Monthly Archives: November 2012

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When Childhood Is Stolen … A Voice Against Sex Slavery

“There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in.” – Graham Greene, The Power and the Glory

An estimated 27 million people are victims of slavery around the world, according to the U.S. State Department. The buying and selling of humans is a multibillion-dollar global business, ensnaring vulnerable people who are often kidnapped or tricked into the trade.

As a little girls Streypich Loch was raped by her father and later forced into sex slavery in a Cambodian brothel. Now 20 years old she has escaped her own slavery, helps rescues other young girls from the same fate, and gives them a voice on her breakthrough radio show.

To read the rest of this article, An Escape From Sex Slavery, by Abigail Pesta that was originally posted on thedailybeast.com on November 26, 2012, please click on the following link.

an-escape-from-cambodian-sex-slavery.html

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Does The Full #Moon Really Make People Crazy?

Along with Mercury in retrograde, the full moon is a pretty popular scapegoat for bad luck and bizarre behavior. Encounter someone acting strangely? Blame it on the lunar phases! It’s said that crime rates increase and emergency rooms are much busier during the full moon. (Plus, there’s that whole werewolf thing!) Why would this be? The reasoning is that the Moon, which affects the ocean’s tides, probably exerts a similar effect on us, because the human body is made mostly of water.

This belief that the moon influences behavior is so widely held—reportedly, even 80 percent of nurses and 64 percent of doctors think it’s true—that a team of researchers at Université Laval’s School of Psychology in Canada decided to find out if mental illness and the phases of the moon are linked.

To test the theory, the researchers evaluated 771 patients who visited emergency rooms at two hospitals in Montreal between March 2005 and April 2008. The patients complained of chest pains; doctors could not determine a medical cause for the pains. Many of the patients suffered from panic attacks, anxiety and mood disorders, or suicidal thoughts.

When the researchers compared the time of the visits to the phases of the moon, they found that there was no link between the incidence of psychological problems and the four lunar phases, with one exception—in the last lunar quarter, anxiety disorders were 32 percent less frequent. “This may be coincidental or due to factors we did not take into account,” says Dr. Geneviève Belleville, who directed the team of researchers. “But one thing is certain: we observed no full-moon or new-moon effect on psychological problems.”

So rest easy (or maybe not): If people are acting crazy during the full moon, it’s likely because they’re just that crazy all the time.

Read the full text here: http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/153149#ixzz2DTO9lsFY
–brought to you by mental_floss!

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#LA Could Ban Elephants From Circuses…Yes,There Is A God

“When a man has pity on all living creatures, then only, is he noble.”

Buddha Siddhartha Gautama (563 – 483 BCE), Indian founder of Buddhism

Los Angeles took a step this week to potentially ban elephants at Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus and other traveling circus shows.

The city’s Personnel and Animal Welfare Committee on Tuesday recommended a full vote by the City Council on the proposed prohibition of traveling circus elephants and the sharp implements used to control them.

The measure, drafted by Los Angeles Animal Services, allows the council to choose between a full ban of pachyderms, a prohibition of so-called bullhooks, or both.

The 2-0 vote followed expert testimony and a video documenting brutal treatment of circus elephants.

“Frankly, it made my blood boil,” said Councilman Paul Koretz, who heads the committee, in a statement. “The video was shot undercover and it showed traveling circus elephants being struck viciously with a bullhook, over and over again, for no apparent reason.”

Animal welfare activists celebrated the decision they said could lead to the banishment of cruel elephant practices in Los Angeles. A state judge this year banned the use of billhooks at the Los Angeles Zoo.

“This is great news for elephants who are forced to perform in traveling circuses,” said Catherine Doyle, the Los Angeles-based director of science, research and advocacy for the Performing Animal Welfare Society, which has a sanctuary for former circus elephants in Northern California. “Los Angeles considers itself a progressive city, and this will take us to the next level.”

[This post was excerpted from the article LA Circus Elephant Ban: City Council Could Bar Performing Pachyderms by Dana Bartholomew of the Los Angeles Daily News and was posted on November 22, 2012. To view it in its entirety please visit this link:  la-circus-elephant-ban_n_2180903.html#slide=1197882.]

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Bet You Can’t…Guess The Least And Most Emotional Countries

“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.” – Kahil Gibran

In a survey of more than 150 nations, Gallup conducted telephone and in-person interviews with about 1,000 people ages 15 and older in each country every year between 2009 and 2011. Residents were asked whether they experienced 10 different emotions a lot the previous day, including five negative emotions (anger, stress, sadness, physical pain and worry) and five positive emotions (feeling well-rested, smiling and laughing a lot, being treated with respect, enjoyment, and learning or doing something interesting).

Here are the 10 least emotional countries based on the percentage of respondents who answered “Yes” when asked whether they experienced a range of either positive or negative emotions daily:
  • Singapore: 36 (percent)
  • Georgia: 37
  • Lithuania: 37
  • Russia: 38
  • Madagascar: 38
  • Ukraine: 38
  • Belarus: 38
  • Kazakhstan: 38
  • Nepal: 38
  • Kyrgyzstan: 38

The 15 most emotional countries based on the same answers:

  • Philippines: 60 (percent)
  • El Salvador: 57
  • Bahrain: 56
  • Oman: 55
  • Colombia: 55
  • Chile: 54
  • Costa Rica: 54
  • Canada: 54
  • Guatemala: 54
  • Bolivia: 54
  • Ecuador: 54
  • Dominican Republic: 54
  • Peru: 54
  • Nicaragua: 54
  • United States: 54

[The above information was excerpted from the article “Most And Least Emotional Countries” by LiveScience Staff that appeared on livescience.com on November 21, 2012. To view this article in its entirety, please visit this link:  24962-most-emotional-countries.html.]