Thursday, April 28, 2005
The government has launched a draft all-ages suicide prevention strategy and is asking members of the public to have their input with submissions and public meetings.
Figures from the US Bureau of Justice show the number of people behind bars in the US has grown by over 2 percent in just the last year. In three decades, the prison population has gone from 300,000 in 1970 to more than 2 million today.
Legislation aimed at giving US families more control over keeping questionable material off of their television screen has been signed by President Bush. The bill, called the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, allows companies to develop filtering software to skip or mute sections of DVDs with violence, sex and foul language without getting sued by filmmakers.
The latest European statistics show that 3.9% of all births in Denmark came as a result of IVF -- probably the highest proportion in the world. The next highest was Slovenia, with 3.2%, but in all the Nordic countries of Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden, more than 2% of births are IVF births. Since the most recent figures date from 2001, the current levels are sure to be higher.
"All around I see mounting social anarchy, gross corruption in the democratic process, the destruction of liberty, mass ignorance and brutality, paralysis in the police, the breakdown of the family and the loss of any faith in the justice system....Yet I am informed that I must celebrate diversity, celebrate the new richness of multi-ethnic Britain."
Recently, Canary pointed to a story showing how the iPod is reshaping culture on the street. It's also starting to have its impact on the radio scene. (Sadly, I can't see the equivalent happening in New Zealand, where radio stations are stuck in a narrow, narcissistic groove. I worked for years for some of them, so I know whereof I speak.) This little gadget is having a cultural impact way beyond its size.
Nokia today launched three new mobile handsets, hoping users will be seduced by the smart phones' built-in multimedia gadgets, which take print-quality pictures, read e-mail, play music, browse Web sites, and display mobile TV. [But can it make telephone calls?]
"The decisive culture war of the 21st century is likely to be between the Darwinian fundamentalists and those who believe in God and the significance of human life," writes Paul Johnson. "It will be prolonged and bitter. Culture wars do not usually end in bloodshed but they break hearts and minds and bring terrible sufferings to the losers (and to many of the winners too)." (This article is available only to Spectator subscribers, but it is easy to find other writing by Johnson on the same topic by Googling some of the key words.)
In his 1993 book, "No Place for Truth," author David Wells wrote: "I have watched with growing disbelief as the evangelical church has cheerfully plunged into astounding theological illiteracy." Some years ago Bill Tammeus became so exasperated by this phenomenon in his own denomination that he began teaching a course called "Theology Even the Clergy Can Understand." He says theological illiteracy is now rampant.
Controversial religious imagery took over from sex last year as the main way UK advertisers chose to get their message across, according to an industry watchdog.
Family doctors in Belgium who want to euthanase their patients can now purchase a 60-Euro kit with the necessary materials at 250 pharmacies throughout the country. Belgian doctors have complained that it has been difficult to practice home euthanasia because of their lack of knowledge about products, doses or products.
Aborted Ukrainian foetuses are being smuggled into Russia to be used as beauty therapies in Russia, the Observer newspaper (UK) claims. Young women are being paid about US$200 for a foetus which can fetch $9,500 across the border.
Scientists can create animals with the cells of other species, but are these chimeras medical marvels or high-tech monsters? The blending of species have raised a host of ethical and philosophical questions over the last year. This article raises some good questions - unfortunately, it does little to answer them.
An analysis by a Democratic think tank argues that Democrats are suffering from a severe "parent gap" among married people with children, who say the entertainment industry is lowering the moral standards of the country. The study, published last week by the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI), the policy arm of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, admonishes Democrats to pay more attention to parental concerns about "morally corrosive forces in the culture," and warns that the party will not fare better with this pivotal voting bloc until they do.
Parents are up to six times more important to a child's academic success than their schooling, according to research from Exeter University. Charles Desforges reviewed studies from around the world, comparing children's attainment with the level of support they received from parents, and found that parental involvement had more bearing on a child's attainment than any other factor including social class. Prof Desforges noted the importance of "at-home good parenting", where mothers and fathers offered a stable environment and intellectual stimulation - including regular talks and discussions with their children. If all schools could be made equally good, said Desforges, that would reduce differences in attainment amongst 7-year-olds by only five per cent. "But if you make all parents equally good at parenting … it would reduce differences … by 30 per cent."
Could this be the excuse that Bush would use to invade Iran? WorldNetDaily reports: Iran is not only covertly developing nuclear weapons, it is testing ballistic missiles specifically designed to destroy America's technical infrastructure, effectively neutralizing the world's lone superpower, say U.S. intelligence sources, top scientists and western missile industry experts. Even one electromagnetic pulse weapon could effectively send the continental US back to the 19th century with a recovery time of months or years.
