Article here. Excerpt:

'While Europe increasingly questions the practice of circumcising boys, US paediatricians are about to say that the medical case for it is getting stronger. Most US adult men are circumcised, but the number of newborns having the op is falling, and is now below 50% in some states - intensifying the dilemma for parents.
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Unlike in Europe - where rates are low, and circumcision is mostly confined to the Jewish and Muslim communities - circumcision is one of the most common operations in the US.

Three-quarters of American adult men are circumcised. There are over one million procedures each year, or around one every 30 seconds.

But rates are falling, as parents - like Stephen Box and his wife - are opting to break with tradition, and alongside this, an increasingly vocal anti-circumcision movement has emerged.
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Take the most private part of the male body, add parenting rights, children's rights, disputed science, history, tradition and a dollop of religion, and you have the recipe for a controversy that will run and run.'

Story here. Excerpts:

"Supporters of a Los Angeles man who remains in California state prison despite being declared innocent by a federal judge delivered more than 90,000 petition signatures to the state Attorney General’s Office on Monday, calling for his release from custody.

Daniel Larsen was convicted in 1999 of possession of a concealed weapon and sentenced to 27 years to life but had the conviction overturned when a judge in 2010 found his constitutional rights had been violated."

You can sign a petition for his release here.

Article here. Excerpt:

'"Parents come into the library every day concerned that their boys aren't reading," said Linda Brilz, youth services supervisor at Boise Public Library in Idaho. But the problem is bigger than "not reading." Across the country and around the world studies show that young men lag behind their female peers in literacy skills by significant margins.

"There is a huge disparity in performance," said William Brozo, professor of literacy at George Mason University's Graduate School of Education.

How serious is the problem? Some of the most compelling data on the topic comes from the results of the Programme for International Student Assessment, an exam given to 15-year olds in 65 countries. On the 2000 PISA exam, girls outperformed boys in reading by an average of 32 points. By 2009, the gap had increased to 39 points.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'The U.S. government is justifiably proud of its leadership abroad funding male circumcision as a way to prevent HIV infections. The president’s AIDS relief program boasts of having provided more than 1 million circumcisions in 14 African countries.

The record of government support for male circumcision within the U.S., however, is nothing to crow about. More and more states (18 so far) are dropping Medicaid coverage for routine infant male circumcision, contributing to a decline in rates from 79 percent throughout the 1970s to 55 percent in 2010. This has occurred even as evidence of the medical benefits of the procedure has stacked up.

Article here. Excerpt:

'"The economic evidence is backing up what we already know medically," said Dr. Aaron Tobian, a Hopkins health epidemiologist and pathologist and senior researcher on the study.

The findings are the latest in a continuing debate over the health benefits of a procedure that was once common practice in the United States — and comes as the Academy of American Pediatrics prepares to announce updated guidelines on male circumcision next week.

Circumcision became controversial in the 1970s when the rate of procedures began to decline. Today, about 55 percent of the 2 million baby boys born each year are circumcised, compared with a peak of 79 percent in the 1970s and 1980s.

Article here. Excerpt:

'The saga isn’t over yet, but the story is so bizarre that it deserves to be told nationwide. The accused has my sympathy, even though he is a left-wing Democrat. Yes, I believe that leftists deserve due process and fair treatment in our criminal justice system.

The local prosecutor charged Mirkarimi with the crimes of domestic violence and child endangerment, which sound bad, but the evidence was trivial. The domestic-violence charge was based on Mirkarimi grabbing his wife’s arm during a New Year’s Eve argument, which allegedly left a bruise, and the child endangerment charge was based solely on their toddler (who was not touched) merely being present when this argument took place.

Mirkarimi’s wife, Eliana Lopez, never made any complaint, and she publicly defended her husband. She is an intelligent adult, a former Venezuelan telenovela star, who is perfectly able to make her own decisions.

Article here. Excerpt:

'United States women Olympians came home bedecked in gold and silver as if they had walked off with the crown jewels from the Tower of London.

Only one nation other than the United States managed to win more gold than our wonder women. American men didn’t come close to taking as many medals as their female counterparts.

Surely Michael Phelps, with his record half a dozen London medals for a total of 22, including 18 gold through three Olympics; and Usain Bolt of Jamaica, the “world’s fastest man,” who defended his Olympic gold in both track dashes, will be well remembered as stars of the XXX Olympics.
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They also reminded us that there was a time 40 years ago when congressmen acted like adults as they voted to protect women athletes from those foolish old chauvinistic white men who made up the minority and waged war on women, just as they are doing today.'

Story here. Excerpt:

'DOVER, Del. (CBS) – The three daycare employees who were arrested on Monday for allegedly watching and encouraging toddlers to fight each other were released Tuesday afternoon after posting $10,000 secured bond.

On Monday, three employees from the Hands of Our Future Daycare in Delaware were arrested after a cell phone video showed employees watching and encouraging two 3-year-olds fight each other.

Tiana Harris, 19, Lisa Parker, 47, and Estefania Myers, 21, were charged with Assault, Endangering the Welfare of a Child, Reckless Endangering and Conspiracy for the incident, which occurred in March of 2012 and was captured on cell phone video.'

Link here. Excerpt:

'The NIH Working Group on Women in Biomedical Careers is a trans-NIH effort to consider barriers for women in science and to develop innovative strategies to promote entry, recruitment, retention, and sustained advancement of women in biomedical and research careers. Under the leadership of NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins and Office of Research on Women’s Health (ORWH) Acting Director Dr. Janine Clayton, the Working Group collaborates with the NIH Institutes and Centers to promote tangible changes to institutional policies in the NIH intramural and extramural communities.

Article here. For "children", read "boys". Imagine if girls were forced into military "service" by thugs and bandits (polite words for them)-- do you think the UN would be sitting on its hands doing pretty much nothing? It just goes on and on. Problems for girls and women are a huge crisis requiring multinational intervention. Problems for boys and men draw a small article on the blog section of the LA Times. Excerpt:

'The chaos has also worsened an existing food crisis, leaving 4.6 million people in need of aid, according to the World Food Program. Swarms of locusts threaten to add to their woes, though the World Food Program says it is unclear whether the insects have reached the north.

Armed groups in the north have also continued to recruit and use children as fighters, UNICEF said Friday. Last month, the agency reported that at least 175 boys had been recruited in the region; the numbers are now believed to be in the hundreds and still rising, the agency warned.'

Story here. Ahh, Martha! Enjoy the champagne! Now I am just wondering when the Ladies Golf Club of Toronto will allow men to join. After all, fair is fair. Or is it? Excerpt:

'NEW YORK (AP) -- The home of the Masters now has green jackets for women.

In a historic change at one of the world's most exclusive golf clubs, Augusta National invited former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and South Carolina financier Darla Moore to become the first female members since the club was founded in 1932.

"This is a joyous occasion," chairman Billy Payne said Monday.'

Article here. The tone, the content, the whole thing. In a rare article that admits that women *gasp* have affairs as much as men do, the tone is suddenly not just tolerant but positively embraces not just the having of affairs but the blatant charging for them (ie, prostitution via dating site). Excerpt:

'Alongside the internet dating revolution, these “playfairs” are evidence of a potentially dramatic shift in British marriage. As dating websites open up a global shop window of sexual possibilities, as life expectancy continues to rise and we become increasingly sexually aware, how can we still take the crushing old rules of fidelity, that turn marriage into a prison, for granted? Why should we not be able to recapture the heady thrills of youth, while protecting a secure home life?

From Marc A.:

As you know, a judge in Germany ruled that infant male genital mutilation violates boys' human rights. A Reuters story on the judge's decision is at http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/27/us-germany-circumcision-idUSBRE85Q19Y20120627.

And as expected, powerful religious lobby groups got the German parliament to legislatively override the judge's decision that circumcision violates human rights. But the good news is that this is forcing the issue into a public debate, and over 700 doctors and professors just signed a letter supporting the judge's decision! The letter in German is here.

Story here. More than just circling wagons, looks to me like an attempt to suppress evidence. Would they dare attempt the same tactic if the complainants were female and the defendant male? Heck, by now, he'd be fired! Excerpt:

'WASHINGTON — The feds have asked a judge to strike from the public record the most “scandalous” details of a bombshell sexual-discrimination lawsuit against Janet Napolitano and the Department of Homeland Security that refer to oral sex and an odd bathroom prank.

The lewd details are included in senior law-enforcement official James Hayes’ suit claiming retaliation anti-guy bias.

The filing claims top immigration aide Suzanne Barr “humiliated” a male employee by calling him in his hotel room and screaming that she wanted his “c--k in the back of [her] throat.”'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Across UK universities, 984,000 female undergraduates are studying for degrees, compared to 713,000 male. The gap is expected to widen in future years as new government rules make it easier for universities to recruit students with A-level grades of AAB or better, more of whom are female.

While last week’s A-level results showed boys narrowly outperforming girls at the A* grade for the first time, girls remained significantly more likely than boys to achieve grades in the upper range of A* to B.
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White males are defined as under-represented because while they make up about 45 per cent of the UK population, according to the last census, they account for only 20 per cent of the college’s intake.