White privilege programs take center stage in pair of school districts — and frustrated board members, parents are pushing back hard

 By Dave Urbanski

Programs fighting white privilege are taking center stage in a pair of Pennsylvania school districts, and board members and parents are pushing back hard against them.

Gladwyne School in the Lower Merion School District — reportedly one of the richest in the nation — will require fourth and fifth graders to read "Not My Idea: A Book About Whiteness," which claims that white people who relate to police officers or don't watch the news are guilty of racism, and kindergartners and first graders will be assigned "A Kid's Book About Racism," the Washington Free Beacon reported.

In response, Elana Yaron Fishbein — a mother of two boys and a doctor of social work — wrote to the district's superintendent, board members, and the school's principal demanding the school remove its "cultural proficiency" curriculum, the paper said.

"The book teaches kids not only to defy parents but to hate themselves," Fishbein told the Free Beacon. "To hate their parents also because they are white. By default, [the kids] are white, and they're privileged, and they're bad. [The school] is teaching this to little kids."

More from the paper:

Cultural proficiency lessons at Gladwyne were announced in an email to parents on June 9. The email claims that despite offering four other lessons on equity and race, the school's "Cultural Proficiency Committee" believes those lessons are insufficient and created a fifth lesson focused explicitly on anti-racism.

"Generally, each class also engages in a cultural proficiency lesson; however, we realize that this is not enough," Gladwyne Principal Veronica Ellers wrote in an email the Free Beacon said it obtained. "We plan to continue designing lessons that promote anti-racist actions in the upcoming 20-21 school year and beyond."

"A Kid's Book About Racism" includes a list of actions deemed harmful and racist, the paper said, adding that the book says that asking questions can be racist and asks 5- to 7-year-olds to call out racism when they identify it.

"[Racism] happens all the time," the book reads, according to the Free Beacon. "Sometimes it shows up in small ways. Like a look, a comment, a question, a thought, a joke, a word, or a belief…. If you see someone being treated badly, made fun of, excluded from playing, or looked down on because of their skin color call it racism."

District spokeswoman Amy Buckman defended the move, according to the paper: "The Lower Merion School District fully supports the ongoing implementation of an anti-racist curriculum in its schools and encourages the use of developmentally appropriate books that raise awareness of the very real issues of racism and privilege."

Other parents afraid to speak out

Fishbein told the Free Beacon that parents who share her concerns privately message her as they're scared to speak up due to fear of being branded racist.

"If you say anything that's racist according to the school or parent's definition of racism, you're out," she added to the paper. "You're called a racist. No wonder the parents don't talk."

Lower Merion refused to respond to her emails, the Free Beacon noted, adding that Fishbein's children will attend a private school in the fall.

School district #2

The Central York School District is about 90 miles west of Lower Merion, and it's feeling the same race-related program tensions.

In fact, two school board members on Monday blasted a proposed curriculum meant to tackle racial issues because they said it doesn't teach respect for police and may promote socialism, the York Dispatch reported.

Vicki Guth and Veronica Gemma said the pilot program and discussions about it within the district's diversity committee focus too much on racism and white privilege, the paper noted.

"The references that were made in this committee about teaching tolerance talked about white privilege and white saviorism," Guth said, according to the Dispatch. "So you can't win. If you're normal, you're ... white privilege. If you're trying to change things, you're doing it out of the savior mentality."

Guth also said she's bothered that such topics influence students to "want to be socialists" and that students are growing up in a generation that doesn't respect religious faith or the U.S. in general, the paper said.

Gemma wondered if students were being taught about the value of police officers and pointed out that one teacher commented in a diversity committee meeting that "I need to make sure my students aren't racist," the Dispatch reported.

As for that teacher's comment, Gemma said, "I don't want anyone to assume that little first graders are racist, little second graders are racist," the paper added.

What did the district have to say?

Central York on Tuesday defended its push for diversity while also distancing the district from the two board members' comments, the Dispatch reported.

"Comments made by individual school board members during a public meeting regarding these issues are reflective of individual board members' personal views/ideologies/beliefs and not reflective of the administration of Central York School District, the school board as a whole, or the Central York School District," the statement read, according to the paper.

The purpose of the proposed curriculum is to allow teachers and students to talk about national issues that have made headlines over recent months, Assistant Superintendent Robert Grove told the Dispatch Monday.

"It's not the same world out there, whether it's a pandemic or other events out there that are commanding our collective attention," Grove added to the paper. "When our learners come back and they want to engage in the conversations, we want to make sure teachers are equipped with the right curriculum and standards but also the right verbiage and mindset.

Tucker Carlson: Big Tech censors COVID-19 video featuring doctors

By Tucker Carlson | Fox News

So much going on right now in the news. New developments from every direction, much of it seems unrelated. A lot of it's shocking. Here's the way to understand it.      

In an election year, everything significant that happens is about the election. So all of these developments are in fact related, and here's the core question in every election. Who is up and who is down?

As of tonight, the president is down double digits in the polls and there's not much question about why that is. Americans are miserable. They're stuck at home. They are fearful. Millions of them don't have jobs.

The percentage of Americans who believe our country is headed in the right direction has dropped off a cliff since this spring. Not coincidentally, that's when a strange new virus from China began to spread among our population.

The rise of COVID-19 in the United States tracks almost precisely the decline of Donald Trump's approval numbers and the political lesson from this is clear. The more damage the Wuhan coronavirus does to America, the harder it is for the President to get reelected.

That's not speculation. It is the most certain fact in American politics. Every Democratic officeholder understands that. If the population remains terrified, Democrats will have more power in January.

So the Democratic Party has every incentive to keep Americans afraid and off balance. For the next 97 days, they plan to do that. That is their entire campaign strategy. It's the only thing they're running on.

Yesterday, the news site Breitbart posted a video of a group of physicians giving a press conference about medical advances in the fight against COVID-19. Some of the news that doctors delivered was hopeful because there is hopeful news to report.

Seventeen million people saw that video, the president retweeted it. This enraged Democrats.

Any scientific advancement that reduces the suffering of Americans in an election year is a threat to Joe Biden's campaign. So they decided to pull that video off the internet.

Fifteen years ago, that would have been absurd. You couldn't have done it. This was America. You weren't allowed to ban a news story just because it might hurt your candidate's poll numbers.

In any case, it was impossible. There were too many news outlets. No one could control them all. That has changed.

While the rest of us were sleeping, or in the case of so many of our senators, taking payoffs from Google, a tiny number of left-wing corporations took virtually complete control of all news and information in this country.

Now, if Democrats want to erase a politically inconvenient news story fewer than a hundred days before an election, they can do that, and they did do it. Big Tech censored science.

They pulled the video of doctors in lab coats talking about coronavirus research, and they hit that video from the public. It's exactly what the Chinese government so often does, except when Silicon Valley erases your freedoms, they lecture you as they do it.

They've got all the ruthlessness of Chinese authoritarians, but with double the self-righteousness. It's the American version.

Thankfully, none of this applies to us at Fox News. We happen to work for one of the very few mass media companies left in America that is not controlled by Google or Facebook. We can report the news honestly. Big Tech can't censor us, at least not right now.

You're not allowed to watch these physicians on YouTube tonight, but we can show them to you here, and we're going to. Here's Dr. Bob Hamilton.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. BOB HAMILTON:  I think that is important that all of us who are here today realize that our kids are not really the ones who are driving the infection, it is being driven by older individuals.

And yes, we can send the kids back to school, I think without fear. We need to not act out of fear. We need to act out of science. We need to do it. We need to get it done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON:  What you just heard is not a crackpot theory. It is at the center of mainstream science. Increasingly, what you just heard represents the consensus among physicians and researchers around the world.

Children are not meaningful vectors for the coronavirus. Worldwide, there is not a single recorded case of a student infecting a teacher with the virus, not one case, and that's why so many nations around the world are reopening their schools this fall, but we're not.

We've got a presidential election in November. Children must suffer so that Joe Biden can win that election. That is the imperative, the political imperative driving our so-called health policy, but you're not allowed to know that. So they pulled the video telling you that.

Here's another physician from the same press conference called Dr. Stella Immanuel.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. STELLA IMMANUEL, PHYSICIAN: There is a cure for COVID. There is a cure for COVID. It's called hydroxychloroquine. It's called zinc. It's called Zithromax, and it is time for the grassroots to wake up.

I say, no, we're not going to take this any longer. We're not going to die.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Dr. Immanuel's claim is harder for us to endorse. Is hydroxychloroquine part of a cure for the coronavirus? We don't know the answer.

We do know that many frontline physicians around the world have prescribed hydroxychloroquine and continue to prescribe it. We've interviewed some of them on the show. The drug appears to show promise in treating some early-stage patients. That's good news.

The science on hydroxychloroquine is not settled either way. Science rarely is settled. That's why it's science and not, for example, radical feminist theory.

Science is constantly evolving as we test and retest our assumptions against observed reality. That's the whole point of science.

Unfortunately, reality is not the point of politics. Winning is the point of politics, so they scrubbed that video. Here's more of it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

IMMANUEL: My message to Dr. Anthony Fauci is, when was the last time you put a stethoscope on a patient? That when you start seeing patients like we see on a daily basis, you will understand the frustration that we feel. You need to start feeling for American people like we, the frontline doctors feel.

You need to start realizing that. They are listening to you and if they are going to listen to you, you've got to give them a message of hope.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Oh, that clip enraged them. Because above all, you must never mock the sainted Anthony Fauci. Under no circumstances can you note that Dr. Fauci is, in fact, very often a hypocritical buffoon who refuses to admit what he clearly doesn't know.

If you say that out loud, they will cancel you. Fauci is too useful to the Biden campaign. So until November, Fauci's word must be law, even when it doesn't make sense. Criticize Fauci and you will disappear from the internet.

And so Dr. Immanuel disappeared from the internet. And then Google's countless toadies online did the cleanup work, the ugly stuff.

"The Daily Beast" attacked Dr. Immanuel for the crime of getting her medical degree in Africa and then suggested she believed in witchcraft because you know, Africans do that, right?

So political correctness is fine with "The Daily Beast" most of the year, but this is election season so Dr. Immanuel must be destroyed. "The Daily Beast" was happy to help achieve that.

So by the way, with the think tank libertarians, including some still posing as conservatives, people you read, people who work for places you probably have sent money to. You saw them on Twitter today, hopefully reminding you that this variety of censorship isn't really censorship because the government isn't doing it.

Oh. They didn't explain exactly why that distinction matters to anyone. In fact, censorship is always bad, whether it's imposed by Congress or whether it's imposed by monopolies that only exist because they receive special carve-outs granted to them by Congress. It doesn't matter.

Censorship is always wrong. Censorship does not improve public health. In fact, it threatens public health.

The authorities responsible for containing this pandemic clearly have failed. We know that. Some of them are decent people. They're trying their best.

But despite their efforts, they've frequently been wrong. We know that because it's on tape.

So what we desperately need now, as we always do in crisis, and especially in a crisis that can be solved by science is more voices in the conversation, not fewer. Want proof? Here's the Surgeon General, remember when he told us this?

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. JEROME ADAMS, U.S. SURGEON GENERAL:  What the World Health Organization and the CDC have reaffirmed in the last few days is that they do not recommend the general public wear mask. Wearing a mask improperly can actually increase your risk of getting disease.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON:  Oh, so masks are dangerous, right? That wasn't very long ago. Now masks are mandatory, and the cops will nab you if you're not wearing one.

What does this tell us? It tells us what we already knew, if we were honest, which is that scientific consensus changes. That's the point.

As we learn more, our conclusions change. Legitimate scientists understand that. That's called the scientific method. Big Tech companies don't care one way or the other because their goal is not the truth. Their goal is to control the outcome of an election. It's not to protect public health.

This isn't about public health, and it's not about science. It never was. It's about power. And no one in the history of the world has ever had more power than Google and Facebook have right now.

So we should have seen this coming. People with power abuse that power and people who have absolute power abuse it absolutely, as we learned.

Adapted from Tucker Carlson’s monologue on “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on July 28, 2020.

(Tucker Carlson currently serves as the host of FOX News Channel’s (FNC) Tucker Carlson Tonight (weekdays 8PM/ET). He joined the network in 2009 as a contributor.) 

Zwei Fälle in wenigen Tagen: Seltsamer Mädchenaufmarsch in Sachsen sorgt für Verwirrung

Einen seltsamen Anblick, wie in einer längst vergessenen Zeit, machten Wanderer am Dienstag auf dem Elbradweg von Wehlen nach Rathen im Elbsandsteingebirge in Sachsen. Mädchen mit Zöpfen und Uniformen, die optisch an die Nazi-Jugendorganisation Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM) erinnerten, sorgten dort für Irritation.

Im Gleichschritt marschierten die Mädchen in hellbraunen Blusen und mit einem markanten Aufnäher am Oberarm durch die Landschaft, wie das Bündnis „Dresden Nazifrei“ mit einem Foto auf Twitter dokumentiert hat. Diese auffallende Ähnlichkeit der Optik ist aber nicht die einzige Parallele, die zurück in dunkle Zeiten führt. Das Emblem auf dem Arm der Mädchen ist ein sogenannter Wotansknoten (auch Valknut genannt) – ein germanisches Kriegersymbol. Der Begriff steht für die „im Kampf erschlagene Krieger“ und wird in der rechtsextremen Szene häufiger verwendet.

„Wir können diese Gruppierung bislang nicht zuordnen. Sie ist möglicherweise neu, augenscheinlich aber eine völkisch-rechte Jugendorganisation“, sagte die Linken-Landtagsabgeordnete und Expertin für die rechtsextreme Szene, Kerstin Köditz (53), der „Bild“-Zeitung.

Weitere Gruppe marschiert durch Dresden

Der Aufmarsch auf dem Elbwanderweg ist nicht das einzige solche Erscheinung in der Region. Eine weitere Gruppe dieser bezöpften Mädchen tauchte diese Woche in Dresden auf – rund 50 Kilometer von Wehlen und Rathen entfernt. „Hier handelt es sich um eine Gruppe des sogenannten Freibunds“, erklärte Köditz der Zeitung.

Die Mädchen trugen rote Matrosenhemden und blaue Röcke. Auch wenn sich diese Vereinigung selbst eher in der unpolitischen Pfadfinder-Tradition der nach dem Ersten Weltkrieg entstandenen „Bündischen Jugend“ sieht, wird sie der neuen rechten Szene zugerechnet. Denn die Gesinnung der „Bündischen Jugend“ ist umstritten. Einige Historiker sehen sie mit ihrer soldatischen Organisation als Steigbügelhalter der Nazis.

Anzeigen gegen die beiden Mädchengruppen liegen auf „Bild“-Anfrage bei der Polizei nicht vor. Allerdings ginge Hinweise an den Staatsschutz.

© FOCUS Online 1996-2020 | BurdaForward GmbH

Leo Terrell Reveals What Caused Him to Leave the Democratic Party

By Beth Baumann

Civil Rights attorney Leo Terrell, a prominent Democrat turned Trump supporter, has come under fire from his colleagues for refusing to support Joe Biden and Black Lives Matter.  Despite that, Terrell said he isn't in favor of the modern-day Democratic Party and what they stand for.

 "The Democratic Party in 2020 is as follows: it's been hijacked by Black Lives Matter and that's why I've shifted away from the Democratic Party. Two major reasons: One, Joe Biden made the assumption that if you're not black, that  if you're black you have to vote Democrat. I find that insulting and offensive to every African American because we don't vote as one group, "he told the Daily Caller.  "Secondly, defunding the police is absolutely ridiculous. Democrats believe in law and order. Those are two major reasons I left the Democratic Party."

 According to the civil rights attorney, the Black Lives Matter movement lacks any substantive policies and their only goal is to defeat President Trump.  It was Biden's comments about blacks needing to vote for the Democratic Party that made Terrell question his values.

 "When Joe Biden made that comment, I had to question my value and find out whether or not the Democratic Party and I still were compatible and we're not, because everything that's going on in 2020 with Black Lives Matter, with defunding the police  , with making the assumption that if you're black you have to vote for the Democrat, that is not what I stand for as a civil rights attorney, "he explained.

 Even though Terrell believes the officers involved in George Floyd's murder were in the wrong, he still believes in law and order and the need for law enforcement.

 "Ninety-eight percent of all police officers are good. Get rid of two percent but not the entire police force and I think that Black Lives Matter has hijacked this entire issue and now we're talking about taking down monuments, taking down statues,  we're talking about painting streets, "he said.  "None of that goes to police reform and changing the system within the system."

 The other issue Terrell has with the BLM movement is the use of the term "systemic discrimination," which he says no one knows the meaning of.

 "They don't even know what it means. I know what it means. This is not 1960. You got Democratic cities - Chicago, Atlanta, LA - run by Democrats, run by people of color. There's chaos in those cities and they  're calling' systemic discrimination. '  They need to look in the mirror, "Terrell told the Daily Caller.  "This is not 1960. This is not Bull Connor. This is not German Shepherds chasing black folks down the street and yet they play this game of using a word, a term, a phrase that does not apply in 2020."

 Terrell also made it clear that it's not racist to question Black Lives Matter or their agenda.

 "Let me be as clear as possible: I, as a black man, as an American, do not support Black Lives Matter. Why? Very simple. Black Lives Matter doesn't care about all black lives," he said

The attorney named off a few examples, including St. Louis Police Department Captain David Dorn, who served his community as a member of the SLPD for 38 years.  He was murdered in cold blood in early June when he protected a friend's pawn shop from looters and rioters.

 Terrell also mentioned the BLM is conveniently silent when black-on-black crime takes place in America's inner cities or a black police officer is killed in the line of duty.

 "They are profiteers. You will see Al Sharpton - you'll see him at a police case involving a black man and a white officer, but other than that, those are the only black lives that matter," he said.

 CNN and MSNBC have pushed the notion that defunding the police will somehow help skyrocketing crime.  Terrell reminded viewers that Seattle's CHOP zone was complete chaos that eventually had to be disbanded.

 "Black people died in that CHOP zone! There was no Black Lives Matter. There was no Al Shaprton. It's ludicrous," he said.  "You cannot be a law and order Democrat and vote Democrat this year."

 "Joe Biden is an empty suit being hijacked by extremists on the left. That's why I'm not part of the Democratic Party in 2020," Terrell explained.

 The attorney also pointed out one obvious fact: Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC) has put together a police reform package and Democrats have shunned him.

 "It didn't see the light of day on the Senate floor. You know why? Because two black Democrats - I won't mention their names - Cory Booker and Kamala Harris - they wouldn't let it get to the floor. You  know why? Because they want to take full credit and if you have an 'R' in front of you name, you cannot be in favor of police reform, "Terrell explained.  "This is ludicrous."

 Colleagues who the attorney has known for more than 30 years have written him off because he's thinking with his head and his heart.  But Terrell said he doesn't care.

 "They're so hell-bent on defeating Trump, they'll vote for anyone. I can't ignore or dismiss logic," he said.

© TOWN HALL

Antisemitas y Antisionistas en una marcha contra la Cuarentena

Itongadol/Agencia AJN.  “Todos los políticos son masones y son sionistas. Soros, Rothschild, Rockefeller, los Warburg, el sionismo maneja el mundo”, fue uno de los tantos comentarios que incitaron al odio en una manifestación contra las medidas para prevenir la propagación del coronavirus.

Agencia AJN.- Un grupo de manifestantes, que marchó ayer en la ciudad de Buenos Aires para protestar contra las medidas de prevención del coronavirus, lanzó una serie expresiones antisemitas y antisionistas, con teorías conspirativas sobre los judíos que “manejan el mundo”.

“La gente tiene que despertar, tenemos que despertar de toda esta mentira. Todos los medios de comunicación trabajan para los mismos poderosos que manejan el mundo. Todos los políticos son masones y son sionistas. Soros, Rothschild, Rockefeller, los Warburg, el sionismo maneja el mundo”, afirmó un hombre que estaba en contra de la cuarentena, en diálogo con un periodista de C5N.

“Más del 60 por ciento son medios judíos. Las bancas internacionales pertenecen a los judíos”, agregó una mujer que se manifestaba en frente del Obelisco porteño.

Además, algunos sostenían carteles que decían “Yo voté a Alberto, no a Soros”. George Soros es un magnate e inversor financiero húngaro de origen judío, que en el último tiempo ha sido blanco de los antisemitas que propagan discursos de odio.

En respuesta a estas manifestaciones, la DAIA expresó a través de Twitter: “Otra vez expresiones irresponsables de la supuesta conspiración sionista de los medios de comunicación en plena pandemia. Voces incitando al odio antisemita, en una manifestación de repudio a la cuarentena en el Obelisco, ante la pasividad del periodista”.

“Seguimos indignados por la incitación a la violencia. Les iniciaremos las acciones legales correspondientes, están visiblemente identificados”, concluyó la institución judía.

La crítica del Centro Wiesenthal al Vaticano por un cuadro "grotesco"

Centro Wiesenthal al Vaticano: "El cuadro del Libelo de Sangre socava la condena del Papa Francisco contra el antisemitismo".

El martirio de San Simon de Trento por libelo de sangre

Giovanni Gasparro

 “A dos semanas de la Pascua Judía y la Pascua de Resurreción reaparecen imágenes de una antigua parodia que muestra imagénes de judíos extrayendo sangre a un niño cristiano para hornear la matzá… ¡El libelo de sangre continúa sangrando!", advierten desde el Centro Wiesenthal.

En una carta al Cardenal Pietro Parolin, Secretario de Estado del Vaticano,  el Dr. Shimon Samuels, Director de Relaciones Internacionales del Centro Simon Wiesenthal, expresó su conmoción ante una pintura recientemente publicada por Giovanni Gasparro. Este artista italiano que se ve a sí mismo como un católico devoto, aparentemente rechaza los principios del Concilio Vaticano II y Nostra Aetate.

La carta explicaba que “la nueva pintura de Gasparro representa el 'Martirio di San Simonino da Trento por Omicidio Rituale Ebraico' ('Martirio de San Simón de Trento por homicidio judío ritual'), que no es más que la repetición de un libelo de sangre de 1475 que representa a judíos en imágenes antisemitas , 'celebrando' la sangría de un niño cristiano para hornear el pan de Pascua ”.

Las horribles imágenes del libelo de sangre, tal como lo representa Giuseppe Gasparro hoy y en una ilustración de finales del siglo XV.

Martirio de San Simon

El Centro recordó que, “en aquellos tiempos, el libelo de sangre no sólo derivó en la tortura y ejecución de la comunidad judía local, sino que sus imágenes provocaron un aumento generalizado de la violencia antisemita en toda Europa. La representación de hoy del libelo de sangre por parte de Gasparro es aún más gráfica y seguramente se difundirá a través de las redes sociales ”.

Samuels argumentó que “la fecha de puesta en circulación de la pintura fue el 24 de marzo, tradicional 'Día de San Simonino',  la que iba a ser seguida de una conferencia programada para el 3 de abril, ahora pospuesta debido a la pandemia, sobre 'La invención del culpable y la ocultación de los inocentes.  El caso de San Simonino de Trento, orador: Don Francesco Ricossa, quien se dedica a difundir el libelo de sangre ”.

Este sitio web  abre con una plegaria: "Dios, restaurador de la inocencia, por cuyo nombre el bendito Simonino fue asesinado con una muy dura muerte por los pérfidos judíos ..."

La carta continuó:  "Su Eminencia, es muy inquietante que estos festivales y conferencias se celebren anualmente próximos a la Pascua Judía y la Pascua de Resurrección... El Concilio Vaticano II actuó para prohibir la veneración de Simón de Trento, con la intención de combatir el antisemitismo en la Iglesia.  Nostra Aetate también inició una largamente buscada relación sanadora entre la Cristiandad y el Judaísmo ".

El Centro agregó:   "Como saben, el 20 de enero, el Centro Wiesenthal se reunió en audiencia con el Santo Padre,  Papa Francisco, quien hizo una apasionada declaración condenando el antisemitismo".

"El trabajo de Gasparro  es  aparentemente bienvenido en las iglesias italianas, pero esta pintura claramente fomenta la búsqueda de chivos expiatorios en un clima recurrente de noticias falsas, socavando así la política del Vaticano, y debería recibir una condena pública directa ... Agradeceríamos la intervención de Su Eminencia ya que el libelo de sangre continúa sangrando!”  concluyó Samuels.

© EL PERFIL.com

Chile seeks to extradite NZ farmer Zach Ward for allegedly killing over 1500 calves

By John Anthony

A New Zealand dairy farmer faces possible extradition to Chile for allegedly brutally killing more than 1500 calves while working in the South American country.

Leyla Chahin Valenzuela, deputy prosecutor in Puerto Montt, said Zachary Reuben Ward was wanted for alleged crimes relating to the mistreatment of animals. A notice filed by Valenzuela with the Court of Appeal of Valdivia says "urgency is implicit" in getting New Zealand authorities to hand Ward over because he was considered a flight risk. She wants Ward held in custody in Chile before standing trial in Valdivia.

 

Ward left Chile in 2014 following the emergence of a video allegedly showing him slaughtering calves using a hammer, and by injecting air into them. The video, which emerged in 2014, was aired in New Zealand at the time, and Ward was named by TVNZ as the man clubbing a bobby calf to death. The video was taken on a farm in Chile owned by New Zealand company Manuka. A month before the video appeared Chilean authorities launched an investigation into Manuka for alleged animal abuse in killing 6000 calves unusable in the milk production process.

Manuka's head office is in Chile and in 2014 it owned 22,500 hectares in Chile with farms in Los Lagos and Los Ríos. Manuka director Steve Smith said Ward left the company in 2014. Ward is now the chief executive of New Zealand dairy company Canterbury Grasslands. The company has dairy farms in Canterbury, Southland and Missouri, United States. Ward has been approved for comment.

When Stuff phoned Grasslands' Canterbury office a man said the company's chairman and director Mark Townshend was the best person to comment. He would not provide contact details for Townshend. Townshend, who is a director of Manuka and a former Fonterra director, told media in 2014 he had sympathy for Ward because there was no vet available to give the animals the lethal injection required under Chile's rules.

Prominent New Zealand businessmen, former Fonterra chairman, Sir Henry van der Heyden is chairman of Manuka and personally holds a small shareholding in Grasslands. He is also a director and shareholder of Pascaro Investments, which owns 31 per cent of Grasslands, making it the company's biggest shareholder. Fonterra director Brent Goldsack is also a director of Grasslands as is former MediaWorks and NZX chief executive Mark Weldon. Van der Heyden, who is also Rabobank chairman, spoke at an Institute of Directors event in Hamilton in 2015 about his experience joining Manuka during the bobby calf issue.

The event synopsis said the animal welfare issue "threatened to undermine shareholder value".

 "Sir Henry will discuss how the board confronted and managed this issue, the responsibilities and risks a director needs to consider in a crisis, his views on how a board can best manage these events, and the learnings from this particular incident."

Bobby calf treatment has been the subject of debate in New Zealand in recent years, particularly in light of a 2015 animal abuse case which centered around a Te Kauwhata pet food company's treatment of bobby calves.

 Graphic footage emerged of bobby calves being picked up at farms and thrown on trucks, as well as being kicked and bludgeoned, and then being clubbed to death at an abattoir.

 Down Cow owner Alan Martyn Cleaver was sentenced to six months' community detention, 180 hours of community work and fined $ 90,000.

 In 2017 the number of bobby calves sent to slaughter fell, which some in the industry said was the result of farmers seeking to adopt more humane practices.

https://i.stuff.co.nz

«Genocida» y «pedófilo»: Colón, enemigo público número uno del revisionismo

Por Javier Ansorena

Una de las estrellas de la programación de comedia de este mes del superpoderoso Netflix en EE.UU. es «Latin History for Morons» (en español, «Historia latina para idiotas»). Es un espectáculo teatral escrito, dirigido y protagonizado por el actor John Leguizamo, que estuvo en las tablas de Broadway el invierno pasado y consiguió una nominación al Tony a la mejor obra del año. Una de estas actuaciones se grabó para un especial de la plataforma de vídeo digital.

Leguizamo es neoyorquino de origen puertorriqueño y colombiano. Su obra, a pesar del humor innegable, es una vuelta de tuerca más al revisionismo, la descontextualización, el complejo y el buenismo del discurso dominante en parte de la sociedad estadounidense sobre la colonización española y los abusos sobre la población indígena. En el relato de Leguizamo, los españoles son «comemierdas, lameculos, hijueputas» que «saquearon y violaron» en el «mayor robo de la historia». El enemigo favorito de Leguizamo es Cristóbal Colón. No ahorra los epítetos para el navegante que conectó a Europa y América: «violador genocida pedófilo», responsable del «Holocausto caribeño» y «el Donald Trump del Nuevo Mundo».

El Columbus Day

El especial de Netflix se ha estrenado el mismo mes en el que Los Ángeles decidía quitar una estatua de Colón de uno de los parques de la ciudad. Todo, pocas semanas después de que muchas ciudades y condados de EE.UU. suprimieran Columbus Day, un festivo en todo el país desde principios del siglo XX en coincidencia con el 12 de octubre, y lo reemplazaran por el Día de los Pueblos Indígenas. En EE.UU., el revisionismo histórico es una tendencia en alza en organizaciones indigenistas, en el discurso de la corrección política del progresismo estadounidense y hasta en el mundo del entretenimiento

«Colón fue responsable de atrocidades y sus acciones pusieron en marcha el mayor genocidio de la historia conocida. Su imagen no debería celebrarse en ningún sitio», aseguró Mitch O’Farrell, el concejal de Los Ángeles que impulsó la eliminación de la estatua, con un discurso desmentido por buena parte de la historiografía. Buena parte de la universidad estadounidense está también dominada por este mensaje. Una fecha clave fue la publicación en 1980 de «Una historia del pueblo de EE.UU», de Howard Zinn –Leguizamo lo muestra al público desde el escenario como un texto revelado–, que reduce la colonización al exterminio de los indígenas. «Es un libro que saca relatos históricos fuera de contexto y que ha calado en nuestra universidad», critica James McCusker, presidente de la Asociación Nacional de Cristóbal Colón de EE.UU. «Ese discurso se ha propagado en los departamentos de historia y se ha trasmitido a los estudiantes y a quienes enseñan».

Fray Junípero Serra

Este mismo año, la universidad de Stanford, una de las más prestigiosas del país, decidió eliminar el nombre de Fray Juníspero Serra, el franciscano que en el siglo XVIII articuló el sistema de misiones que dio lugar a la actual California, de calles y edificios del campus. Entre las razones que esgrimió la comisión nombrada por el rector para decidir sobre el asunto está «el dolor, el trauma, el daño emocional y el perjuicio a la salud mental» que los estudiantes y profesores nativos americanos –algunos tan alejados de California como Canadá o Hawaii– sufren al encontrarse con una calle dedicada a Serra, al que el Papa Francisco canonizó en 2015, entre otras razones, «por defender la dignidad de la comunidad nativa y protegerla de aquellos que la maltrataron y abusaron».

Es imposible encontrar una única razón para explicar el porqué de esta corriente en EE.UU. «Los blancos, si son decentes y si admiten la realidad de la historia del país, sienten la culpa de la esclavitud de los negros y del exterminio de los nativos. Es lógico que intenten expresar y compensar esa vergüenza», asegura Felipe Fernández-Armesto, profesor en la Universidad de Notre Dame y una eminencia en la figura de Colón y en las contribuciones hispanas a la formación de EE.UU. En su opinión, Colón es un chivo expiatorio perfecto «por ser extranjero, por supuesto». Su figura buscó ser apropiada por todos: italianos, judíos y hasta escoceses, pero cada vez se le asocia menos con la formación de EE.UU.

«Se puede purgar la culpa histórica de las injusticias imperiales regañando a Colón, sin el inconveniente de admitir los excesos de los compatriotas y familiares, que fueron los auténticos autores de genocidios y esclavitudes». «Se toman los valores de hoy en día y se trata de juzgar con su luz a los héroes del pasado», critica McCusker, que ve como principal problema «la falta de conocimiento histórico» cuando se juzga a personajes como Colón. «Es ante todo ignorancia», insiste en esa línea el periodista y profesor universitario Miguel Pérez, de la Universidad de la Ciudad de Nueva York, de origen cubano y dedicado a enseñar el papel indiscutible de los hispanos en la creación y configuración de EE.UU.

¿Qué intereses hay detrás de este fenómeno, quién lo promueve? «Se trata más bien de la falta de voces en contra», responde Fernández-Armesto. «Stanford es una universidad sometida a valores comerciales: responde a la demanda del mercado; los municipios que derrumban estatuas siguen otro tipo de negocio: el de acumular votos». «Pero también hay una intención de hacer desaparecer las contribuciones hispanas a ello», apunta Miguel Pérez sobre el revisionismo. Leguizamo lamenta en varios pasajes de su espectáculo la inexistencia de héroes latinos, su ausencia en los libros de texto que estudia su hijo, el borrado de un pueblo desde la caída del imperio azteca hasta nuestros días. En su particular cacao histórico, denigra a Hernán Cortés y Francisco Pizarro, y ensalza a Simón Bolívar; cita de pasada como héroe a Bernardo de Gálvez, una figura decisiva en la revolución estadounidense, pero no menciona que era el gobernador español en Luisiana.

Para Pérez, Leguizamo y los hispanos que aplauden cuando se derriba una estatua no son conscientes de que su discurso solo contribuye a enterrar todavía más una identidad –la lengua compartida, la cultura, la gastronomía– y una historia –tan heroica y violenta como cualquier otra– todavía muy poco celebrada y reconocida en EE.UU.

Tras Los Ángeles, ataque en La Paz

El presidente de Bolivia, Evo Morales, se apresuró esta semana a celebrar la retirada de la estatua de Colón en Los Ángeles. «Saludamos al hermano concejal de Los Ángeles, Mitch O’Farrell, descendiente de la tribu Wyandotte de Oklahoma», dijo en un mensaje en Twitter. «Coincidimos con él en que el llamado Descubrimiento fue un genocidio y un saqueo de recursos naturales», añadió. Dos días después, la estatua de Colón en el Paseo del Prado, una de las arterias principales de la capital boliviana, fue víctima del vandalismo. El monumento apareció con manchas de pintura roja y negra y con carteles en los que se leía «Colón genocida», «Nos mataron», «Fue invasión» o «Saquen a Colón». La alcaldía de La Paz aseguró que se limpiaría el monumento, pero añadió que sufrió el ataque «por ser considerado el colonizador y opresor de los habitantes de América».

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Norway Olympic ski team under fire for sweater’s symbol used by Nazi Germany

By Katie Dangerfield
National Online Journalist,
Breaking News
Global News


The black and grey sweaters feature a symbol known as the Tyr rune, representing the team’s theme for the Olympics, “the Attacking Viking.” The symbol is associated with Viking and Norse mythology and stands for heroic glory.

But the symbol has also been hijacked by extreme right-wing groups. For example, Tyr was also the official emblem for Adolf Hitler’s leadership school in Nazi Germany.

Since the Second World War, neo-Nazis and other white supremacists continued to use the Tyr symbol — its popularity in part stems from the fact that it is considered by many to be the “warrior rune,” according to the Anti-Defamation League (ADL).

Norway’s security police have warned of the rise of a small but politically extreme and potentially violent neo-Nazo group called the Nordic Resistance Movement, which uses the Tyr rune in its branding, according to the New York Times.

Company will not remove sweaters
Despite the controversy, the manufacturer of the sweater, Dale of Norway, is continuing to sell the sweater. It is being sold for C$279 on the company’s website, and is described as a “Viking concept” with bold patterns that includes “runic symbols for victory and protection.”

Hilde Midthjell, Dale of Norway’s CEO, told the New York Times, she is frustrated and disappointed over the situation and has “vowed to face down any attempts by white supremacists to co-opt symbols that belonged to a shared Norwegian heritage.”
“Neo-Nazis have marched with Norwegian flags,” she said. “That does not mean we stop using that, does it?”

The design is still the downhill ski team’s official sweater for the 2017-2018 season. But several members of the Alpine team told the New York Times they will no longer be wearing the sweater during the games in South Korea.

Muere Salvador Borrego, revisionista histórico de habla hispana

Ayer día 8 fallecía a los 102 años de edad, el escritor y periodista mejicano Salvador Borrego Escalante.

Fue director de 37 periódicos y fundador de varios de ellos. Publicó 50 libros de diversa temática como historia militar, política, economía, sociología, periodismo, filosofía y religión.

Borrego sería constantemente acusado de presunto antisemitismo debido a sus críticas a la ideología judía internacional, a quien señalaba como causante de la Segunda Guerra Mundial.

Junto al español Joaquín Bochaca, fue considerado hasta su muerte como uno de los máximos representantes del revisionismo histórico de habla hispana.

J. Garrido