Category Archives: racism

Nevada Death-Row Prisoner Released on Plea Deal After Medical Evidence Suggests No Crime Occurred | Death Penalty Information Center

Ha’im Al Matin Sharif, formerly known as Charles Robins, has been released from Nevada’s death row, nearly 30 years after he was convicted of killing his girlfriend’s 11-month-old daughter, after medical evidence revealed that the baby died from infantile scurvy, rather than from physical abuse. Prosecutors agreed to amend the charges against Sharif and release him on time served after a prosecution doctor confirmed that Brittany Smith actually died of Barlow’s disease, a form of scurvy affecting infants. The child’s autopsy showed broken bones and hemorrhages, a local medical examiner listed the cause of death as blunt force trauma, and Las Vegas police accused Sharif of torturing her. “I was confused as to the nature of the injuries they described, because I had done nothing,” Sharif said. The child’s mother initially told police that Sharif was not abusive, but then testified against him. She later recanted her testimony and told Sharif’s appellate attorney that police had coerced her into providing false testimony implicating Sharif by threatening to take her other children away. During Sharif’s appeals, medical experts who reviewed the baby’s X-rays to rule out disease as the cause of death said the injuries were likely caused by scurvy.

Source: Nevada Death-Row Prisoner Released on Plea Deal After Medical Evidence Suggests No Crime Occurred | Death Penalty Information Center

Israel’s national wound that cannot heal | +972 Magazine

On Wednesday of this week, Amram will hold a demonstration in Jerusalem, which will focus on three demands: first, that the state formally recognize that kidnappings indeed took place, apologize to the families and the children, and hold an annual day of recognition to mark the affair. Secondly, the activists demand that the state invest the necessary resources to unite the families who were torn apart. Amram has already succeeded — through D.N.A. tests, perusing adoption files, and public activism — to unite two families with children who were kidnapped and given up for adoption. There is no doubt that the state, with all its resources, will be able to do more. And lastly, Amram demands the state retroactively acquit Rabbi Uzi Meshulam, who was sentenced to six years after being convicted of violent offenses as part of his struggle to raise awareness over the affair.

Source: Israel’s national wound that cannot heal | +972 Magazine

Finsbury Park Mosque attacker, identified as Darren Osborne, 47, being held for terrorism, attempted murder – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Mr Aidroos said he had helped tackle and detain the driver while other witnesses said an imam stepped in to ensure the man was not harmed.”We found that a group of people quickly started to collect around him, around the assailant and some tried to hit him either with kicks or punches,” imam Mohammed Mahmoud said.”By God’s grace we managed to surround him and to protect him from any harm.”One official said the Muslim cleric’s “bravery and courage” possibly saved the man’s life.

Source: Finsbury Park Mosque attacker, identified as Darren Osborne, 47, being held for terrorism, attempted murder – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

The Real Reason Senator Kamala Harris Made AG Jeff Sessions “Nervous” | Dame Magazine

What we saw during that exchange between Sen. Harris and the good ole boys, was White fragility personified. You see, most White people live in environments where they are shielded from race-based stress. They’re not used to be challenged by people of color. And so when they are confronted, they get triggered, defensive, hostile, guilty, fearful.It’s not hard to read these hearings in the context of an overwhelming fear of Black bodies, along with the paranoia of Sen. Harris’s clear authority as she refused to let Sessions filibuster through, taking up all of her time with his rambling non-answers. Viewed against the historical backdrop of anti-Black racism, it’s easy to see how low they’ll go when their White male dominance is challenged in any way—even by a Black person working strictly within the rules and policies of the machine that they created and control. It is no wonder they’re nervous: their undeserved power and unearned advantages are on life support.

Source: The Real Reason Senator Kamala Harris Made AG Jeff Sessions “Nervous” | Dame Magazine

Bigoted Homophobe Steve Scalise’s Life Was Saved by a Queer Black Woman 

Scalise has also been described as one of the most anti-LGBTQ politicians in Washington. He’s voted against LBGTQ rights over and over again. He also authored Louisiana’s ban on same-sex marriage. Like many of his ilk, he said he was only trying to protect “traditional” marriage. So it is a point of especially delicious irony that Scalise, who survived the attack (and is reportedly in critical condition), may owe his life to a queer black woman.Crystal Griner, a Capitol Police officer, was one of two special agents on Scalise’s security detail yesterday who helped take down shooter John Hodgkinson. People at the scene said that the two officers prevented an all-out “massacre” on the field that day, engaging in a firefight with Hodgkinson before killing him.

Source: Bigoted Homophobe Steve Scalise’s Life Was Saved by a Queer Black Woman 

Whitewashing by brown hands – sister-hood magazine. A Fuuse production by Deeyah Khan.

Kendall Jenner on the cover of Vogue India’s tenth anniversary edition is the tip of the iceberg. There are more disturbing goings-on in India and colourisation. The colour-struck media industry is seeking to destroy the idea that brown skin is beautiful by integrating more foreign actresses who have only the skill of light skin, through promoting skin whitening creams via Bollywood heavyweights and devoting entire shows to the idea that nobody would ever consider a darker skinned girl beautiful.Before we can confidently wage war on the lack of diversity in Western countries, we must work together to ensure that brown countries aren’t the first to jump at the chance to wash out brown beauty and talent.

Source: Whitewashing by brown hands – sister-hood magazine. A Fuuse production by Deeyah Khan.

We Don’t Need Megyn Kelly To Shine a Light On a Dumpster Fire | Dame Magazine

The way Jones sees it, shadowy groups within the U.S. government orchestrated—or at least refrained from preventing—the 9/11 attacks, the Boston Marathon massacre, the bombing of Oklahoma City’s Murrah federal building, and the mass shootings in Aurora, Colorado, and at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut. He has even suggested that President Obama was responsible for the 2013 Oklahoma tornado outbreak. When Jared Lee Loughner went on his January 2011 rampage in Tucson, killing six people and severely wounding U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), Jones told Rolling Stone: “This whole thing stinks to high heaven. … My gut tells me this was a staged mind-control operation. The government employs geometric psychological-warfare experts that know exactly how to indirectly manipulate unstable people through the media.”Kelly’s assertion that many don’t know him is probably true. He only has around 600,000 followers on Twitter (though that number will likely jump post NBC interview). And even though that may be true it is irrelevant. In fact, it is actually a good thing.Shining a light? Honestly, Kelly missed the boat on that one. Jones has been outed, debunked, marginalized, and ridiculed into relative silence. And anyway, according to Jones’s divorce lawyer the Alex Jones on Infowars is just a persona, a character:

Source: We Don’t Need Megyn Kelly To Shine a Light On a Dumpster Fire | Dame Magazine

Kansas man indicted on hate crime charges for killing Indian national | US news | The Guardian

A man accused in a bar shooting in suburban Kansas City that left one Indian national dead and another wounded was indicted by a federal grand jury on hate crime charges, the US justice department announced Friday. The indictment against Adam Purinton, 52, comes after a 22 February shooting at Austin’s Bar and Grill in Olathe, Kansas. Witnesses have said Purinton, who is white, yelled “get out of my country” at two 32-year-old Indian nationals, Srinivas Kuchibhotla and Alok Madasani, before he began shooting. Kuchibhotla died and Madasani was injured. A third man, Ian Grillot, was wounded when he tried to intervene.The shooting raised fears of more attacks on immigrants following Donald Trump’s election and his push for a ban on immigrants from some countries. Officials in India also expressed concern about their citizens’ safety in the US, where many work.An affidavit released in March said Madasani told detectives that the gunman asked if their “status was legal” before he opened fire.

Source: Kansas man indicted on hate crime charges for killing Indian national | US news | The Guardian

When Did Running for Office Become So Dangerous? | Dame Magazine

the 12th (death threat), well, that’s the one that changes your life; it’s the picture of your home or your office, it’s the one with white powder in the envelope, it’s the one that mentions the hair color of your teenage daughter, or with screencaps of your teenage son’s Snapchats. It comes from a person who is really committed to fucking with you, the kind of crazy person you imagined was behind the first threat you ever received, it’s the one that makes the jaw of the cop who responds to your freaked-out call tighten as he tried to keep his poker face but you can tell he’s worried. It’s the one that makes you take an unscheduled vacation, or break your lease, or drop out of your political race or stop writing on the internet for a while; it’s the one that makes you question whether you should’ve been so sanguine about numbers one through 11, because maybe they’re more realistic than they sounded at the time.They’re the kind of threats that upend the basis of our democracy and our society, by silencing and scaring away and driving out everyone but  the people who would never be silent or scared, no matter how realistic the risk—and, goodness knows, having rational actors who think through risk and reward is reasonably important in government—and by driving out the people more likely to receive the more serious threats. They’re the kind of threats that true public servants, even those who benefit, ought to condemn and discourage, not dismiss and ignore.Or else, you’re essentially guaranteeing that there will be more. And, with 2018 coming, there probably will be.

Source: When Did Running for Office Become So Dangerous? | Dame Magazine

Oldest Fossils of Homo Sapiens Found in Morocco, Altering History of Our Species – The New York Times – “Racism reigns in science and non-reporting! Desire to whiten or de-Ethiopianize single source of modern humans is huge! Last week, reports supposedly pointed to Eastern Europe as being a source of early humans, now Morocco… All the research really means is that researchers are finding more specimens that date back further than before. Findings do not say Ethiopia not source of modern humans or that there are multiple sources. DNA research point to single source not multiple sources – duh? Racism and desire to be top dog researcher are too strong for reporting facts.”

“We did not evolve from a single cradle of mankind somewhere in East Africa,” said Phillipp Gunz, a paleoanthropologist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Liepzig, Germany, and a co-author of two new studies on the fossils, published in the journal Nature.