The Male Shooter Epidemic

  James Lorello asks us to consider creating authentic relationships with young men to curb violence.   In recent weeks the U.S. has seen a number of shootings around the country committed by men.  This includes shootings at military bases, schools and other public arenas. In the past, these types of incidents have raised questions around two topics; gun control and mental illness. While these topics contribute to the issue, a third should be added to the list. Why are most of these campus shooters men? What within their identity says that this violent tactic is the only way to heal from their past?   Recent work has debunked the claim that these shooters are simply “loners” and that social separation influences them to commit acts of violence. Katherine Newman, co-author of Rampage: The Social Roots of School Shootings says that these shooters “experience rejection all the time, but that doesn’t stop them from trying to join groups. They just fail, all the time.” Instead of being people who are lone wolves, they are individuals trying to fit in to a larger peer group. Today’s construction of masculine identity does not leave much room for those who do not fit in.  Whether too slow in gym class, or too smart, not good enough with the ladies, or too much acne. Young male groups are built upon tearing down those that are less than. This continual posturing forces men to establish themselves as the alpha male and therefore a “real man”. Click through to read more.   Source: goodmenproject.com

Children Are Being Pinned Down & Isolated By Staff in Schools…And It’s Legal

  “The room where they locked up Heather Luke’s 10-year-old son had cinder block walls, a dim light and a fan in the ceiling that rattled so insistently her son would beg them to silence it. A thick metal door with locks—which they threw, clank-clank-clank—separated the autistic boy from the rest of the decrepit building in Chesapeake, Virginia, just south of Norfolk. One day in March 2011, his mother said, Carson flew into a panic at the mere suggestion of being confined there after an outburst.Staff members held him down, then muscled him through the hallway and attempted to lock him in, yet again. But this time, the effort went awry. Staffers crushed Carson’s hand while trying to slam the door. A surgeon later needed to operate to close the bleeding half-moon a bolt had punched into his left palm. The wound was so deep it exposed bone.”   Click through to read more.   Source: illuminatebytanya.wordpress.com

Mistreatment, Abuse and Murder of the Mentally Ill & Others at Rikers Island “Correctional” Facility

 

Where was the “long arm of justice” when it was needed to protect Bradley Ballard, Ronald “Knowledge” Spears, Jerome Murdough and countless others who’ve been killed at New York’s Rikers Island?

 

Source: ushypocrisy.com

Feds made humanitarian crisis worse

 

Immigration officials were caught in an untenable position. And then they made it worse.
Unaccompanied minors from Central America, as well as mothers with young children, have been crossing the Rio Grande into south Texas in vast numbers this year. Increasing gang violence in their home countries incredibly makes the long trek across Mexico a safer alternative. Some seek to reunite with parents who already crossed the border. Human smugglers promise a land of milk and honey.

They’re not heading for California, Arizona or west Texas. Those sectors of the border have been fortified. Even desperation cannot push a child into a deadly desert. Instead, they’ve targeted the most lightly guarded section of the border, where a nearly dry river is easily crossed into south Texas.

Once over, they are quickly caught, apparently part of the plan.

The Border Patrol and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement are trapped. Then, because secrecy is engrained in the culture of their parent Department of Homeland Security, they do a poor job of getting out of the trap.

Immigration officials can’t send these children back across the border. They can’t fly them back to Central America once they make a credible claim of fear of violence. They don’t have adequate facilities in south Texas to process the children. They need help.

But instead of acknowledging their problem, instead of reaching out to state leaders in Arizona and California, they surprised them.


The mayor of Nogales, AZ is speaking out about the hundreds of unaccompanied kids at a giant Border Patrol warehouse in Southern AZ. The mayor said the kids are in good care.

 

In Arizona, it started when families were dropped at bus stations, apparently after being processed at Arizona immigration facilities with greater capacity than those in Texas. Most, it turned out, were bound for other states.

But no one here knew this. A state that bore the brunt of the last surge in illegal immigration feared the worst. It was unconscionable that the Border Patrol and ICE said nothing.

Next came the children, bused into a warehouse of a building in Nogales. Again, the buses showed up out of nowhere, with no warning and no explanation. Hundreds of children were dumped into a building with insufficient beds and showers. If nothing else said crisis, that did.

But again, no explanation. Just that stony silence until reporters started pressing for answers. In the meantime, the vacuum of information invited politicians to puff up their outrage. SB 1070 was born in an atmosphere like this.

Silence and surprises do not serve ICE or the Border Patrol. They do not serve the people of the United States. And they do little for the children bewildered by all they are encountering.

 

Click through to read more.

 

Source: www.azcentral.com

Study: Eviction Rates for Black Women on Par With Incarcerations for Black Men

 

MacArthur Foundation “How Housing Matters” (pdf) study reveals that while black men face alarmingly high incarceration rates, black women are disproportionately evicted from their homes.

According to the study, in any given year, approximately 16,000 adults and children are evicted in Milwaukee from approximately 6,000 housing units—that equates to 16 households evicted every day.

 

Click through to read more.

 

Source: www.theroot.com

The Overwhelming Empirical Evidence That Guns Endanger Children

Caroline Starks was 2 years old. Her 5-year-old brother was playing nearby with his birthday present: a .22-caliber Crickett rifle. His mother stepped outside for a moment, certain the gun wasn’t loaded. She was wrong. Caroline was pronounced dead a few hours later at the Cumberland County Hospital in Kentucky….

Source: www.slate.com