worrying whether those rights will be implemented or will turn out to be merely ink on paper.
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Saudi Arabia | Country report | Freedom of the Press | 2013 - 0 views
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This report discusses the conditions of the media in Saudi Arabia. It claims that in 2012 Saudi Arabia media environment "remained among the most repressive the the world." It also talked about the fact that their government justified this repression by saying that it violated the Islamic Sharia law. This brought up and interesting point, because I had never thought about freedom of speech and religious freedom being linked in this regard.
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US and Russia in partnership over Syria - BBC News - 0 views
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Syria's "cessation of hostilities" is making a difference - whatever the arguments about early violations, the level of violence across the country has fallen - and with this fragile modicum of progress, the United States and Russia find themselves in harness after years in which Syria was a forum for their rivalry.
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Syria's "cessation of hostilities" is making a difference - whatever the arguments about early violations, the level of violence across the country has fallen - and with this fragile modicum of progress, the United States and Russia find themselves in harness after years in which Syria was a forum for their rivalry. But privately officials are nervous, both about Russian attempts to brand any group that has ever co-operated with militant elements like the Islamic state or the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front as "terrorist" and, therefore, ineligible to take part in, or make any significant move towards moving President Assad off the political stage. For now there is an agreement to allow the PResident to stay in power and the United States is biting its tongue, hoping that the violence will slow down.
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Syria conflict: Peace talks delayed to let truce 'settle down' - BBC News - 0 views
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U.N. rep accuses Saudis of violating international law - 0 views
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Egypt women: Rights on paper, not yet on ground - Yahoo News - 0 views
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Men hold an overwhelming near-lock on decision-making in politics, and activists say they are doing little to bring about equality.
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saying the student was "dressed like a belly dancer." She was wearing black pants, a long-sleeved pink shirt and a head-scarf.
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security forces dragged a female protester to the ground, pulled up her top to reveal her blue bra and stomped on her chest.
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female protesters at the time were forced to undergo humiliating "virginity tests" when detained by the military.
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"If there is no democratic climate, how would you benefit from these beautiful laws?" said Abdel-Hameed. "It will be the same as under Mubarak: you have a beautiful law but it's not implemented."
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The document explicitly enshrines equality between the sexes and women's rights to education, work and high political office.
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"It's not just more progressive than the 2012 constitution, it's more progressive than the 1971 constitution . from the gender perspective,
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2010 court decision barred women judges from the State Council, a powerful judicial body that regulates disputes between individuals and the state and reviews legislation.
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January she wrote to the State Council demanding it take on women judges in light of the constitution.
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activate a unit specialized in fighting violence against women and "the health sector should take into account reproductive rights.
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Prevalence of female genital cutting among Egyptian girls - 0 views
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harmful physical, psychological and human rights consequences has led to the use of the term “female genital mutilation
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women who have undergone FGC do not consider themselves to be mutilated and have become offended by the term “FGM”
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practised in ancient Egypt as a sign of distinction, while others hypothesize its origin in ancient Greece, Rome, Pre-Islamic Arabia and the Tsarist Russian Federation.
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94.6% of married women had been exposed to FGC and 69.1% of those women agreed to carry out FGC on their daughters
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females interviewed was 38 816. The prevalence of FGC among schoolgirls was 50.3%. The prevalence of FGC was 46.2% in government urban schools, 9.2% in private urban schools and 61.7% in rural schools.
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Egypt are type I (commonly referred to as clitoridectomy) and type II (commonly referred to as excision).5 In Africa, the most common type of FGC is type II (excision of the clitoris and the labia minor) which accounts for up to 80% of all cases.6 I
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The difference in the prevalence rates of FGC is mainly due to educational status in both rural and urban areas
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There is an obvious negative correlation between the female’s parents’ education and the practice of FGC
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Parents with low or no education are the most likely to have circumcised their daughters with prevalence rates ranging between 59.5% and 65.1%
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higher degrees of education are the least likely to have their daughters circumcised and the prevalence rate ranged between 19.5% and 22.2%.
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. In Egypt, in the past, the majority of FGC procedures were performed by traditional midwives, called dayas. However, according to the Demographic and Health Survey (1995),16 the number of
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include infection because of unsanitary operating conditions, and significant psychological and psychosexual consequences of FGC
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complications (early and late) such as severe pain, bleeding, incontinence, infections, mental health problems, sexual problems, primary infertility and difficult labour with high episiotomy rate. In addition, the repetitive use of the same instruments on several girls without sterilization can cause the spread of HIV and Hepatitis B and C.
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In these surveys, 72% of ever-married women reported that circumcision is an important part of religious tradition and about two-thirds of the women had the impression that the husband prefers his wife to be circumcised
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one-third of ever-married women cited cleanliness as a reason while a small number saw it as a way to prevent promiscuity before marriage.
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. It is an issue that demands a collaborative approach involving health professionals, religious leaders, educationalists and nongovernmental organizations.
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Past issues Information for contributors Editorial members How to order About the Bulletin Disclaimer Prevalence of female genital cutting among Egyptian girls
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This is such a controversial topic. I saw a reference to it recently (was it possibly something that was brought up in the Bill Maher/Ben Affleck dust-up?) that pointed out that the practice is almost unheard of outside of central and northeastern Africa, with a few small pockets in Iraq and the Gulf.
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Syria crisis: Russia and China step up warning over strike - BBC News - 0 views
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Russia and China have stepped up their warnings against military intervention in Syria, with Moscow saying any such action would have "catastrophic consequences" for the region
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UN chemical weapons inspectors are due to start a second day of investigations in the suburbs of Damascus
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Russian foreign ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich has called on the international community to show "prudence" over the crisis and observe international law.
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Attempts to bypass the Security Council, once again to create artificial groundless excuses for a military intervention in the region are fraught with new suffering in Syria and catastrophic consequences for other countries of the Middle East and North Africa
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US said it was postponing a meeting on Syria with Russian diplomats, citing "ongoing consultations" about alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria
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The two sides had been due to meet in The Hague on Wednesday to discuss setting up an international conference on finding a political solution to the crisis
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Western powers were rushing to conclusions about who may have used chemical weapons in Syria before UN inspectors had completed their investigation
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Medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres said three hospitals it supported in the Damascus area had treated about 3,600 patients with "neurotoxic symptoms", of whom 355 had died
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Earlier in the day, the UN convoy came under fire from unidentified snipers and was forced to turn back before resuming its journey
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In the most forceful US reaction yet, US Secretary of State John Kerry on Monday described the recent attacks in the Damascus area as a "moral obscenity
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What we saw in Syria last week should shock the conscience of the world. It defies any code of moralit
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President Obama believes there must be accountability for those who would use the world's most heinous weapons against the world's most vulnerable peopl
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Analysts believe the most likely US action would be sea-launched cruise missiles targeting Syrian military installations.
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some Western countries that military action against the Syrian government could be taken without a UN mandate
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Mr Lavrov said the use of force without Security Council backing would be "a crude violation of international law
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an international military response to the suspected use of chemical weapons would be possible without the backing of the UN
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The UN Security Council is divided, with Russia and China opposing military intervention and the UK and France warning that the UN could be bypassed if there was "great humanitarian need".
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if the West does not intervene to support freedom and democracy in Egypt and Syria, the Middle East will face catastrophe
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After Western powers suspected that the Syrian government used chemical weapons against the Syrian people, tensions grew against them and Russia, China, and Syria. The Eastern Powers believe that Western powers are overstepping their bounds for their need of power but the Western powers think that they need to interfere to help the people.
Sabahi remains in Egypt's presidential race despite 'widespread violations': Campaign -... - 0 views
english.ahram.org.eg/...102370.aspx
egypt race campaign politics Sabahi election #jan25 sisi revolution
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Efua Dorkenoo fought against female genital cutting - The Globe and Mail - 0 views
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Dorkenoo started organizations to battle genital cutting and co-ordinated the effort more broadly as acting director of women’s health at the World Health Organization in the late 1990s.
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“She inspired a generation of feminists across the world to take up the cause of banning the procedure,
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Last year, the UN General Assembly voted unanimously to recognize female genital cutting as a human-rights violation.
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African-led organization she helped found, The Girl Generation: Together to End FGM, began work this month.
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teenage girls were less likely to have been cut than older women in half of the 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East where the practice is concentrated.
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In Egypt, where more women have been cut than in any other country, surveys showed that 81 per cent of 15- to 19-year-olds had undergone the practice, compared with 96 per cent of women in their late 40s.
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Female genital cutting involves pricking, piercing or amputating some or all of the external genitalia
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The World Health Organization says female genital cutting has no health benefits and can cause severe bleeding, problems urinating and, later in life, cysts, infections and infertility.
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125 million women living today in the countries where it is concentrated have experienced such cutting.
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The mother was so badly scarred, she said, that she could not deliver her baby through natural childbirth.
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Foundation for Women’s Health and Development to promote the health of African women and girls, with a focus on abolishing female genital cutting
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co-ordinated national action plans against female genital cutting in Burkina Faso, Ghana, Cameroon, Kenya, Somalia and Sudan.
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In 1994, Queen Elizabeth II named Ms. Dorkenoo an honorary officer in the Order of the British Empire.
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The U.S. Needs to Rethink Its Anti-ISIS Approach in Syria | TIME - 0 views
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ISIS remains essentially unchallenged in its heartland in northern Syria, despite repeated U.S. air strikes
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In the south, nationalists have fared better at keeping ISIS out and Jabhat al Nusra in check, partly due to a coherent, rational U.S.-led support program operating covertly out of Jordan
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A strategy to beat the jihadists and make sure they stay beaten must be locally-driven, led by nationalist forces supported by the Sunni population that forms the insurgency’s social base.
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The U.S.-led air campaign against the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) has scored some points in Syria, weakening ISIS’s oil infrastructure and revenues and keeping the group out of Kobane
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the promised U.S. train-and-equip program is unlikely to reverse the nationalists’ losses or jihadists’ gains in northern Syria
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air strikes alone, and treating nationalist groups as agents rather than partners, violates this principle
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, the U.S. has helped nationalists in the south avoid the fragmentation, infighting, and lawlessness that weakened them and benefited the jihadists in northern Syria
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ISIS offers conquered populations the choice between submission – which brings a sense of order and some protection from regime violence – or futile resistance and death
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Jabhat al Nusra has driven nationalist forces out of much of their core territory in northern Syria, and ISIS continues to threaten those that remain
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Even if the coalition wants to avoid confronting regime forces, it can and should concentrate air strikes closer to ISIS’s front lines with the nationalist insurgency, helping the latter block ISIS advances in cooperation with local Kurdish forces when possible
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, U.S. interests would be better served by a two-pronged approach in northern and southern Syria, helping nationalist rebels contain ISIS and compete with Jabhat al Nusra for control of the insurgency.
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U.S. airstrikes on jihadists have spared the regime’s forces and inadvertently killed Syrian civilians
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that Sunni Muslims are under siege by oppressive regional minorities, Iran, and even the United States itself
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Ironically, the coalition campaign has contributed to the near-collapse of nationalist forces in northern Syria who, despite their imperfections, were ISIS’s most effective rivals and competed with Jabhat al Nusra for leadership of the insurgency
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campaign has had serious local side effects that have undermined the broader, long-term objective of degrading and destroying ISIS in Syria and preventing the Al Qaeda affiliate, Jabhat al Nusra, from replacing or thriving alongside ISIS
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Egyptians visit Washington to defend their 'revolution' - Al-Monitor: the Pulse of the ... - 0 views
www.al-monitor.com/...si-human-rights-terrorism.html
United States egypt egyptian revolution washington
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during an anti-Morsi and anti-Muslim Brotherhood protest in Tahrir Square in Cairo, June 28, 2013. (photo by REUTERSAsmaa Waguih)
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group of influential Egyptians sought to convince a dozen Americans that the removal of elected president Mohammed Morsi in 2013 and his replacement by Field Marshal Gen. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi was a plus for Egypt’s political evolution and US interests.
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Morsi had violated the constitution by claiming dictatorial powers in November 2012 and acquiesced in the brutal beating of demonstrators in front of the presidential palace. Crime rose during Morsi’s tenure and Egyptians were afraid to walk the streets or send their kids to school, she told Al-Monitor.
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The Americans, in turn, criticized Egypt for criminalizing the Muslim Brotherhood, killing more than a thousand people and detaining thousands more, including journalists and secular liberals, in the aftermath of Morsi’s ouster.
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told Al-Monitor that the Egyptians conveyed their support for Sisi, who, after ruling as head of a military council that replaced Morsi, was elected president in May with a large percentage of votes, although a smaller turnout than in the previous presidential election.
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Zaki said the delegation also expressed their view that while “we know we are moving toward a strong state, a strong state needs civil society and political opposition.” The third message, he said, was that Egypt wants US support in the fight against terrorism.
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Washington has praised Cairo for mediating last summer’s Gaza war between Israel and Hamas and expressed sympathy for those fighting Islamic extremists, such as the Egyptian soldiers killed in the Sinai Peninsula on Oct. 24.
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l some restrictions on US aid to Egypt and many analysts in Washington assert that Egypt cannot return to stability while repressing major components of its society. They also criticize an impending edict for civil society groups to register with the government, which has led many respected foreign-funded nonprofit organizations
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encouraged the Egyptians to embrace political and religious pluralism. “The Egyptians should understand that no government can deliver peace, prosperity and law and order that does not involve all sections of society,” he said.
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“Don’t deal with us like a teacher with a pupil,” said Nashwa el-Houfi, a columnist for the daily newspaper Al Watan. “No one has the whole truth. You have part and I have part.”
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Another plea was for Americans to stop acting as though they knew better what was in the interests of a country with a recorded history going back 7,000 years.
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This article talks about how some Americans feel like Egypt did itself a disservice by getting rid of Morsi's rule. This article describes the conversation had by some members of the Egyptian delegation that were invited to Washington by Hands Along the Nile Development Services. This articles goes on to talk about different issues regarding U.S., Egyptian relations and basically was the U.S. condones and what it doesn't, as if it mattered.
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Ben Affleck's Attack on 'Islamophobia' Inspires One Muslim Woman To Write An Open Lette... - 0 views
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After the heated argument Ben Affleck had with Real Time host Bill Maher, people are still debating the topic of Islam in the world. A Muslim woman named Eiynah has entered the discussion, and directed her opinion of the often archaic nature of Islam in an open letter to Affleck, which was posted on Pakistan Today : Dear Ben, I am writing to you today as a woman who was born and raised in Islam. This topic is interesting because liberals in the West are so annoyed by the rhetoric that comes from bigoted sources; while Affleck was standing up for what he believes in, the writer suggests he should have gone about it in a different way. It's just also unfortunate that many are quick to judge and condemn a faith even though other faiths have had just as many problems (and have supported immoral practices) throughout history. However its still important to bring up and try to make solutions for human rights crisis that take place based on Sharia law.
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After the heated argument Ben Affleck had with Real Time host Bill Maher, people are still debating the topic of Islam in the world. A Muslim woman named Eiynah has entered the discussion, and directed her opinion of the often archaic nature of Islam in an open letter to Affleck, which was posted on Pakistan Today : Dear Ben, I am writing to you today as a woman who was born and raised in Islam. This topic was interesting because liberals in America have to deal with bigoted rhetoric all the time and its frustrating. While the author of the letter was proud of Affleck for standing up for Islamic people and what he believes is right, she suggests he just go about it in a different way because discussions of human right violations in the Middle East should still be called out.
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Beheading Video Stirs Debate On Social Media Censorship : NPR - 0 views
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Twitter and others being proactive about censoring this information start to engage in a slippery slope
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I don't want any government or industry to censor what I can and cannot say to my community in my attempt to ethically inform them
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GREENE: Let me just make sure I understand this because it seems like a very important point - you're saying the New York Post, they are journalists; they made the decision on their own. You might say that it was a bad decision, but it was a news organization, a publisher, so to speak, making a decision about what to publish. Twitter, in the eyes of many of us, you know, is a platform for us to share. And that's a different thing for them to censor you or I or other people in terms of what we want to share or not.
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Yeah, I would look at it as if the printing press operators decided that they wanted to censor the New York Post, right? That's if we view Twitter as a platform. Printing press operators wouldn't shape a newspaper
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these organizations are really sophisticated with their propaganda, and this is just one video of many different types of strategies that they employ.
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that by allowing this video to be available, it is helping ISIS - these militants - spread their propaganda
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we were to have a technology company censoring images from the Vietnam War, think of the iconic images that would be censored and blanked.
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Viewing a video, I feel like you need to make that decision. You need to make that decision. The government shouldn't make that decision for you. A tech company shouldn't make it for you.
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This one here is not the government censoring. This is a tech company that is censoring. Now, again, it's their platform. It's their rules. But it is something to be aware o
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The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.
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The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.
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The beheading of James Foley by the Islamic State triggered debate. David Greene talks to Robert Hernandez, assistant professor at USC Annenberg, about censorship with new tech platforms like Twitter.
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BBC News - Can Iraqi militants be kept off social media sites? - 0 views
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The Iraqi government responded by blocking social media sites and, in some provinces, barring access to the internet entirely.
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The BBC spoke to a number of social networks, all of which said they did not actively monitor their sites for content promoting terrorism, but rather responded to requests from governments and individuals to remove offending material.
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One Ask.fm account offered advice on how to join Isis fighters in Iraq, as well as what weapons one could expect to be equipped with on arrival.
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rminated any account registered by a member of a foreign terrorist organisation - as designated by the US secretary of state - and used in an official capacity to further its interests.
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G.O.P. Senators' Letter to Iran About Nuclear Deal Angers White House - 1 views
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Open letter sent from Republican members of congress to Islamic Republic of Iran about nuclear deal said to be "an unprecedented violation of the tradition of leaving politics at the water's edge." Republicans said that by styling it as an "open letter," it was related to a statement, not an overt intervention in the talks.
Egypt should reject amendments - 0 views
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Five years on, why do Egyptian authorities still fear January 25? - Al-Monitor: the Pul... - 0 views
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Rates of poverty, unemployment, administrative corruption and the violation of freedoms continue to soar in Egypt, and many people including activists are still frustrated. Five years after the revolutions a "tense calm" still remains in Egypt. Tanks have been in Tahrir Square this January incase of uprisings and constant searches in people's flats keep occurring of suspected activists promoting uprisings.