Holy non sequiturs, Batman! Read it here. Excerpt:

'The findings confirm a long-held belief among sexual researchers that has apparently not been studied in any depth before. The results provide new insight into the evolutionary development of human sexual responses, suggesting that women may have evolved a more responsive sexuality to help them cope with forced copulation.

Article here. Excerpt:

'New Yorkers in midlife crisis, meet the brotherhood of Fortress Astoria: Danaher Dempsey, Luke Crane, Rick Brown and Shyaporn Theerakulstit, best friends and artists.

Article here. Excerpt:

'An elementary school teacher who admitted having sexual relations with students has escaped prison after prosecutors declined to bring charges against her.

Kristle Vandever, 44, resigned two years ago after the allegations first emerged - but she has only just had her teaching licence revoked.

Shortly after quitting, the 21-year veteran wrote an email admitting: 'I just can't help wanting these hot young boys... and they want me.'

She also appeared to imply that she could have faced legal action if her victims had spoken up as she wrote, 'no witnesses coming forward'.

Vandever taught English as a second language at McNary Heights Elementary School in Umatilla, Oregon, having qualified as a teacher in 1989, according to the Hermiston Herald.'

Article here. A rebuttal to this post can be found here. Excerpt:

'The first statement, called sexist by many viewers, was Heina Dadabhoy’s comment that the Y chromosome is a broken X chromosome. The other, called outrageously sexist, was Greg Laden’s statement that the male brain is a female brain that has been damaged at various times throughout development by testosterone. The question is, however, are these statements true?

Heina’s statement is the easier to address. A number of people did so in the YouTube comments, but I’ll do it here as well. Yes, the Y chromosome is definitely a broken X chromosome.
...

Article here. Excerpt:

The problem with men, as a group, as a type of organism, as a subset of humans, is that at various points along the way on their journey from the female template on which all humans are built biologically, they have been altered in ways that make them dangerous assholes. Even when we try to reduce the male-female difference as a society, men who do not willingly participate in that often end up being fairly nasty, dangerous beasts; they may be rapists, they may be batterers, they may be some other thing. They break our efforts to have an egalitarian peaceful world. In a way, they are broken. They are damaged, if you will. Some of that damage is facilitated by what you may know of as testosterone (a word that stands in for androgens).

Link here. Excerpt:

'A 15-year-old girl charged in relation to the murder of a young chef in western Sydney appeared "strangely happy" when she fronted court today.

Patrick Crowe, 22, died on July 7 after being stabbed in Parramatta while heading home from a night out last month.

This morning the girl, who can't be named for legal reasons, appeared in Parramatta Children's Court via video link and smiled to the courtroom as she heard she would not be released on bail, the Daily Telegraph reports.

"You need to remain in custody for now until next Thursday, at least," Magistrate Anthony Spence told the girl.

"Ok, thank you," the 15-year-old replied.'

Link here. Excerpt:

'Minister for Mental Health Mark Butler has announced $5.24 million for a new suicide prevention initiative to be rolled out on construction sites across Australia.

Minister Butler announced the funding for suicide prevention program Mates in Construction at a construction industry conference in South Australia.

Mr Butler said the program would build better connections between construction workers, mental health professionals and other organisations to offer support for people in these industries who are at risk of suicide.
...
“Getting men to seek help on mental health issues is notoriously difficult, but the Mates in Construction program seems to have cracked this chestnut for the building and construction industry.”
...
“We have more than 23,000 workers in the program nationally and we connect two to three workers to help each other every day - I believe this additional funding will help us save lives,” Mr Gullestrup said.'

Foreskin Pride March, 4-5 Aug. 2012, Vancouver, Canada, a project of CAN-FAP

Watch the short video of the Foreskin Pride Salute.

Visit CAN-FAP’s Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/canfap

Visit http://ForeskinPride.org/ for details on the 4-5 Aug. 2012 Foreskin Pride March in Vancouver, BC, Canada.

Article here. Excerpt:

'“With deployments on the rise from the first Gulf War through the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, especially for National Guard and Reserve members, a majority of the states have implemented a patchwork of laws designed to protect service members in child custody and visitation cases. But the rules aren't consistent across the country,” says Eric Fish, legal counsel for the Uniform Law Commission.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Why MGM and FGM are not considered equally reprehensible defies compassionate reason.

FGM is carried out – for cultural/religious reasons – by restraining a young girl and removing her clitoris with a sharp implement. It is done without her consent ostensibly in order to control the sexual urges of women.
MGM was not uncommon practice in western Europe until recently. It even had mainstream medical sanction. But more recently the justification for MGM has been undermined. If it is not medically necessary then there are no good reasons to mutilate a child's body.

Article here. Excerpt:

'Malawian cancer expert at the country’s sole certified oncology unit at the Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital (QUECH) has asked authorities to consider exploring possibilities of using medical male circumcision as a measure of reducing cases of cervical cancer in women.

The country’s lone oncologist, Dr Leo Masamba told the Malawi News Agency (Mana) that though no research has been conducted locally, there are theoretical linkages between the HIV virus and the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) which is one of the major causes of cervical cancer in women.

Dr Masamba’s sentiments come at a time when more men are willingly to go for certified medial male circumcision since its endorsement by the World Health Organization (WHO) as a means of reducing HIV infection in 2007.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Crane-Banford said Marshall has made progress when it comes to Title IX but the law presents challenges.

The school now offers the maximum number of scholarships in women's sports. The women also don't have to provide some of their equipment anymore -- a change implemented within the last five years, Crane-Banford said.

But other areas of compliance are trickier, especially when it comes to getting participation numbers proportional to enrollment, which fluctuates each semester.

There's a cap on men's sports teams and a floor on women's sports participation, but that number is "kind of a moving target," Crane-Banford said, depending on total school enrollment.'

Letter here. Excerpt:

'David Brooks shines a light on the worsening situation for boys in education [“Time to change the cookie-cutter approach to school,” Opinion, July 9]. While convincing in his case that there is indeed a problem, he comes up short on solutions, other than to point out the obvious fact that one size does not fit all.

As an educator and father to an adolescent male, I believe one solution is to increase the number of male teachers in elementary, middle and high school. When I was in middle school in the 1970s, at least half of my teachers were male. In stark contrast, my son had only one male teacher during the two years of middle school he just completed.
...
I did not like all my teachers, male or female, and surely not all of them liked me, but the six male teachers I can specifically remember — all very different in style, personality, and physique — no doubt contributed in some way to my modest success in school, even if just in allowing me to see myself reflected in the mirror of education.'

Article here. Excerpt:

'Statistics released this week by the Teaching Agency have revealed a notable increase in the number of male trainee primary school teachers in the past four years. This is an encouraging sign for those worried by the gender imbalance among teachers that has typically characterised primary education in Britain.

According to the research, in 2008/9 there were just 2,467 male primary school teachers (or 15 per cent of the total) yet in 2011/12 the number had increased to 3,743 (or 19 per cent of the total).

Article here. Excerpt:

'Michael Gove wants male role models for boys and better discipline he says. Yet, yesterday he let his civil servants knock back a Free School application that offered just that.

Mr Gove has also said he wants more male teachers. He is right, they are needed. To our cost, teaching has become a female-dominated profession in both secondary and primary schools. Fewer than one in four recruits are men. Only 25% of teachers are men and it is set to get worse as the profession sheds older members.

The three main teachers’ unions too are led by women. The simple fact is that this is not a great environment for men to work in. With the elimination of so many single-sex schools, boys today can go through their entire schooling without ever being taught by a man.

This is quite, quite wrong. I would go so far as to say it is a disaster. No wonder so many of our young men are in crisis, out of control, on drugs and unemployable.'