a gal for pursuing any business opportunity that comes her way. I just wish I had this idea ... she's probably going to make a zillion dollars off of those jeans!" He’s not alone with this idea, another member of the show, Michael Costello, is also saying yes to Rihanna’s polarizing look. “I like how she can set trends and make them look so easy to wear when sometimes you see them in a department store and wonder, Who in the world would wear that?" “Rihanna, I believe, is really a style icon and pushes the boundaries of fashion and adds her own eclectic unique style and personality to everything she does including her fashion line. If you ask me, the double jeans work for her.”

However, Costello adds that this doesn’t mean they’d look the same way on the everyday woman. “The cut of the jeans is more likely to accommodate women who are a size 0-2,” he explains. “Even if they are a loose-fit denim cut jean, the design is implicated to compliment the model body.”
That would explain why the “double top” jeans, which retail for $150, are sold-out on River Island’s website through size 10 U.K., which in America translates to sizes 2, 4, and 6.

What do you think of the “double top” look? And would you pay that kind of money for this fad?
Do you think Chris Brown should regulate or will you advocate?Jay McCarroll

IS IT THAT SIMPLE...???

The decisions that we make everyday to do whats "right" and not to do whats "wrong"... Whenever a question is at all complicated and cannot be settled by following some simple rule, such as thou shalt not steal or thou shalt not bear false witness, it is evident that the decision cannot be made except by the thought of consequences. The word rightis very ambiguous and it is by no means easy to distinguish the various meanings which it has in our culture. Owing yourself to the variety of these meanings, adherence to any one necessarily involves us in certain paradoxes when we use it in a context which suggests one of the other meanings. This is the usual result of precision of language; long as the paradoxes are merely verbal, they do not give rise to more than verbal objections from each other.

The question we have to ask ourselves is what do we mean when we understand the moral sense of words? If these are to make a definition of the right way how to act, we cannot say that they consist in judging that such and such acts are right, for that would make our definition a bit contradictory. We have to say that the moral sense consists in a certain specific emotion of approval towards an act and that an act is to be called right when the person, at the moment of action, feels this emotion of approval towards the action which he or she decides to perform is right or wrong.
There is certainly a sense in which a person ought to perform any act which he approves, and to commit any act which he disapproves. It seems also undeniable that there are emotions which may be called approval and disapproval. Now with this theory, whether adequate or not, they must be allowed to contain a part of the truth. What is right, then is in some way dependent on consequences.

The most natural position to start from would be that the purpose of the right act, under any circumstances, is the one which will have the best consequences. We can recognize this as the most valuable choice or the most fortunate act, then it will be the one which will produce the greatest example of good over evil, or the least excess of evil over good (for there may be situations in which every possible act will have consequences that are on the total bad side). But we cannot show that the most fortunate act is always the one which is objectively right, in the sense that it is what a wise man will think that he ought to do. For it may happen that the act which will in fact prove the most fortunate is likely, according to all the evidence at our disposal, to be less fortunate than some others. In such a case, it will be wrong to go against the evidence, in spite of the actual good result of our doing so.

There have certainly been some men who have done so much harm that it would have been fortunate for the world if their nurses had killed them in infancy. But if their nurses had done so their action would not have been objectively right, because the probability was that it would not have the best effects. (Hitler-Stalin-Saddam)


This argument reminds us that even in the issues of abortion debate, we should regard the woman as a person and not just as a container for the foetus. We should therefore give great consideration to her rights and needs as well as those of the unborn and as just as well to our own.

Pro-choice women's rights activists do not take a casual attitude to the foetus; the opposite is usually true, and most of them acknowledge that choosing an abortion is usually a case of choosing the least bad of several more bad courses of action.

A pregnancy to a woman is perhaps one of the most determinative aspects of her life. It disrupts her body. It disrupts her education. It disrupts her employment. And it often disrupts her entire family life at no matter of the age.

Many people regard the right to control one's own body as a key moral right. If women are not allowed to abort an unwanted foetus they are deprived of this right. This leads some people to claim is that it is unethical to ban abortion because doing so denies freedom of choice to women and forces 'the unwilling to bear the unwanted'.

To further discuss this matter, comment and continue reading here.

SURROGATES RIGHTS

 

SAVIOR OR IGNORANCE?

 

It all began in August of 2011, when Crystal Kelley, who has two children of her own, began working with a surrogacy agency; she agreed to work with a couple who wanted but could not have a fourth child. She would be a gestational carrier, meaning she would have no genetic connection to the baby, but would carry a baby formed by a frozen embryo the couple had left from a previous round of in-vitro, and the father’s sperm. Her fee would be $22,000.


Just ten days later Crystal, then 29, conceived. But everyone’s happiness turned to anguish when a routine five-month ultrasound revealed many physical abnormalities, including a cleft palate and lip, a brain cyst and serious heart defects.

“Given the ultrasound findings, (the parents) feel that the interventions required to manage the baby’s medical problems are overwhelming for an infant and that it is a more humane option to consider pregnancy termination,” the fetal medical staff at Hartford Hospital wrote to Kelley’s midwife, according to CNN. The parents had already gone through three previous premature births that left two of their children with medical problems.

On February 22, 2012, six days after the fateful ultrasound, Kelley received another letter. The parents had hired a lawyer. "You are obligated to terminate this pregnancy immediately," wrote Douglas Fishman, an attorney in West Hartford, Connecticut. "You have squandered precious time." At this point she is put in a situation that stresses the value of Ethical and Logical behavior in such a manner many of us will never have to fathom in our lifetime. On March 5, Kelley would be 24 weeks pregnant, and after that, she couldn't legally abort the pregnancy, "TIMEIS OF THE ESSENCE," he added.  

Fishman reminded Kelley that she'd signed a contract, agreeing to "abortion in case of severe fetus abnormality." The contract did not define what constituted such an abnormality.

Kelley was in breach of contract, he wrote, and if she did not abort, the parents would sue her to get back the fees they'd already paid her, which was around $8,000, plus all of the medical expenses and legal fees. Speaking in general, he said everyone who enters into a surrogacy contact needs to be clear from the beginning about what they are willing and able to do.

“It’s very common to talk about this type of issue before there’s an actual pregnancy and is something that should be agreed upon at the outset, to make sure that philosophically and ethically, parents and the carrier are on the same page,” reproductive law attorney Victoria Ferrara told Yahoo Shine. “The same issue holds if there’s a triplet pregnancy. You need to have a carrier willing to carry a triplet pregnancy, because it could be risky.” On the other side, added Ferrara, author of “Gestational Surrogacy, A Primer,” and owner of Worldwide Surrogacy Specialists in Fairfield, CT, parents may want to make sure to find a carrier who would be willing to undergo selective reduction in the case of triplets.

In one particular case of hers, she explained, “the carrier had originally said she would reduce (abort one of the fetuises), but when it came time, she had a lot of qualms about it.” She finally agreed, after hearing from a doctor about how high-risk the pregnancy would be, but the case serves as an example of how a situation like this one could arise, Ferrara said.



Kelley disagreed and was “adamantly” opposed to aborting, touching off a legal battle that had each side going to great lengths to save the unborn baby in its own way; the parents, by wanting to “have mercy on the child and let her go,” and Kelley, by deciding to “carry and protect” the child until its birth. It was an unfortunate time for both sides to discover such a wide gap between their philosophical and ethical beliefs I would say.


Since Kelley would not agree to abort, she says the couple offered her $10,000 to reconsider. Kelley refused, and instead asked for $15,000; the couple would not pay that much, and Kelley said that she had changed her mind anyway. At the suggestion of Leslie Ciarlegio, a genetic counselor, the parents encouraged Kelly to terminate the pregnancy. The parents stated that their decision was based on humanity as they did not want their unborn child to suffer.

Kelly obtained a lawyer, finding Michael DePrimo, an anti-abortion First Amendment attorney with connections to the American Family Association who agreed to take on her case for free. The couple’s attorney reminded Kelley that her contract with them stipulated she would have an abortion in the case of “severe fetus abnormality.” But such an agreement is not legally binding, said Ferrara. “She still has the constitutional right that any woman has, to make decisions about her own body.”

Eventually, Kelley learned she and her children could relocate to Michigan, a state where the birth mother, and not the genetic parents, is considered the legal guardian. She chose this option, and gave birth to the baby there. Baby S was born with a grip of issues, including holoprosencephaly, which means the brain fails to completely divide into distinct hemispheres, and heterotaxy, which means many of her internal organs are in the wrong places. She also has a misshapen ear and many complex heart problems. Ultimately, though, Kelley, a single mother, realized she could not raise Baby "S" and wound up finding her adoptive parents who had experience with high-needs babies.

Baby "S" wakes up every single morning with an infectious smile. She greets her world with a constant sense of enthusiasm," the baby's adoptive mother said in an e-mail to CNN. "Ultimately, we hold onto a faith that in providing "S" with love, opportunity and encouragement, she will be the one to show us what is possible for her in her life and what she is capable of achieving."


 

But Kelley says she doesn’t regret what she did.

Ethical decisions are not always black and white, right vs. wrong, good vs. bad.When there's a lack of clarity then you start to have a recipe for problems. You would want to position yourself to not have to be addressing these kinds of issues for the first time when problems such as these emerge.

Kelley, meanwhile, still wrestles with her decision to not keep the baby. “I know logically I did what was right and I know that nobody in the world would dare think that I gave up on Baby S after all the fighting I did for her, but the battle in my head is bigger and stronger than I really know how to handle,” she wrote on her personal blog in February. “I feel myself slipping down that slippery slope, and I am fighting so hard to stay afloat. I just hope I find a foothold soon.” Also discussed in Kelly’s blog, the parents filed a court case against Kelly in Connecticut, where both parties resided at the time. “No one else was feeling this pregnancy the way that I was. No one else could feel her kicking and moving around inside,” she told the A.P. “I knew from the beginning that this little girl had an amazing fighting spirit, and whatever challenges were thrown at her, she would go at them with every ounce of spirit that she could possibly have.”

Ferrara told Shine she hopes that the public won’t “vilify the whole process of surrogacy” based on this one case. “Most often it just goes so beautifully,” the lawyer said, “and everyone understands the nature of the gift that’s been given and received.”

The couple that offered the surrogate $10,000 to abort their baby has exhausted all legal means to gain custody. They changed their mind and decided to pursue custody of their unborn child.


The baby is now 8 months old, living with adoptive parents, has had three surgeries with more to come, if she lives, little baby "S" faces a 50 percent chance she won’t be able to ever walk or talk.

Sources: Yahoo Shine, CNN, Huffington Post, A.P and Yours Truley... =)

I WROTE THIS SONG A LONG TIME AGO

I Wrote This Song A Long Time Ago

* from a sketch about hearing the "new Tupac song" at a club!

Listen close, as life turns its pages
Machiavelli here, kickin' rhymes for the ages
Seen things in stages, wise words spoken by sages
From SkyTel to BlackBerry pages
Your crew don't phase us, we'll make you bustas pay us
Run up in your spot like CJ from San Andreas

I wrote this song a long time ago
A real long time ago
Feel me!
I wrote this song a long time ago
It was the dopest song I ever wrote... in '94

What can a {nigga} do when half the people voted for George W.
It's a bitch, {fuck} George W. -- can't be true --
I wanna choke him, because he's a snitch
I'm talking about George W. Smith
From city council, he ran in '93
Out in Oakland, you probably didn't hear about him

I wrote this song a long time ago
A real long time ago
Way before Slim Shady was in demand
Way before we dropped baloney on Afghanistan
I wrote this song in '94

How am I doin' this?
Look around the club, see everyone in the place
Showing 'Pac love got a smile on my face
The girl in the miniskirt has bad taste
Because her shirt don't match
And there's a puddin' stain on the back
What the {fuck} is that?
It might be doo-doo

And you in the back, you ain't {shit}
You bought a gin and tonic but you didn't even tip
And if you hit the table one more time then the record might skip
Might skip... I told you, stop hittin' the table

Tupac Shakur
I wrote this rhyme in 1994
I'm not alive!
Thug life!
Dave Chappelle, that ain't your wife
A married man, you've got two kids
Go home!

I wrote this song a long time ago
A real long time ago
Way before Beanie Sigel had to do a bid
Way before Dave Chappelle had two kids
You ain't gettin' no {cootchie}

IM HERE FOR YOU...

I’m Here For You...

Four words and a thousand different interpretations. This just so happens to be one of the many phrases/words that we continuously use and neglect the true meaning.
Sometimes, when people say “I’m here for you,” they mean “I’m here for a while, for an hour, or an evening. You think to yourself, "You’re a good person and I enjoy your company and I know you have to vent right now, so I’ll listen; I’ll even bring some Moscato if you want. Most likely I probably won’t stay the night.”
Sometimes, when people say “I’m here for you” they mean “I don’t know what else to say to your sad story. I have absolutely no advice, nowhere to go from here. All I can do is sit here with you and absorb, I hope that helps.” Other times, “I’m here for you” means “I’m here for you but I’d rather not be," it’s just what you’re supposed to say in these situations. "I’m offering, but I hope you don’t actually take me up on it.”
Sometimes it means something and in most cases it doesn’t. Sometimes the people who say it might as well be commenting on the weather or the brunch they just came from. The words come out but they don’t resonate, emptied of their meaning, just tiny words resting in a bowl.
And sometimes the people who truly mean it never say the words at all.... "I'm here for you"

But when I say "I’m here for you," I mean it! I mean it differently! Genuinely! Let me explain.
There’s a part of friendship that’s more than mere aquaintances and/or good feelings, more than having someone to hang out with all the time and bullshit with on lazy Sunday afternoons. There’s a part of real friendship that’s fierce in compassion. The part marked by understanding, protection and sacrifice. The strong, selfless, human part. The part that would move your body in front of theirs to take a bullet without a blink or second thought.
That’s what I represent when I utter the sounds, "I’m here for you" because I am. Not in the therapist sense, not in the "let’s gossip about others crapy relationships over martinis sense, but the real sense. I love you enough to make room for your pain in my heart and handle it like my own. Or even better than my own, because my own usually ends up stuffed into a back corner of my brain and left there to ferment into a viscous back-wood moonshine.

I’m here for you honestly, sometimes painfully so. I may not have firsthand experience with the exact thing you’re going through but I know what it means to hurt. Senses of hurt translate pretty well. I know what it’s like to feel silenced, shut down, wounded. To feel like there’s no one who really understands, or cares, or will even make the genuine effort to help console you. To feel like even talking about it is nothing but a pointless stir of emotions. I care about you too much to make you feel that way alone.
I may not give the best advice as the proclaimed Dr. Phil or sooth your ears like the Dog Wisperer but "I’m here for you." I may not give you any advice at all.... sometimes there just isn’t any! At times just trying what sucks the least and hopeing for the best is all we can do — but I’m listening. You can talk to me about anything you want; your fears and apprehensions, the things you’re afraid to acknowledge, let alone say out loud. They probably won’t go away but maybe they’ll get smaller and a little easier to deal with, and that’s still something and you know why... cause "I'm here for you."