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‘BASICALLY CYBERBULLYING’: HOW COPS ABUSE SOCIAL MEDIA TO PUBLICLY HUMILIATE

Police departments have said that maintaining a presence on social media and direct engagement with the community builds trust and leads to arrests of people with outstanding warrants by soliciting crime tips. But a trend has emerged on social media accounts run by law enforcement: a hypermalicious form of voyeurism and public humiliation targeting people who have been arrested or just suspected of a crime. Critics argue that this form of “engagement” does not reduce recidivism and can often do more harm than good.

The Mobile County sheriff’s office deleted the post, telling a local NBC affiliate it had received threats to deputies’ safety. But despite the outcry, the office has continued the “Thug Thursday” Facebook series at the request of its followers, said Lori Myles, spokesperson for the sheriff’s office. 

“Our goal is making the arrest and getting that criminal off the street,” Myles said. “We use the definition of THUG as what is in the dictionary…a criminal.”

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NYU prof: What if White Americans’ taxes were investigated for ties to slavery?

A New York University professor suggested that White people should be forced to submit their taxes to be checked for ties to slavery.

On Nov. 18, the University of California-Berkeley hosted a panel titled “The Future of Freedom: Reparations after 400 Years.” The goal of the panel was to “consider what the question of reparations means for this freedom’s fulfillment and what kind of future could follow for African-Americans beyond 400,” according to the video description. 

The panel consisted of professors Bertrall Ross and Jovan Scott Lewis, both of UC-Berkeley; Katherine Franke of Columbia Law School, and Michael Ralph of New York University.

Each professor provided past examples of reparations given to marginalized people, and said these could be examples of how to pay reparations to African Americans for 400 years of “systemic and violent racism.” 

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Biden COVID Advisor Urges More “Genomic Surveillance” Necessary To Stop Mutant COVID Strains

With December on track to be the deadliest month for the virus since the outbreak began (more than 63K people have died in the US so far this month), Dr. Fauci and others have been in the press constantly warning that the situation is on track to worsen in January and February.

And on Monday, he was joined by Dr. Celine Gounder, a clinical assistant professor of medicine and infectious diseases at NYU’s Grossman School of Medicine and member of Biden’s COVID task force, who reiterated Dr. Fauci’s warnings about already-overwhelmed hospitals being poorly equipped to handle the next wave of patients.

But while the MSM focused on remarks about President Biden likely invoking the Defense Production Act to try to ensure the US catches up to its lofty vaccination targets (we’re already about 18MM behind the OWS target of 20MM doses by year’s-end), Dr. Gounder added an off-hand line about the need for using “genomic surveillance” to track mutations like the B.1.1.7 mutated “variant” that has been making headlines for the past week or so.

“We’re also going to see an increase in genomic surveillance which is where you track the changes in…virus genetic materials…we can do that…we have the technology…we just chose not to spend the money on public health surveillance…”

Offering up some math to demonstrate why the US needs to dramatically ramp up the pace of vaccinations if it wants to reach whatever the new herd immunity threshold is, Dr. Gounder insisted there is “no question” about another surge due to the number of people traveling during the holiday.

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Camper Recounts Abuse at Warnock Church Camp

Among the indignities 12-year-old Anthony Washington endured at the church camp overseen by Reverend Raphael Warnock: counselors who tossed urine on him and locked him outside his cabin overnight.

Washington, now 30, recounted the events in an interview with the Washington Free Beacon and said his experience at the camp resulted in a 2003 lawsuitthat ended two years later, when Washington says he and his family received a large financial settlement.

Washington’s account of the 2002 events provides the first direct insight into the alleged abuse and neglect that transpired at Camp Farthest Out, which Warnock oversaw as senior pastor of Maryland’s Douglas Memorial Community church, and raises new questions for the Democrat, who is currently vying for a Senate seat in Georgia.

Washington expressed surprise when he was told Warnock is currently running for U.S. Senate in Georgia. “I don’t think nobody like [Warnock] should be running for damn Senate nowhere, running a camp like that,” he told the Free Beacon. “He should not be running for government.”

Warnock has faced scrutiny over his 2002 arrest for allegedly obstructing a child abuse investigation by Maryland State Police that centered on the camp’s treatment of children. Washington’s account is buttressed by records from the Maryland Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, obtained by the Free Beacon earlier this month, which indicated that campers were routinely left unsupervised; staffers were not subject to required criminal background check; and at least five cases of child abuse or neglect were brought against the camp’s director, who was ultimately forced to resign.

Warnock served as senior pastor at Baltimore’s Douglas Memorial Community Church from 2001 until around 2005. His job included overseeing the expansion of the church’s sleepaway camp, Camp Farthest Out, which served inner city children. Warnock’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

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University Claims Words ‘Picnic,’ ‘Brown Bag’ Are Offensive

The University of Michigan has a “Words Matter Task Force.”

Seriously. Maybe that’s why out-of-state tuition costs more than $66,000 a year.

The WMTF, set up by the school’s Information and Technology Services (ITS) department, has declared that it finds more than two dozen words and phrases possibly offensive to people, including “picnic,” “brown bag” and “blacklist.”

“To effectively communicate with customers, it is important for ITS to evaluate the terms and language conventions that may hinder effective communication, harm morale, and deliberately or inadvertently exclude people from feeling accepted to foment a healthy and inclusive culture,” the task force said in a memo.

The WMTF offers alternative words to use, for instance urging people to say “gathering” instead of “picnic” and “lunch and learn” instead of “brown bag.”

“The word ‘picnic’ appears to be banned because of false suggestions on the internet that it originates from the racist, extrajudicial killings of African Americans,” the Daily Mail reported. “The word picnic actually comes from the 17th century French word ‘pique-nique,’ a term used to describe a social gathering in which attendees each contributed with a portion of food.”

In July, the Reuters News Agency published a piece headlined: “Fact check: The word picnic does not originate from racist lynchings.”

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Disabled child removed by police from AMC theater for failing to wear a mask

A video recorded in Jacksonville, N.C. appears to show the manager of an AMC movie theater refusing to allow a reportedly disabled child from entering the theater without a mask, and calling the police to escort her distraught family from the scene.

The child, who was in a stroller at the time of the incident, is reportedly non-verbal and has a condition that precludes her use of a mask or face shield. The child’s family members were all wearing masks.

Police officers were ultimately asked to escort the upset family from the theater. 

The Jacksonville, N.C. Police Department and the AMC Theatres chain did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Public health policy surrounding the use of masks on toddlers and children has become a subject of controversy over the last several months. Throughout the pandemic, there have been countless stories of families being thrown off flights or having flights canceled altogether because a baby was failing to don the required facial covering.

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More than 1.5 billion masks believed to have entered oceans in 2020

For months, we’ve seen face masks in places they shouldn’t be: storm drains, streets, beaches, and parks.

Now, we’re learning just how many could be flooding our oceans.

“Once plastic enters the marine environment, it’s very difficult to move,” said Dr. Teale Phelps Bondaroff, director of research for OceansAsia.

The marine conservation group has been tracking the number of face masks washing up on a remote island south of Hong Kong since the pandemic started.

“About six weeks after COVID hit Hong Kong, so late February, we began finding masks, and lots of masks,” said Bondaroff. “What’s remarkable is we weren’t finding face masks before COVID.”

Masks are made with polypropylene, which Bondaroff describes as thin fibers of plastic.

“The fact that we are starting to find masks that are breaking up indicates that this is a real problem, that microplastics are being produced by masks,” he said.

These tiny pieces of plastic can remain in the ocean for hundreds of years, threatening fish and even polluting the air.

“The question that we couldn’t answer was how many are entering our oceans? We just didn’t know,” said Dr. Bondaroff.

OceansAsia launched a study to find the answer and recently shared its findings.

Of the estimated 52 billion masks manufactured globally in 2020, it’s believed 1.56 billion will enter our oceans this year, resulting in an additional 4,680 to 6,240 metric tonnes of marine plastic pollution

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