Where Will It End?

Councilman Robert Jackson (D-7th) is the only Muslim on the New York City Council and has called for adding Eid al-Fitr at the end of Ramadan, and Eid al-Adha, which honors the willingness of the prophet Ibrahim to sacrifice his first-born son Ismail, according to published reports.

“If this is the melting pot of our great society, it has to be flexible enough in order to move in a direction of inclusiveness, and that’s all that we’re asking for,” Jackson said.

Jackson said Muslim students now make up about 12 percent of the city school population.

He said he does not want a repeat of several years ago, “where they had a big statewide exam on our holy holiday.”

By Jackson’s count, the two Muslim holidays would only require extra days off five times over the next decade.

Mayoral candidates Bill de Blasio and Joe Lhota already have agreed that giving kids days off for two Muslim holidays is a good idea.

But some critics have said adding holidays to the school calendar is not a good idea – particularly given the proposals to add additional holidays for other faiths and cultural celebrations too.

New York State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) believes children should also be given days off for the Chinese New Year. City Councilman Daniel Dromm (D-25th) said a day off should also be awarded for the Hindu holiday of Diwali.

Community member Ravi Batra of the National Advisory Council on South Asian Affairs called Diwali “an American landmark to be achieved on the road to fostering as Thomas Jefferson said a more perfect union it is ‘E pluribus unum’ in action.”

But passersby at Flatbush and Atlantic avenues in Brooklyn said the holiday proposals are getting out of hand, 1010 WINS’ Carol D’Auria reported Saturday.

“We all have some holidays in common, but to celebrate every one of them is a lot,” one man said. “It’s too many, I think.”

“If you give everybody off holidays, then the children will never be in school,” a woman said. “I think that our children need to be in school at all times, because they need to be educated.”

Soon-to-retire Mayor Michael Bloomberg does not like the idea either.

“The mayor believes our students need more time in the classroom, not less,” said Bloomberg spokesman Jake Goldman. “When you have a city as diverse as New York, you simply cannot add a holiday for every religion.”

By law, children must attend school for 183 days, and any holidays they are given off must be made up during the school year, the newspaper reported.

The city hasn’t added a school holiday in 27 years – since Martin Luther King Day was put on the calendar in 1986.

Public schools already observe 13 holidays, ranging from the religious, Christmas and Rosh Hashanah, to the patriotic, Veterans Day and Memorial Day, to the historic, Columbus Day.

Halloween

Halloween is a holiday celebrated on the night of October 31.  The word Halloween is a shortening of All Hallows' Evening also known as Hallowe'en or All Hallows' Eve.

Traditional activities include trick-or-treating, bonfires, costume parties, visiting "haunted houses" and carving jack-o-lanterns. Irish and Scottish immigrants carried versions of the tradition to North America in the nineteenth century. Other western countries embraced the holiday in the late twentieth century including Ireland, the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico and the United Kingdom as well as of Australia and New Zealand.

Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic festival known as Samhain (pronounced "sah-win").

The activity is popular in the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, and due to increased American cultural influence in recent years, imported through exposure to US television and other media, trick-or-treating has started to occur among children in many parts of Europe, and in the Saudi Aramco camps of Dhahran, Akaria compounds and Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia.

The most significant growth and resistance is in the United Kingdom, where the police have threatened to prosecute parents who allow their children to carry out the "trick" element. In continental Europe, where the commerce-driven importation of Halloween is seen with more skepticism, numerous destructive or illegal "tricks" and police warnings have further raised suspicion about this game and Halloween in general.

 

In Ohio, Iowa, and Massachusetts, the night designated for Trick-or-treating is often referred to as Beggars Night.

Part of the history of Halloween  is Halloween costumes. The practice of dressing up in costumes and begging door to door for treats on holidays goes back to the Middle Ages, and includes Christmas wassailing. Trick-or-treating resembles the late medieval practice of "souling," when poor folk would go door to door on Hallowmas (November 1), receiving food in return for prayers for the dead on All Souls Day (November 2).

It originated in Ireland and Britain, although similar practices for the souls of the dead were found as far south as Italy. Shakespeare mentions the practice in his comedy The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1593), when Speed accuses his master of "puling [whimpering, whining], like a beggar at Hallowmas."

The thousands of Halloween postcards produced between the turn of the 20th century and the 1920s commonly show children but do not depict trick-or-treating. Ruth Edna Kelley, in her 1919 history of the holiday, The Book of Hallowe'en, makes no mention of such a custom in the chapter "Hallowe'en in America." It does not seem to have become a widespread practice until the 1930s, with the earliest known uses in print of the term "trick or treat" appearing in 1934, and the first use in a national publication occurring in 1939.

Trick-or-treating spread from the western United States eastward, stalled by sugar rationing that began in April 1942 during World War II and did not end until June 1947. Early national attention to trick-or-treating was given in October 1947 issues of the children's magazines Jack and Jill and Children's Activities, and by Halloween episodes of the network radio programs The Baby Snooks Show in 1946 and The Jack Benny Show and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet in 1948. The custom had become firmly established in popular culture by 1952, when Walt Disney portrayed it in the cartoon Trick or Treat, Ozzie and Harriet were besieged by trick-or-treaters on an episode of their television show, and UNICEF first conducted a national campaign for children to raise funds for the charity while trick-or-treating.

Although some popular histories of Halloween have characterized trick-or-treating as an adult invention to re-channel Halloween activities away from vandalism, nothing in the historical record supports this theory.

To the contrary, adults, as reported in newspapers from the mid-1930s to the mid-1950s, typically saw it as a form of extortion, with reactions ranging from bemused indulgence to anger. Likewise, as portrayed on radio shows, children would have to explain what trick-or-treating was to puzzled adults, and not the other way around.

Sometimes even the children protested: for Halloween 1948, members of the Madison Square Boys Club in New York City carried a parade banner that read "American Boys Don't Beg."

Hump Day Art

Unknown

Monet

Picasso

Stop Having Sex

Ai Aoyama is a sex and relationship counselor who works out of her narrow three level home on a Tokyo back street. Her first name means "love" in Japanese, and is a keepsake from her earlier days as a professional dominatrix. Back then, about 15 years ago, she was Queen Ai, or Queen Love, and she did "all the usual things" like tying people up and dripping hot wax on their nipples. Her work today, she says, is far more challenging.

Aoyama, 52, is trying to cure what Japan's media callssekkusu shinai shokogun, or "celibacy syndrome".

Japan's under-40s appear to be losing interest in conventional relationships. Millions aren't even dating, and increasing numbers can't be bothered with sex. For their government, "celibacy syndrome" is part of a looming national catastrophe. Japan already has one of the world's lowest birth rates. Its population of 126 million, which has been shrinking for the past decade, is projected to plunge a further one-third by 2060. Aoyama believes the country is experiencing "a flight from human intimacy" – and it's partly the government's fault.

The sign outside her building says "Clinic". She greets me in yoga pants and fluffy animal slippers, cradling a Pekingese dog whom she introduces as Marilyn Monroe. In her business pamphlet, she offers up the gloriously random confidence that she visited North Korea in the 1990s' and squeezed the testicles of a top army general. It doesn't say whether she was invited there specifically for that purpose, but the message to her clients is clear: she doesn't judge.

Inside, she takes me upstairs to her "relaxation room" – a bedroom with no furniture except a double futon. "It will be quiet in here," she says. Aoyama's first task with most of her clients is encouraging them "to stop apologizing for their own physical existence".

The number of single people has reached a record high. A survey in 2011 found that 61% of unmarried men and 49% of women aged 18-34were not in any kind of romantic relationship, a rise of almost 10% from five years earlier. Another study found that a third of people under 30 had never dated at all. (There are no figures for same-sex relationships). 

Although there has long been a pragmatic separation of love and sex in Japan – a country mostly free of religious morals – sex fares no better. A survey earlier this year by the Japan Family Planning Association (JFPA) found that 45% of women aged 16-24 "were not interested in or despised sexual contact". 

More than a quarter of men felt the same way.

Islamic Sex Shops

An online Islamic sex shop selling condoms, massage oils and perfumes has been launched in Turkey, becoming the first of its kind in the predominantly Muslim country.

The "Halal Sex Shop" website presents its products as being "entirely safe," and in compliance with Islamic norms.

What is Halal sex?

Halal sex shops also can't display pornographic imagery, since such images expose a person's awrah, the Arabic word for areas forbidden from the public eye. According to some, women are not allowed to see the region stretching from the navel to the knees on another woman, and men are permitted to see only a woman's face and hands. Although Turkey is the only Muslim country where porn is technically legal, huge black markets dedicated to it run through Muslim countries with stringent anti-porn policies, with Pakistan leading the entire world.

A Turkish entrepreneur has opened what he says is the country’s first online sex shop for Muslims, selling everything from lubricants to herbal aphrodisiacs and offering advice on how to have “halal” sex.

Haluk Murat Demirel, 38, said he had been inspired to launch the site (below) by friends who wanted sex advice and products but found the content on other websites and in specialist stores too explicit.

(www.bayan.helalsexshop.com) 

“Online sex shops usually have pornographic pictures, which makes Muslims uncomfortable. We don’t sell vibrators for example, because they are not approved by Islam,” Demirel said.  Sexual mores provoke frequent debate in the majority Muslim but constitutionally secular country. There are relatively few sex shops, even in major cities, although in parts of Istanbul those that do exist advertise themselves with bright lights.

Internet users who enter the site find two different links directing them to separate sections for male and female products.

Other sections of the website are designed to discuss sex in the context of Islam under various headings: "Oral sex according to Islam", "Sex manners in Islam" and "Sexual life in Islam."

The founders of the website said they believed the online shop would help correct prejudices against Islam which they claimed is perceived as "against sex."

"The religion of Islam has praised sex under certain circumstances," is written on the site.  "The use of every product on sale is in compliance with Islam."

Turkey does have so-called "erotic shops" in its streets, however Islamic conservative Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan suggested last year they rename themselves "love shops."

Orwellian Police State

Watch Video First 

by clicking 

here

After illustrating their enthusiasm for repealing the Bill of Rights, a video shows Americans happily signing a petition to support a “Nazi-style Orwellian police state,” in what easily represents the most shocking footage of its kind to date.

Citing issues with how the government shutdown has impacted the ability of the police to “keep the community safe,” Dice tells San Diegans that there is a need to “increase the Orwellian system.”

“Not a problem,” responds one man as he signs the petition.

“We just want to model it after the Nazi Germany system to keep people safe and secure,” Dice tells another individual.

After signing the petition to “implement the Orwellian police state,” another man responds, “You find the pot of money though,” apparently more concerned about how much a Nazi-style police state would cost than its actual consequences.

“They’re trying to cut the budget by 20 per cent so we just want to make sure that we can model the police state after the Nazi Germany system,” Dice tells another couple who sign the petition, before adding, “Thanks for supporting the police state.”

“We’re going to model it after the Nazi Germany-style police state,” Dice clearly tells another man who signs the petition.

“We need this Orwellian-style system to keep everybody safe,” Dice tells a woman as she is signing the petition, to which she responds, “Yeah.”

The standard bearer for using satirical petitions to illustrate how misinformed Americans really are stretches all the way back to 1990, when it was repeatedly proven that people would sign petitions to ban water, but only if it was renamed “dihydrogen monoxide.” Penn and Teller reproduced the social experiment in 2003 when they were successful in getting environmentalists to sign a similar petition.

However, Dice has proven that some element of trickery is no longer necessary to convince Americans to support ludicrously draconian policies.

He quite clearly spells it out to them on numerous occasions what they are supporting – an Orwellian police state modeled on Nazi Germany.

Dice’s previous videos illustrate how Americans are willing to support just about anything, so long as it is done in the name of supporting Obama or the government, including granting Obama immunity for all crimes he commits while in office.

Nothing Else Really to Say...

Seeing boy

overcoming stammer

will leave you

speechless

There isn't much irony in Musharaf Asghar's nickname being "Mushy." The 16-year-old student at Thornhill Community Academy has battled a difficult stammer "since I can remember," and was the target of some bullying until school officials put a stop to it. But teacher Matthew Burton took inspiration from the film "The King's Speech," and, employing the same music-through-headphones approach to allay the boy's angst, helped Musharaf conquer his fears as he prepared for some critical oral exams. His triumphant moment was captured for the British TV series "Educating Yorkshire," and there wasn't a dry eye among any of Mushy's schoolmates. "I still won't be applying for any call-center jobs yet though," he cracked. [Source] 

Click here to watch video…

How Do You View Breast Cancer?

"In our society, 

breast cancer is hidden behind 

a small pink bow.  

The public needs to be educated."

This is the message behind The Scar Project, a photography series dedicated to young breast cancer survivors. 

Shot by fashion photographer David Jay, the large-scale portrait endeavor features the faces and bodies of over 100 women who have battled and bested early-onset cancer.

As the project's name suggests, the photographs showcase the many scars of women age 18 to 35 who have undergone mastectomies as a result of a breast cancer diagnosis. The series shines a spotlight on the fact that over 10,000 women under the age of 40 will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year alone -- a stark reality that younger woman often overlook.

Jay's photographs aim to raise awareness of these breast cancer statistics as well as provide a platform for survivors to confront their harrowing experiences. 

“For these young women, having their portrait taken seems to represent their personal victory over this terrifying disease," Jay explains on The Scar Project website. "It helps them reclaim their femininity, their sexuality, identity and power after having been robbed of such an important part of it."

Jay began the project after his 29-year-old friend, Paulina, was diagnosed with breast cancer and subsequently decided to have a mastectomy. 

He asked if he could photograph her after the surgery, and from there, the project mushroomed, leading to over 100 portraits of various woman and a Facebook page supported by over 40,000 fans. 

The works have been published in a book and, in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, are currently on on view in an exhibition in Houston.

"Through these simple pictures, [the women] seem to gain some acceptance of what has happened to them and the strength to move forward with pride," Jay explained to The Huffington Post.

To see more Breast Cancer Survivor Photos, 

click here…

Human Wants and Needs

The United States has been the world’s biggest economy since 1871, but that top ranking is now under threat from China. The Asian giant has achieved economic growth averaging 10% since it initiated market reforms in 1978 and, in the process, lifting almost half of its 1.3 billion population out of poverty and becoming the undisputed second-largest economy. 

China’s gross domestic product (GDP) – in terms of current prices and market exchange rates – was estimated by the IMF at approximately $8.25 trillion in 2012, which is just over 50% of US GDP of approximately $16 trillion for the same year. While that is a significant gap that may take China many years to close, using another measure known as Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), China is forecast to race past the U.S. in just a few more years.

In November 2012, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published an authoritative study on global long-term growth prospects. The study concluded that on the basis of 2005 PPP rates, China may surpass the Euro area’s GDP within a year, and that of the U.S. in another few years to become the world’s largest economy.

Specifically, China’s GDP (based on 2005 PPP) is forecast by the OECD at $15.26 trillion for 2016, exceeding the forecasted U.S. GDP of $15.24 trillion for the very first time. China is estimated to pull ahead of the U.S. steadily in the following years; the Chinese economy is estimated to be 1.5 times as large as the U.S. by 2030 and 1.7 times bigger by 2060. 

India, for its part, is only projected to surpass the U.S. in 2051, when its GDP is forecast at $33.1 trillion, compared with U.S. GDP of $33 trillion. The IMF reached a similar conclusion in its October 2012 World Economic Outlook report, projecting that China’s GDP of $20.20 trillion in 2017 (based on current, rather than 2005, PPP rates) will exceed U.S. GDP of $19.75 trillion for the first time.

With a population less than one-fourth that of China, the U.S. is still projected to remain one of the world’s most prosperous economies by 2060. The OECD study forecasts U.S. per capita GDP or income to more than double over the next 50 years, from roughly $43,000 in 2012 (based on 2005 PPP rates) to $92,000 in 2060.

China is forecast to boost its per capita income by a stunning seven-fold over this period, from $8,000 in 2012 to $55,000 by 2060. The difference in income levels between China and the U.S. are estimated to narrow substantially as a result. While 2012 per capita incomes in the U.S. were more than five times higher than in China, by 2060, they would only be 67% higher.

While the Chinese economy may be poised to surpass the U.S. on a PPP basis in less than five years, the U.S. will continue to be well ahead on most indicators related to living standards and quality of life. However, China’s surging economic clout may result in the country increasingly challenging the U.S. on a number of fronts, including diplomacy and military.

China is ranked 29th, with the WEF (World Economic Forum) noting some deterioration in areas that have become critical for its competitiveness, such as financial market development, technological readiness and market efficiency. 

Growth isn’t always a great thing, with rapid economic growth over more than three decades leaving China grappling with a host of problems including income inequality, rapid urbanization, environmental issues and demographic pressures due to the aging population.

While Americans have a higher per capita GDP, China has an ever increasing middle class that finally has non-discretionary monies to spend; consequently, the Chinese will be buying the same basic goods and services that Americans traditionally have been buying causing a shortage in the marketplace to develop.  

This is a by-product of population not per capita GDP because for every 1 middle class American (relative to US per capita GDP), there will be 4 middle class Chinese (relative to China per capital GDP).  

Since the US middle class is shrinking this ratio could become larger over time.

Sunday Funnies

Caturday

Getting an early start on Halloween...

But...

if that's not your thing...
then,
would you settle for making a friend?

OR,

allow dogs to make a buddy too..?

T. G. I. F. Solitude

Relax and Ponder 

Your

Surroundings

Drink Coffee Everyday!!!

According to a study done in 2005, "nothing else comes close" to providing as many antioxidants as coffee. While fruits and vegetables also have tons of antioxidants, the human body seems to absorb the most from coffee.

Researchers at the Seoul National University examined the brains of rats who were stressed with sleep deprivation and discovered that those who were exposed to coffee aromas experienced changes in brain proteins tied to that stress.

Science Daily reported in 2012 that drinking coffee may help people with Parkinson's disease control their movement. Ronald Postuma, MD, the study author, said, "Studies have shown that people who use caffeine are less likely to develop Parkinson's disease, but this is one of the first studies in humans to show that caffeine can help with movement symptoms for people who already have the disease."

A study published in 2006 that included 125,000 people over 22 years showed that those who drink at least one cup of coffee a day were 20 percent less to develop liver cirrhosis -- an autoimmune disease caused by excessive alcohol consumption that could lead to liver failure and cancer. 

Arthur L Klatsky, the lead author of the study, told The Guardian, "Consuming coffee seems to have some protective benefits against alcoholic cirrhosis, and the more coffee a person consumes the less risk they seem to have of being hospitalised or dying of alcoholic cirrhosis."

Studies have also shown that coffee can help prevent people from developing non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). An international team of researchers led by Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School revealed that drinking four or more cups of coffee or tea a day may be beneficial in preventing the progression of NAFLD.

 A study done by the National Institute of Health found that those who drink four or more cups of coffee were about 10 percent less likely to be depressed than those who had never touched the java. And apparently it's not because of the "caffeine high" -- Coke can also give you a caffeine high, but it's linked to depression.

A study done by the Harvard School of Public Health determined that drinking between two and four cups of coffee can reduce the risk of suicide in men and women by about 50 percent. The proposed reason is because coffee acts as a mild antidepressant by aiding in the production of neurotransmitters like serotonin, dopamine and noradrenaline.

Seat Declined

Saudi Arabia on Friday rejected its freshly-acquired seat on the U.N. Security Council, saying the 15-member body is incapable of resolving world conflicts such as the Syrian civil war.

The move came just hours after the kingdom was elected as one of the Council's 10 non permanent members on Thursday night. It also followed another gesture of displeasure from the kingdom in which Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal (below) declined to address the General Assembly meeting last month.

The Saudi discontent stems from its frustration with longtime ally United States. The two are at odds over a number of Mideast issues, including how Washington has handled some of the region's crises, particularly in Egypt and Syria. 

It also comes as ties between the U.S. and Iran, the Saudi's regional foe, appear to be improving following a recent telephone conversation between President Barack Obama and Iran's new president, Hassan Rouhani.

In a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency, the Foreign Ministry said Friday the Security Council has failed in its duties toward Syria.

It said this has enabled Syrian President Bashar Assad's regime to perpetrate the killings of its people, including with chemical weapons, without facing any punishment. The Syrian regime denies it has used chemical weapons in the war.

The kingdom, which has backed the Syrian rebels in their struggle to topple Assad, has often criticized the international community for failing to halt Syria's civil war, now in its third year. According to U.N. figures, the conflict has so far killed over 100,000 people.

Saudi Arabia is also frustrated that the U.S. backed away from launching punitive strikes against Assad's forces after Damascus agreed to allow inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons and the United Nations to destroy its chemical weapons arsenal.

The kingdom easily won the Security Council seat in a vote in New York on Thursday, facing no opposition because there were no contested races for the first time in several years. 

The Council seats are highly coveted because they give countries a strong voice in matters dealing with international peace and security, in places like Syria, Iran and North Korea, as well as the U.N.'s far-flung peacekeeping operations.

The 15-member council includes five permanent members with veto power — the U.S., Russia, China, Britain and France — and 10 non permanent members elected for two-year terms.  Read more…