Volleyball coach says her home was shot at after speaking out against trans athletes | Daily Mail Online

Former San Jose State volleyball coach Melissa Batie-Smoose claims her home in California was shot at this week – three months after she was suspended in the wake of her complaint about transgender player Blaire Fleming.

Batie-Smoose, who served as an assistant for the Spartans’ women’s volleyball team before receiving her suspension, previously filed a Title IX complaint against the program over Fleming, whose inclusion on the team sparked outrage last year.

She is also a plaintiff in a lawsuit against SJSU and the Mountain West Conference along with 11 players, which includes some of Fleming’s ex-teammates.

Batie-Smoose revealed that the shooting took place while she was discussing the legal battle and the NCAA’s new policy on gender eligibility in a virtual meeting with members of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports.

When asked on Fox News if she thinks the shooting was linked to her lawsuits involving SJSU and Fleming, Batie-Smoose said: ‘I do.’

She then continued: ‘It can’t be a coincidence. I have never had this happen and in our neighborhood I talked to neighbors that have lived there over 10 years and not even a robber in the area, let alone someone shooting at someone in their house.’

Source: Volleyball coach says her home was shot at after speaking out against trans athletes | Daily Mail Online

New report: Gun boom threatens community safety in Australia – Gun Control Australia

Australia is awash with over four million legally owned guns, many of them kept in homes in our metropolitan and suburban areas.

Disturbing new Australia Institute research has found, despite gun reforms after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, Australia now harbours even more guns than before this tragic event.

A representative poll late last year found 70% of Australians want gun laws to make it much harder to access a gun.

This included most voters for all political parties and people living in metropolitan, regional and rural Australia.

Although Australia has been a global leader in gun control, we cannot afford to be complacent.

Our gun laws are not keeping up with weapon advancements, which is putting our community at increasing risk.

Source: New report: Gun boom threatens community safety in Australia – Gun Control Australia

CALL FOR A GLOBAL ACTION OF SUPPORT FOR UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, Ms Reem Alsalem

CALL FOR A GLOBAL ACTION OF SUPPORT FOR UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, Ms Reem Alsalem

We would like to express our deepest gratitude for the excellent and path-breaking work carried out by Ms Reem Alsalem, during her current mandate as a Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls. It is utterly important that the position of the Special Rapporteur on a matter as crucial as male violence against women and girls is held by someone with both merits and bravery, and with the highest possible authority and standards of integrity.

Women’s organisations all over the world follow Ms Alsalem’s work and we are deeply concerned by the smear campaigns and unfounded attacks against her and her work that have recently escalated due to Ms Alsalem’s unwavering commitment to women’s human rights and her independent and objective presentations on all forms of violence against women and girls. These campaigns and attacks are only a proof that Ms. Alsalem has exposed the hard truth of the systems that normalise and justify violence against women.

With this letter we want to express our strong support for Reem Alsalem’s extremely important work. We call for a global support action to Ms Reem Alsalem by joining forces with her and supporting her mandate and independent work, sharing her reports and her coverage of critical issues and her recommendations for stopping the ever growing endemic of violence targeting women.

Source: CALL FOR A GLOBAL ACTION OF SUPPORT FOR UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and Girls, Ms Reem Alsalem

NORWAY: Trans-Identified Male Convicted of Murdering Female Partner with Baseball Bat Receives Reduced Sentence – Reduxx

A trans-identified male in Norway recently convicted of beating his female partner to death with a baseball bat has had his sentence reduced on appeal. Despite the crime being committed by a male, the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (NRK), which is subsidized by the government, has described the killer as a “woman.”

On the evening of November 27, 2023, a 22 year-old female who went by the name Oliver Ravn Rønning was beaten to death with a baseball bat at her apartment in Porsgrunn, which she had just moved into days before with her partner after having met via an LGBT dating app that summer. Rønning is a female who identifies as a man, while her partner, who Reduxx will refer to as Jonas, is a 19 year-old male who identifies as a woman.

Source: NORWAY: Trans-Identified Male Convicted of Murdering Female Partner with Baseball Bat Receives Reduced Sentence – Reduxx

Women kept as slaves on HUMAN egg farm: 100 victims are fed hormones and treated like cattle, with eggs removed and sold each month by gangsters | Daily Mail Online

Around 100 women were kept as slaves on a human egg farm in Georgia where they were fed hormones and treated like cattle.

Their horrifying ordeal has been revealed by three Thai women who were freed from the clutches of the ‘egg mafia’ on January 30 after being exploited for half a year, tabloid Bild reports.

The woman said they were held captive on a ‘human farm’ in the eastern European country of Georgia by a criminal organisation led by Chinese criminals, who sold their eggs on the black market.

One former slave who worked on the egg cell farm bought her freedom and alerted Pavena Hongsakula, founder of a Thai foundation for children and women.

The woman told Ms Pavena that several other Thai women were still held as slaves at the farm as they could not afford to pay for their release.

The eggs collected from the women are understood to have been sold, trafficked in other countries for use in in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), Ms Pavena said at this week’s press conference, according to the Bangkok Post.

Source: Women kept as slaves on HUMAN egg farm: 100 victims are fed hormones and treated like cattle, with eggs removed and sold each month by gangsters | Daily Mail Online

Statement of ICC Prosecutor Karim A.A. Khan KC: Applications for arrest warrants in the situation in Afghanistan | International Criminal Court

After a thorough investigation and on the basis of evidence collected, my Office submits that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the Supreme Leader of the Taliban, Haibatullah AKHUNDZADA, and the Chief Justice of the “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan”, Abdul Hakim HAQQANI, bear criminal responsibility for the crime against humanity of persecution on gender grounds, under article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute.

My Office has concluded that these two Afghan nationals are criminally responsible for persecuting Afghan girls and women, as well as persons whom the Taliban perceived as not conforming with their ideological expectations of gender identity or expression, and persons whom the Taliban perceived as allies of girls and women. This persecution was committed from at least 15 August 2021 until the present day, across the territory of Afghanistan.

This ongoing persecution entails numerous severe deprivations of victims’ fundamental rights, contrary to international law, including the right to physical integrity and autonomy, to free movement and free expression, to education, to private and family life, and to free assembly.

These are the first applications for arrest warrants in the Situation in Afghanistan. My Office will file further applications for other senior members of the Taliban soon.

These applications recognise that Afghan women and girls as well as the LGBTQI+ community are facing an unprecedented, unconscionable and ongoing persecution by the Taliban. Our action signals that the status quo for women and girls in Afghanistan is not acceptable. Afghan survivors, in particular women and girls, deserve accountability before a court of law.

Source: Statement of ICC Prosecutor Karim A.A. Khan KC: Applications for arrest warrants in the situation in Afghanistan | International Criminal Court

ICC chief prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Taliban leaders over persecution of women | Taliban | The Guardian

The international criminal court’s chief prosecutor has requested arrest warrants for the Taliban’s supreme leader and Afghanistan’s chief justice on the grounds that their persecution of women and girls in Afghanistan is a crime against humanity.

It marks the first time the prosecutor has built a case around systemic crimes against women and girls, legal experts say. It is also a rare moment of vindication for Afghan activists, who over the last three years have often felt abandoned by the international community even as Taliban oppression deepened.

Since sweeping back to power in 2021, the Taliban have issued more than 80 decrees that violate women’s basic rights. Women are barred from most work, secondary education and public spaces, and their daily life is restricted in various ways.

Recently the group banned windows in rooms frequently used by women, to ensure they could not be seen by men not related to them. New buildings should be constructed without windows in these rooms and existing windows should be covered up, the order stipulated.

Activists are campaigning for the crime of gender apartheid to be recognised under international law, to reflect the scale of Taliban restrictions.

Source: ICC chief prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Taliban leaders over persecution of women | Taliban | The Guardian

#BoycottAfghanistan – Campaign Club

Women can’t look out windows or talk to each other, while men get to travel the world and play sport. What kind of planet is this?

PLEASE SHARE THE PETITION
Use #BoycottAfghanistan on social media to find your friends, and local activism.

Women’s cricket in Afghanistan has effectively been outlawed since the Taliban’s return to power in 2021. Further restrictions have included banning the sound of women’s voices from being heard in public.

Source: (1) #BoycottAfghanistan – Campaign Club

Friday essay: are wars and violence inevitable, or is there another way to live? | The Conversation

Most of us want to live in peace and safety. Yet violence is in epic proportions, particularly towards women and children.

Every day, a new atrocity blares from the radio or across huge screens in gyms, railway stations and homes, causing widespread fear, feelings of powerlessness, and despair.

Is this violence just human nature, and inevitable?

Politicians repeatedly urge us to “change the culture” of violence. But what exactly does this mean? How can it be achieved? And don’t governments send mixed messages when they spend far more on nuclear submarines, weapons and fighter planes than on violence prevention?

In 2016, actor Matt Damon visited Australia to shoot a violent, gun-filled Jason Bourne film, featuring an Anglo hero out to rid the world of a psychopathic Venezuelan. While here, he said he wished the US could have gun laws like Australia’s, seemingly unaware his films almost certainly reinforce and spread US gun culture.

Histories and museums can glorify war and patriarchy, or commemorate effective nonviolent movements such as the suffragists.

Australia has more war memorials than any other nation. They’re often in the middle of towns (like the War Memorial in Sydney’s CBD), making them a central part of our lives. “Remembrance Driveway”, the highway between Sydney, Australia’s economic powerhouse, and Canberra, the nation’s capital, has 24 rest stops dedicated to Victoria Cross war heroes. All were men.

Our new and former parliament houses are in line with the avenue to the Australian War Memorial. There’s no shortage of funding for upgrades to the War Memorial, including more than $830,000 from arms manufacturers in three years, meaning its histories are unlikely to be objective or anti-war.

The militarisation of Australian history means other stories go untold. One under-recognised figure is Wiradjuri resistance leader Windradyne, who in 1824 led a delegation to Parramatta to call for peace. He addressed the governor, calling for an end to the killing, wearing a hat with “peace” written in English on it.

There’s no major road or museum in Australia recognising the effectiveness of suffragists and nonviolent movements, often led by women, for land rights, social justice, the environment and peace.

Ninety per cent of movies contain violence. Even children’s stories, such as Peter Rabbit, The Cat in the Hat, Peter Pan and the Tintin adventures, are often made violent or more violent when adapted for the screen, even though their original authors, such as Dr Seuss and Hergé were increasingly pro-peace.

Violent films often glorify weapons and make people more fearful – and likely to accept the narrative that armed violence is necessary and more effective than nonviolent action, despite strong evidence to the contrary. This narrative is actively pushed by the military-industrial complex, (the individuals and institutions involved in the production of weapons and military technologies), and by the media and entertainment outlets it influences and supports.

Militaries want films like Top Gun because they make the armed forces seem glamorous, exciting, social and sexy. So they often give filmmakers cheap or free access to billions of dollars worth of taxpayer-funded jet fighters, aircraft carriers and nuclear submarines. In return, the movies serve as sophisticated, enticing forms of recruitment propaganda.

The military-entertainment complex supports such movies because they encourage a favourable view of militarism, “defence” spending and the purchase of their products. As psychiatrist Emanuel Tanay observes, “what we call entertainment is really propaganda for violence”. He continues: “If you manufacture guns, you don’t need to advertise, because it is done by our entertainment industry.”

Arms dealers also do this through the media companies they own or influence. General Electric, which has ties to Mobil, owned the NBC TV network until 2013. Disney Entertainment, which owns the American Broadcasting Company, collaborated with Boeing to create flying X-Wings to soar over their Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge theme park in California’s Disneyland Resort. Inevitably, the editorial leanings of military-linked media are pro-war, biased and critical of peace activism, if they cover it at all.

Media can also be influenced by think-tanks sponsored by arms companies and “defence” departments. For example, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, which has numerous arms-related sponsors, was behind the Red Alert series of front-page articles in Australia’s Nine newspapers, which argued for more military spending to resist a supposedly imminent war with China.

The military-industrial complex, with its “revolving door” relationship with governments, is gaining influence in universities and schools. The University of Melbourne trumpeted the arrival of a new laboratory in partnership with Lockheed Martin, the world’s biggest and wealthiest arms corporation, with a history of bribery and corruption.

Wars and violence are neither inevitable, nor an inherent part of human nature. The power to reduce violence is in our hands, words and TV remotes.

Source: Friday essay: are wars and violence inevitable, or is there another way to live?

Moves to appeal after court upholds ban on naming judges who presided over Sara Sharif hearings | UK | MSN

The high court judge who banned the media from reporting the names of the fellow judges who oversaw three sets of family court proceedings relating to the murdered schoolgirl Sara Sharif, on Friday night refused permission to appeal against his decision.

The reporting restriction protecting judges’ identities that was made by Mr Justice Williams on Monday is thought to be unprecedented in relation to family court proceedings.

Two reporters who specialise in reporting on the family justice system – the authors of this piece – lodged the first press application in September 2023 for court documents relating to child protection concerns for Sara Sharif.

Related: Inexperienced social worker did not identify Sara Sharif’s father as posing any risk

The papers released to the press show that one judge presided over all three family court cases, which included two sets of care proceedings brought by Surrey county council, and one private law application made by Urfan Sharif asking the court to agree that Sara and her sibling could live with him.

In a democracy, it is the norm that judges are named in relation to cases over which they preside and the decisions they make.

Scrutiny and accountability for judges is not restricted even in cases that concern highly sensitive political issues, terrorism allegations and organised crime, where there may be a perceived risk to judges.

Source: Moves to appeal after court upholds ban on naming judges who presided over Sara Sharif hearings