Speaking Out on the Issue of "Rape"

The rape that occurred in the city of Richmond is a wake up call to society as a whole. The fact that there were at least 20 bystanders watching and laughing while this 15-year-old girl was getting assaulted at her homecoming dance is pitiful.
It is a call to the Richmond Unified School District as well as to all school districts that rape is not just a problem that happens on college campuses. It happens to high school students and to students who are still in middle schools and even elementary schools. I have no doubt in my mind that these children had the worst sexual education a school could give. The best way to make students aware of sex, rape, and other issues is not to keep silent. The best ways to address these issues is to speak about it.

All too often issues like rape are kept secret while children are struggling to understand and trying to grapple with the thoughts or experiences that they are going through. I blame these rapes on the adults in our society.
I began to understand how crucial sex education is after watching the documentary, No! It was a documentary by Aisha Simmons who was a rape and incest survivor. The documentary confronted rape in the black community and the stigma that was associated with victims of rape crimes. The statistics stated that one in three women would be sexually assaulted in her lifetime. The documentary also brought to light that people of the same race as the victim commit rapes and the victims are usually silent.

Rape survivors and activists were the main people who were interviewed in the documentary so they were able to offer a framework behind why rape happens. One of the women said that rape is a “community based issue.” The fact is that children that commit acts of rape know very little about sex. And most of these children and minors have misconstrued assumptions about a female’s right to say no.

“Why are we silent about one of the most barbaric, intensely painful, ultimately destructive acts that any community can endure?” Asked Johnetta B. Cole, Ph.D, and former president at the Bennett College for Women in North Carolina.
According to the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network (RAINN) 44% of rapes happen to minors.
The fact that most rapes go unreported does not mean that the victim’s suffering do not exist. The psychological effects of rape are real and they need to be addressed because victims of rape are three times more likely to suffer from depression and are 13 times more likely to abuse alcohol.

What we need is visible support in our communities. Rape awareness needs to be advocated more in sexual education classes and sexual education needs to be addressed in the home. While rape and sex may be very uncomfortable things to talk about they need to be addressed or we are going to have a generation of youngsters who know nothing about sex or rape and despite their ignorance they are still going to be pressured by obscene images on the television screen.

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NY Fed stays undiversified...possibly more corrupt

Op-Ed

By Crystal Carter and The GreenLining Institute

Our economy collapsed because of corporate greed and malfeasance and we have just added two more greedy moguls to the mix. The New York Fed, an institution that is supposed to pursue maximum employment and to “support financial stability in the U.S. and abroad,” just named Jeffrey Kindler and James Tisch to fill their public interest positions. These two men had an estimated compensation of over $22 million dollars for the year of 2008; all while the people living at or under the poverty level was 37.3 million in 2007.

If success was measured by how much money you had then these men are successful but one must wonder why the Fed couldn’t find more qualified directors especially in light of the fact that communities of color have been hardest hit by the current economic crisis. For instance, while the national unemployment rate is 9.7 percent, African-American unemployment is 15 percent and Hispanic unemployment is at 13 percent, stated Chairman Edolphus Towns at a recent House Oversight and Government Reform meeting. With the addition of these two directors, there are only white board members and only one woman on this board.

We call on President Obama and his constituents to investigate this appointment, especially considering the controversial pasts of the New York Fed. Witnessing the resignation of Stephen Friedman because of a conflict of interest with Goldman Sachs, which he owned in the nineties. Also AIG awarding highly inappropriate bonuses to its executives after receiving over $180 billion in government bailout money is a wake up call that the NY Fed needs a lot of alterations.

Pfizer, under CEO Jefrrey Kindler, has a net income of $8.1 billion as of 2008. While receiving a 100% on the corporate equality index it has spent a lot of its earnings bribing people. This company has been sued at least four times in the past decade for off-label promotional practices and fraudulent promotion and bribery by paying medical providers to promote drugs for uses not approved by the Food and Drug Administration.

Loew’s Corporation’s President and chief executive officer, Tisch is busy pouring all of his company’s money into cigarette companys is in it for the money and obviously not about the American people’s health.

In addition, the Fed should adopt strict new rules that more adequately define the public interest that includes somebody with a proven track record of standing up for consumers’ and not on its own need to make a quick profit.

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