Monthly Archives: February 2017

The co-founder of the Toronto chapter of the Black Lives Matter protest movement has come under scrutiny in recent days for an old Facebook post that declared white people were genetically inferior to their black peers.

Whiteness is not humxness, wroteYusra Khogali,in a now-deleted post (using gender-neutral alternative spelling). In fact, white skin is sub-humxn. All phenotypes exist within the black family and white [people] are a genetic defect of blackness.

Khogali proceeded to go on an extended pseudoscientific rant about the benefits of dark skin, according to The Toronto Sun. Melanin enables black skin to capture light and hold it in its memory mode which reveals that blackness converts light into knowledge, she claims at one point. Melanin directly communicates with cosmic energy.

White [people] are recessive genetic defects. This is factual, she claimed, nonfactually.

Khogali made the Facebook post months ago, but her comments resurfaced after she declared Canadian Prime MinisterJustin Trudeaua white supremacist terrorist, earning her criticism from liberal allies.

[image via screengrab]

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Black Lives Matter Leader: White People are 'Sub-Human,' 'Genetic Defects' - Mediaite

To celebrate its 40th anniversary, the EQT Pittsburgh Three Rivers Regatta will partner with Red Bull to bring a human-powered flying craft competition to the lineup of water, land and air events on the weekend of Aug. 4-6.

The contest on Aug. 5 Red Bull Flugtag (which means flying day in German) involves teams of five pairing together to create homemade flying machines. The teams then send them off a 22-foot-high flight deck to see which craft sails farthest before hitting the water.

In Boston last year, winning team Flite-Riot flew its craft 69 feet. The current record stands at 258 feet, set by a team calledChicken Whisperers from Long Beach, Calif.

Prospective pilots must submit their designs to http://www.RedBullFlugTag.comby May 1.Judges will review applications and select 40 teams to compete in a follow-up announcement on May 8.Participants must be 18 years of age or older.

Courtney Linder: clinder@post-gazette.comor 412-263-1707. Twitter @LinderPG.

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Human-powered flying crafts sail into this year's Regatta | Pittsburgh ... - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Chlorine gas attacks paved the way for Syrian forces as they advanced into rebel-held portions of east Aleppo during the final months of the battle for the city, a new studyfrom Human Rights Watch said Monday.

While forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad have usedchlorine gas on opposition fighters sporadically since 2014, the frequency of chemical attacks between Nov. 17 and Dec. 13 point to a military strategy to use the banned weapon to force both fighters and civilians fromAleppo, according to the report.

The pattern of the chlorine attacks shows that they were coordinated with the overall military strategy for retaking Aleppo, not the work of a few rogue elements, Ole Solvang, deputy emergencies director at Human Rights Watch, said in the report.

[Syrian military says it has retaken control of key city of Aleppo]

Human Rights Watch documented at least eight separate chlorine gas attacks before a cease-fire was signed Dec 13. The attacks resulted in the deaths of nine civilians, including four children, and wounded roughly 200. If confirmed, the attacks would be a significant breach of the 1993Chemical Weapons Convention that Syria signed in 2013. Although chlorine is not considered a chemical weaponby the convention because of its industrial uses, the document explicitly statesthat weaponizing the chemical properties of a substanceis prohibited.

When inhaled in large enough quantities, chlorine can be fatally toxic.

The Syrian government has routinely denied using internationally condemnedweapons such as chemical, cluster andincendiary munitions. In 2013, Syrian government forces were accused of using sarin gas in an attack that killed hundreds, bringingthe United States to the brinkof military action against Assad. In a last-minute deal coordinated by Russia,the Syrian presidentpledged to give up his chemical weaponstockpiles, and inOctober of that year signed the Chemical Weapons Convention. The Islamic State has also used chemical weapons, including variants of sulfur mustard powder.

Following the deal, however, Assad continued to use chlorine as a weapon. Last year, a United Nations investigative teamdeterminedthat Syrian government forces had been responsible for three separate gas attacks inApril 2014 and March 2015.

Although the report doesnt directly implicate Russia, it does say that Russian forces benefited from the strategic effects of the gas attacks. Russian forces had been providing close air support for Syrian government forces since September 2015 and flew hundreds, if not thousands, of sorties during the battle to retake Aleppo. Russian Special Operations forces also likely participated in the campaign, fighting and advisingalongside Syrian troops as they pushed into the city.

The report relied oninterviews with witnesses, videos, photographs and social media postings to verify the eight attacks. Some of theposts included pictures of thespent gas canisters dropped from Syrian helicoptersand footage of the trademark yellow-greenchlorine clouds billowing fromresidential areas.

The Human Rights Watch study was one of two reports released Monday that covered the battle of Aleppo. The Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank, published a report titled Breaking Aleppo that also accused the Syrian government of using chlorine bombs and the joint Syrian-Russian air campaign ofdropping cluster and incendiarymunitions on civilian areas.

Read more:

At 7, Bana al-Abed told the world about the siege of Aleppo on Twitter. Now, she is safe.

Heres what the end of Aleppos rebellion looks like

Link:
Syrian forces used gas attacks as key part of campaign to retake Aleppo, Human Rights Watch says - Washington Post

Lawyer Tamara Thermitus has been named head of the Quebec Human Rights Commission. Handout / Montreal Gazette

Its been a long time coming, but a change has finally come. The seemingly impossible became possible, right smack bang during Black History Month, almost like a long-awaited gift to Quebec blacks. Tamara Thermitus, an anti-discrimination lawyer of Haitian origin, was named head of the Quebec Human Rights Commission last week,with the unanimous support of the National Assembly.

Her appointmentwas not a slam dunk, however it may now appear; it was originally challenged by opposition politicianswho claimed that she was too multiculturalist and much too close for comfort to Dominique Anglade, a Liberal cabinet ministerwho also shares the same roots.

The Human Rights Commission is specifically mandated to ensure that Quebecs laws, bylaws, standards and institutional practices, both public and private, comply with the Quebec Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms, which prohibits discrimination based on race, colour, ethnic or national origin and religion.

Hitherto, the commission lacked both anglophone and minority representation, and since its creation in 1976, Thermitus willbe the second woman and the first black to oversee the organization a situation that testifiesto the underrepresentation of black Quebecers in decision-making bodies.

Despite the fact that the appointment of Thermitus as head of Quebec Human Rights Commission is truly symbolic for the blacks and the Haitian community in Quebec, blacks should not be lulled into a false sense of complacency. We have made strides and advances, giving the impression that everything is resolved, but this is not the case. We must press on for diversity with the appointment of the other four remaining human rights commissioners. There is an urgent and ongoing need for public education to ensure that there is better awareness regarding the value of diversity to society as a whole.

According to Premier Philippe Couillard, the appointment of Thermitus sends a very strong signal about the place that people from diverse backgroundsmust occupy in our society. Strong words well spoken would be better if adhered to. Parti Qubcois then-leadership candidate Jean-Franois Lise in September 2016 pointed out the presence of systemic racism in Quebec, and called on the government to spring into action rather than hold public consultations. In response, Couillards government said it would soon announce a plan to look into the issue. Since the creation of the Quebec Human Rights Tribunal in 1990, the Human Rights Commission has never brought a case of systemic racism before the tribunal.The first court decision on systemic racism in Quebec was issued only in 2013 by the Superior Court. That case involved Olthene Tanisma, a Haitian-born urban planner who successfully sued the City of Montreal, after his case was stalled at the Human Rights Commission.

In order to cultivate an arena of legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry, Couillard was repeatedly called upon when filling existing vacancies to give thoughtful and deliberate consideration to racial and linguistic diversity. At that time there was an unprecedented absence of black or anglophone commissioners in the current composition, which only served to further impair the decision-making process.

It stands to basic logic that in a world where perception can be as important as reality, it is critically important that visible minorities believe that the deck is evenly stacked, and that they have as much of a chance of being judged by someone who looks like them, as someone else.

The current appointment of Tamara Thermitus as head of the Quebec Human Rights Commission will go a long way toward allaying any fear and improving chances of a satisfactory resolution. But with her appointment,have black Quebecers seen the last of the past, and does this herald a new cast? Or willthis, as welcome as it is, be seen as a mere sop, an isolated gesture?

Yvonne Sam is a retired Montreal nurse and teacher.

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Opinion: Naming of Tamara Thermitus to human rights post is welcome - Montreal Gazette