All Entries Tagged With: "Human Rights"
Appeals Circuit Grants Stay on Prop 8 Case
It turns out advocates for same-sex marriage were right to treat last week’s historic court ruling with a hefty dose of caution. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco froze Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision which struck down California’s ban on same-sex marriage as discriminatory and unconstitutional. The three-judge panel issued their ruling without explanation in a brief, two-page document which imposed a stay on Walker’s Aug. 4 decision that struck down the voter-approved Proposition 8.
“I’m completely devastated by this,” Rebekkah Guston, a self-identified lesbian from Missouri, explains. “The battle for gay legitimacy is being fought in California, and this is a huge setback in our movement. How much longer do they expect citizens to wait for them to decide we deserve equal protection?”
Guston, like countless other gay couples and advocates in the status quo, is not comforted by the built-in provision of the Ninth Circuit’s ruling. According to the document, an appeal will be heard on Dec. 6.
“I suppose they think we should be grateful that we’re still receiving something like due process, but when it’s being shared in the same breath as denying you other rights, it just comes across as lip service,” she says.
Strange Bedfellows
But others are recognizing that the unusually groundbreaking nature of the case calls for any number of accommodations and unconventional forms of redress.
“I think the court realized the importance of this case and expedited it,” Geoff Kors, executive director of Equality California, the state’s largest gay civil rights organization, tells The San Francisco Gate. “Normally, the Ninth Circuit court takes a year and a half to decide an issue, but this one they’ve indicated they want done in months.”
The stay was granted just 48 hours before California was set to start issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples, as instructed in Walker’s ruling. Since rendering his decision two weeks ago, both Jerry Brown, California’s attorney general, and governator Arnold Schwarzenegger–the chief defendant in the Perry case--publicly stated their support for gay marriage.
“The Administration believes the public interest is best served by permitting the Court’s judgment to go into effect, thereby restoring the right of same-sex couples to marry in California,” Schwarzenegger’s brief reads, according to CNN. “Doing so is consistent with California’s long history of treating all people and their relationships with equal dignity and respect.”
The public display of support from Brown and Schwarzenegger seemed to guarantee that gay marriage had a strong foundation that would bolster Walker’s decision under judicial scrutiny. According to John Schwartz of The New York times, Walker’s lengthy analysis was deliberately constructed as a “finding of fact,” in the hopes of providing greater defense against a possible appeal in the future.
“The reason, he said, is that while appeals courts often overturn lower-court judges on their findings of law — like the proper level of scrutiny to apply to Proposition 8 — findings of fact are traditionally given greater deference,” Schwartz writes on Aug. 4.
Losing the Battle to Win the War
Which may mean that the battle is far from over, particularly as legal scholars see this most recent development as beneficial to the long-term health of the cause. The stay delays the case’s appearance before the Supreme Court, which will inevitably invite other states to consider taking their own actions to approach same-sex marriage with a fresh prospective. When voters passed Proposition 8 two years ago, they did so with a slight, 52 percent majority. In recent months, statistics have revealed a complete reversal of the trend, with nearly 53 percent of residents in favor of extending marriage rights to gay couples. Such a trend is indicative of a culture that is not only becoming more tolerant of same-sex couples, but more favorable to the extension of their inalienable rights. Capitalizing on this could create a smart legal strategy, scholars argue.
“In the year or more that it could now take for the case to reach the high court, more states will have time to adopt same-sex marriage statutes, and more judicial opinions will be formed to support the issue, the thinking goes,” Daniel B. Wood opines in the Aug. 17 edition of The Christian Science Monitor.
Had the panel not issued a stay on Walker’s ruling, supporters of Proposition 8 were prepared to seek a stay from the U.S. Supreme Court. Already divided on the issue of same-sex marriage, even the most sympathetic Justices–Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Anthony Kennedy and newcomer Elena Kagan–are likely to find the issue of rights affirmation Herculean in nature. Kagan, especially, amidst the rumors of her own sexuality, her lack of judicial experience and her age, is likely to feel the pressure to prove herself as a worthy, neutral interpreter of the law, thus breaking with the liberal block if she can find a sound enough reason to do so. Delaying the appearance of the case before the court may assure the ultimate victory, The Christian Science Monitor suggests.
“In terms of the ultimate result, this may be a good thing for Prop. 8 opponents because it doesn’t force the issue before the US Supreme Court right now,” Kelly Strader, a law professor at Southwestern Law School, tells the publication.
She also cautions Proposition 8 supporters from celebrating the Ninth Circuit’s decision to stay Walker’s ruling. San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who appeared before the Ninth Circuit to ask for marriage licenses to be issued to same-sex couples, maintained that Prop. 8 supporters have no right to appeal or even ask for a stay. Obviously, proponents for Proposition 8 have disagreed they lack ground. In a nutshell, the stay was granted to give proponents for Proposition 8 time to demonstrate their ground in seeking to appeal Judge Walker’s ruling. It means that a simple stay of Walker’s ruling isn’t a guarantee of anything.
“I think if they are overly optimistic from this, they are misreading the ruling,” Strader tells the San Francisco Gate. “It will be a different panel of judges which will ultimately decide this.”
Such words are a small comfort to Guston, who had been considering marriage options for her partner of five years. She’s at the place where she feels she can’t take any decision at face value.
“Maybe this isn’t a loss, but I don’t really see it as a win, either,” she says. “All I know is at the end of the day, whatever hope I had from the decision given two weeks ago is gone.”
Obama Administration Extends Asylum for Domestic Violence Victims
A Mexican woman with a history of domestic violence at the hands of her common-law husband was granted asylum by the Obama administration in a groundbreaking case that holds promise for future seekers of asylum with similar backgrounds.
The woman, whose identity in the press has been abbreviated to “L.R.” due to the confidential nature of asylum cases, had first filed for asylum five years ago, but her case’s implications will redefine policies that are nearly two decades in the making. A similar case featuring a woman from Guatemala had been pending for 15 years before receiving approval last December.
“The Department of Homeland Security has recognized that asylum should be available to women who have suffered domestic violence and whose governments won’t protect them,” Simona Agnolucci, a lawyer with the Howard Rice law firm in San Francisco who represented L.R., tells The New York Times. “Now the day finally came when the department said these are the criteria required to show a case for asylum.”
The ruling in L.R.’s favor will likely begin turning the tides for international victims of domestic violence, whose claims have largely been ignored and dismissed by the asylum process. During the initial application, L.R.’s legal team was presented with a list of narrowly defined guidelines that would have to be proved in order for asylum to be granted.
L.R.’s attorneys argued the cultural and political biases of Mexico guaranteed that she had no recourse within her home country. One attorney, Alicia Elena Perez Duarte y Norona, a former special prosecutor in Mexico City for crimes against women, insisted that L.R. could not secure assistance from the police in Mexico because of “the enormous social and cultural tolerance of this abuse, resulting in the virtual complicity of authorities who should prevent and punish these violent acts,” according to The Times.
Bring Me Your Huddled Masses
Not everyone is celebrating the gradual expansion of guidelines in favor of abuse victims. Against the backdrop of identity politics, conservative pundits are already wringing their hands over the possibility of allowing more immigration into the country, particularly from Latin countries.
“If we’re going to expand certain categories of asylum from their original definition, then some clarification from Congress is warranted,” Jon Feere, legal analyst for the Center for Immigration Studies, which supports stricter enforcement of immigration laws, tells MSNBC on August 14.
But it’s an idea that advocates against domestic violence find particularly absurd.
“There are so many obstacles to fleeing their home countries,” Pamela Goldberg, who works on asylum jurisprudence for the UNHCR in Washington, D.C., tells MSNBC. “There is no such thing under asylum law as a blanket, ’say the magic words and you’re in’ situation.”
Not to mention the process of applying for and receiving asylum is long, complicated and financially, cost-prohibitive. As with the Guatemala case, many applications languish for years and, for the cases that involve gender-based persecution or violence, the applicants are denied before they ever see the inside of a courtroom. Most will not have access to the resources afforded to L.R., who even had the Department of Homeland Security intervene on her behalf, because the system is stacked against them from the get-go.
“It is doubtful that many abused women will have the same resources and support that were available to L.R. and that were the keys to success in her case,” Jason Dzubow, a Washington-based immigration attorney, writes at The Asylumist. ”However, L.R.’s case has established a framework for asylum based on domestic violence. Now, at least, such women have a chance to gain protection in the United States.”
As Michelle Chen writes for Colorlines, women around the world who are systematically brutalized and killed are rendered invisible on two levels—first by their murderers, and then by a society that looks the other way.
Especially since decisions like L.R.’s have precedent. Gender-motivated violence as a reason for political asylum first came to light in 1995, when a woman from Togo sought asylum to escape genital mutilation. Internationally, countries such as Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom have granted asylum on the grounds of gender-based violence, which domestic violence often is. Yet even in these countries, the numbers often remain low because the ability of women to escape such situations is incredibly compromised by factors beyond their control. It’s a model that most believe will repeat with the United States.
“Looking at Canada and other countries [that offer such asylum], we don’t see that it opens the floodgates,” Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, tells The Washington Post.
But for advocates for asylum reform, the fear that it might shouldn’t be used to justify denying victimized women access to resources that could assist them.
“In the absence of a comprehensive overhaul that would establish a more uniform standard of justice, decisions like Perdomo are the best hope women have for enfranchisement in a world that treats them, on many levels, as second-class citizens,” Chen’s July 21 blog post opines.
While it may seem Chen’s logic is feeding into the argument that political asylum will signal an open-door policy for immigration, it’s worth questioning why a flood of battered women into this country would be so reprehensible. The idea that we ought to be actively discouraging abused, battered and victimized women from finding refuge within our borders is not only antithetical to the principles upon which those borders were founded, but demonstrating an appalling indifference to human suffering.
While the culture of the United States isn’t without it’s skeletons regarding domestic violence, there are more resources in place to assist women fleeing abusive situations than the majority of countries which are undoubtedly to emerge in the forthcoming applications. And while our own rate of domestic violence is a problem that has failed to be adequately addresssed, we nevertheless remain in a unique position to offer remedy to women who have even fewer alternatives elsewhere.
Do you think the United States should extend political asylum on the grounds of domestic violence? Is there a possibility it will increase the influx of immigration? Weigh in!
Judge Finds Proposition 8 Unconstitutional
The battle for gay rights reached a zenith today with a California judge handing down the decision that Proposition 8, the California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage, violates the Constitution. While dozens of states have grappled with the question of whether gay marriage is a violation of their individual constitutions, this is the first time laws against gay marriage have been considered on a Federal level.
Despite the looming Federal framework that his decision will almost certainly create, United States District Judge Vaughn Walker’s decision was rooted firmly with California itself.
“Plaintiffs have demonstrated by overwhelming evidence that Proposition 8 violates their due process and equal protection rights and that they will continue to suffer these constitutional violations until state officials cease enforcement of Proposition 8,” his ruling reads. “California is able to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, as it has already issued 18,000 marriage licenses to same-sex couples and has not suffered any demonstrated harm as a result.”
While the issue of same-sex marriages has been a hotly contested issue with California residents since the right was briefly extended and taken away a short time later, this decision seems to be signaling an end, despite both sides vowing to continue the fight before the decision was announced. The supporters of Prop. 8, however, may have unintentionally allowed their poker faces to crumble yesterday evening with their last-minute filing seeking for the ban on same-sex marriages to remain in place during the appeals process.
“After court officials on Tuesday announced plans to release the decision, Prop. 8’s sponsors filed papers making it clear they expect to lose this round,” Bob Egelko writes for The San Francisco Chronicle earlier today. “They asked Walker, if he rules against them, to leave the ban on same-sex marriages in place while they appeal. Lawyers for Prop. 8’s backers told the judge they are confident that any such ruling would be overturned on appeal. They said a stay would honor the will of the voters and would not harm same-sex couples, who can still register as domestic partners.”
TIMES ARE CHANGING
But domestic partners isn’t enough for nearly 52 percent of California residents. A recent Field Poll found that the percent of Californians who support gay marriage now mirrors the same percent that two years ago voted against it (while The Los Angeles Times puts the figure at 53)–suggesting that biases can be changed in a relatively short amount of time. Recent polls have confirmed an overwhelming shift in the general American attitude towards gay rights, mirroring the legislative and judicial push seen from a handful of important decisions from the overturning of the HIV travel ban to the Obama administration’s commitment to overturning “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
“This is potentially a huge victory,” Chris Matthews told viewers during his “Hardball” session on MSNBC. “Expect this case to go all the way to the Supreme Court.”
Two same-sex couples, Kristin M. Perry and Sandra B. Stier and Paul T. Katami and Jeffrey J. Zarrillo, along with the city of San Francisco, sued the state after Proposition 8 passed with a slight majority of voter support in 2008. The law banned same-sex marriage five months after California’s state Supreme Court legalized them, leaving somewhere around 18,000 same-sex couples who married during that time in limbo. However, Walker argues that these same 18,000 couples demonstrate how Prop 8 “cannot withstand any level of scrutiny” in relation to state interests.
“Proposition 8 cannot withstand any level of scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause, as excluding same-sex couples from marriage is simply not rationally related to a legitimate state interest,” he writes. “One example of a legitimate state interest in not issuing marriage licenses to a particular group might be a scarcity of marriage licenses or county officials to issue them. But marriage licenses in California are not a limited commodity, and the existence of 18,000 same-sex married couples in California shows that the state has the resources to allow both same-sex and opposite-sex couples to wed.”
CALIFORNIA IS JUST THE BEGINNING
Perry v. Schwarzenegger isn’t the only decision currently capturing headlines in the interest of gay rights. In Massachusetts, the Federal Defense of Marriage Act, known as DOMA, sought to deny recognition to same-sex couples. As gay marriage has been permitted in the state for several years, U.S. District Judge Joseph Tauro stated that the law interferes with the right of a state to define marriage and therefore denies married gay couples access to some Federal benefits. He ruled almost a month ago in favor of gay couples’ rights in two separate challenges to DOMA, which the administration of President Barack Obama has argued for repealing. DOMA was pushed through by the conservative agenda under George W. Bush’s administration.
The end result of DOMA’s appeal, coupled with Walker’s rejection of Proposition 8, will have implications for the national movement to secure and protect rights for same-sex individuals and couples in this country. It’s signaling the beginning of a seismic shift in the American jurisprudence, which experienced a number of setbacks earlier this year from the initial Constance McMillen decision to the Obama administration’s earlier reluctance to honor the promise to end “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” The decision in Perry v. Schwarzenegger, articulated over 138 pages, will ultimately leave many of the arguments against gay marriage behind.
“Moral disapproval alone is an improper basis on which to deny rights to gay men and lesbians,” Walker’s conclusion reads. “The evidence shows conclusively that Proposition 8 enacts, without reason, a private moral view that same-sex couples are inferior to opposite-sex couples.”
Of course, Perry v. Schwarzenegger is revolutionary for a number of other reasons. The suit was brought by David Boies and Ted Olsen, two attorneys who previously argued against each other in the 2000 Bush v. Gore recount case. Heralded by news outlets as “the most unlikely of allies,” the liberal Boies and conservative Olsen, nevertheless viewed the lawsuit as necessary in the name of equality. Urging advocates for equality to stop framing the debate as liberal versus conservative, Olsen has recently become the darling of the left with his emotional and eloquent appeal against Proposition 8.
THE BATTLE IS FAR FROM OVER
Despite the historic decision, some advocates are cautious in their praise.
“Cheers for judge, though I suspect, given the current make-up of the Supreme Court, the decision shall be overturned shortly,” Kris Spellman, a student from Rohnert Park, Calif., says.
Andrew Koppelman, a professor at Northwestern Law School, predicts to the New York Times that Judge Walker’s ruling will make it difficult for the highest court in the land to uphold bans of same-sex marriage. While appeals courts often overturn lower-court judges on their findings of law, findings of facts are given a stronger and greater defense, and Walker’s concise thought process speaks directly to the justice most likely to make the difference in whether Walker’s ruling gets overturned–Anthony M. Kennedy. Kennedy is the most traditional swing vote, casting the tie-breaking decision which struck down Texas’ sodomy laws. According to Doug NeJaime, an associate professor at Loyola Law School, Walker’s reasoning and execution in his opinion is “speaking directly to Justice Kennedy” by allowing the Court to use a lower level of scrutiny.
However, the most important item to take away from today is that rights, which have never been up for public validation, were reaffirmed today. As Rachel Maddow is keen to point out during discussions about gay marriage and ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’ they’re called rights precisely because they are protected, not matters up for public debate or voting. Seeking to circumvent that equal protection for any group is not only a suppression of those rights but a violation of the Constitution, which Judge Walker wisely ruled today.
It’s fair to assume that even the most conservative rotation of judges on the Supreme Court will have no way to justify any other interpretation.
Personal Technology Fuels Violence in the Congo
Your computer, cell phone, iPod, and digital camera all share a dirty secret: each one of these personal technology devices use tantalum, tungsten, tin and gold mined in the Congo. According to a spoof on YouTube, you’re funding the deadliest conflict since World War II.
The sketch — which accuses both MAC and PC of using the “3 Ts…and gold. Gotta have gold.” — refers to what have come to be known as “conflict minerals.” These minerals are mined under slave-labor conditions and smuggled to and traded in Asia by armed groups in return for money that is then used to buy more weapons. These groups make millions of dollars each year, but are better known for controlling their territories and natural resources through violence and terror.
These minerals are bought in large quantities by the manufacturers of electronic devices found in our homes, purses and pockets. The link between our spending and their suffering is clear.
The issue on our end is a familiar one – we need transparency in the producer-consumer chain. Last year two legislative acts were proposed to regulate the trade of conflict minerals: H.R. 4128, The Conflict Minerals Act, and S.891, The Congo Conflict Minerals Act. Both have been sitting in committees for months with no movement, but if passed would require that U.S. Commerce Department-sanctioned auditors go to mines to declare whether they are conflict-free. Then, importers would have to certify whether they were importing conflict minerals, and electronic companies would declare whether their products are conflict-free (like the Kimberley Process for blood diamonds).
Steve Jobs actually responded to a concerned consumer’s question on what Apple’s position regarding conflict minerals. His response, though brief, highlights how difficult it would be to solve the problem, even with all the legislation the U.S. might care to throw down:
Yes. We require all of our suppliers to certify in writing that they use conflict few materials. But honestly there is no way for them to be sure. Until someone invents a way to chemically trace minerals from the source mine, it’s a very difficult problem.
Sent from my iPhone
Even if we all band together and declare that we will not buy products made with conflict minerals, how are we — or even well-meaning manufacturers — to know that the minerals being sent are conflict-free? There are no easy answers. Considering the corruption rampant through much of Africa, facility auditors could be bought off or just plain lied to.
For now (unless any readers have a better idea), it has to be enough to make our electronics companies aware that this is important to us.
To do that much is simple. Use this online form to tell the major electronics companies that if they take conflict out of their products, you’ll buy them.
Labor Pains: Pregnant Inmates Give Birth Under Restraint
It sounds like something out of a movie-of-the-week on Lifetime. The image of a visibly pregnant woman in prison stripes, laboring to give birth with her wrists and ankles shackled to a hospital gurney. But the mom-to-be isn’t Stephanie Zimbalist; she’s a real person, and the haunting image is one that takes place at prisons across the country.
According to National Public Radio, Gail Smith, the executive director of the group Chicago Legal Advocacy for Incarcerated Mothers, the practice of shackling pregnant women while giving birth is “tantamount to torture.”
“I think that there is a general attitude on the part of some people that they don’t deserve to be treated with full human rights,” Smith says. “And I find that appalling.”
Recently, the issue of restrained delivery has received some national attention. Two weeks ago, an Arkansas jury found a pregnant inmate had her rights violated when a guard shackled her while she was giving birth, but they awarded her just $1 for her pain and suffering. The former prisoner, who gave birth in 2003, asserted that the shackling unnecessarily increased her comfort during labor and heightened the risk of complications for both her and her child.
According to Amnesty International, an international nongovernmental organization dedicated to studying and ending human rights violations, women undergoing childbirth need to be “mobile so that they can assume various positions as needed,” which is limited and usually prevented due to the nature of shackling. In “Giving Birth in Shackles: A Constitutional and Human Rights Violation,” Dana L. Sichel contends that the medical industry’s reliance on emergency cesareans presents an additional set of problematic circumstances when the pregnant woman is restrained during labor, including permanent brain damage for the baby. Ultimately, Sichel concludes, the shackling of pregnant women is not only inhumane, but a violation of multiple international codes of conduct and the Eighth Amendment.
“Because the U.S. Supreme Court has opened the door for international human rights arguments, the country should look to international human rights for an indication as to how American law should protect its pregnant prisoners,” Sichel writes.
Even though the Federal Bureau of Prisons banned the shackling of pregnant prisoners two years ago, the memorandum doesn’t impact state, local or juvenile facilities. And yet even several states that have banned the practice are still experiencing it within their respective prisons, including Illinois, which became the first state to enact legislation against shackling in 1999.
“In fact, more than 20 lawsuits have been filed by women against the Cook County sheriff’s office since 2008, even though Illinois became the first state to ban the practice in 1999,” Christine Cupaiuolo of Our Bodies, Our Blog writes on July 20. “The lawsuits were granted class-action status last month; attorneys told Hsu that there ultimately could be up to 150 women included in the case.”
The recent attention to the issue of shackling inmates has yielded support from other areas. Both the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists have come forward to condemn the practice. According to Andrea Hsu’s NPR story, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists “has testified that physical restraints have “made the labor and delivery process more difficult than it needs to be; thus overall putting the health and lives of the women and unborn children at risk.”
But most prison officials downplay the risk. Steve Patterson, a spokesperson for the Cook County sheriff’s office, insists to NPR that prison guards are not trained to know when a woman is in labor, and cannot make that determination. Once a medical professional has determined that a female inmate is in labor, the restraints are removed, as per standard policy. Not surprisingly, Patterson also uses fear mongering to compel the public to be “aware of the dangers” pregnant inmates pose while unrestrainted.
“We have to bring inmates to the same area that the general public comes to,” Patterson tells NPR. “So, if you’re laying in hospital bed, and in the next hospital bed is a woman who’s in on a double murder charge, because she’s pregnant she shouldn’t be handcuffed to the side of the bed — I think if you’re the person laying in bed next to her you might disagree.”
Except, of course, that the vast majority of women doing time and giving birth in prison are incarcerated for nonviolent offenses, such as check fraud, meaning that most women will never have to worry about sharing a birthing room with a murderer. In particular, policies passed under the zeal of the War on Drugs have disproportionately impacted the poor and minorities–the same demographic of women who are likely to be sentenced to serve hard time for relatively minor infractions.
The end result of this unusual bundle of race, class and gender politics on incarceration is a slew of procedures designed without the rights of women in mind, and a failure of colliding sociopolitical forces beyond the scope of just this article. It’s also worth nothing that while advocates of shackling cite escape concerns as justification for keeping a laboring woman bound, there’s been no escape attempt by any pregnant woman while in custody since 1999.
It’s the argument that a pregnant inmate might attempt an escape which convinced Sen. Evie Hudak, a Democrat from Colorado, to take action against the practice of restraining women during birth. She dismisses the idea of escaping while in labor as “ludicrous” with the posting of an armed guard outside the birthing room and the very grueling nature of delivery.
“Maybe it’s based on a misunderstanding that men have, who have never been through labor and are generally in charge of the corrections system. One person said the women might escape. I think that shows a misunderstanding of how a woman feels during labor and after delivery,” Hudak tells The Boulder Weekly. “At the beginning of labor, contractions can be 20 minutes apart, but you don’t know when the next one is going to come. When you’re in that pain, the last thing you want is to be away from a hospital or medical center. And running? Oh, my God. I’m sorry, but it’s just ridiculous to think that a woman could run at the speed necessary to escape. That’s the time when women feel the most vulnerable and helpless in their entire life, because the body is in control, not you.”
Despite the considerable health risks and the lack of justification from any other angle, states aren’t in any rush to correct the issue. Part of it, research suggests, seems to simply be due to a comfort with an established routine.
NPR reports that Ginette Ferszt, associate professor and psychiatric clinical nurse specialist from the University of Rhode Island College of Nursing, recently conducted a survey of state prisons to learn more about what practices are in place for pregnant inmates. She sent out questionnaires to wardens of prisons in all 50 states and received replies from 19. The results verified that at least six cuff a woman’s hand or ankle when labor begins, and four reported that the shackles remain on during delivery. At least two facilities use leg irons, belly chains and handcuffs during transport.
More than likely, there are far greater human rights violations taking place in states where the wardens chose not to respond. It’s a horror we expect from a country that routinely torpedoes human rights, not one whose official branding is home of the free. Currently, 40 states have no formal legislation against the shackling of pregnant inmates, and the solidarity of states to oppose shackling is necessary to set forth more appropriate guidelines for labor and delivery.
To urge your representative to take action and outlaw this inhumane practice, click here.
Justice Department Sues Arizona Over Immigration Laws
After months of controversy, the United States Department of Justice is issuing a lawsuit against the recent wave of anti-immigration laws passed in Arizona. The suit will challenge the constitutionality of the law targeting undocumented immigrants, asserting specifically that the requirement for state and local police officials to detain, question and arrest individuals present in the country illegally during the enforcement of other laws, like traffic stops, usurps federal authority.
The lawsuit comes after months of political and social dissension throughout the country. The immigration overhaul in Arizona largely divided the nation through the spring and early summer, amid reports of city-sponsored boycotts, public demonstrations across college campuses and a wave of copycat bills in 11 other states.
“[Immigration] just seemed like it was this big issue that kind of defined the first six months of 2010,” Marisol Torrez, a junior at Kansas State University, says. “It became a call to action. You expected to see a need to keep fighting the good fight for gay rights, but not immigration because we all came from some country at some time, and probably not always legally. I mean, every time I see Jan Brewer’s face [pictured left] on TV speaking about immigrants like they’re the enemy, I just want to ask her if ‘Brewer’ is her Cherokee name.”
While Torrez’s sentiment is shared by a significant portion of the population — particularly those under the age of 30 — a recent poll found that 52% of Americans support Arizona’s laws.
“Most citizens are fed up with the Federal government not taking action on the issue of immigration,” Brian Pratt, a 26-year-old law student at Empire College in northern California, says. “The reasoning then becomes, if the government isn’t going to do it the right way, we’ll support doing it the wrong way and force them to fix it.”
Yet for many, the Arizona law does little to ultimately address the so-called immigration problem in the status quo, and has instead created a set of new problems, including multi-million dollar losses to the state’s tourist industry. While the law isn’t set to go into effect until July 29, many families of undocumented workers have opted to leave Arizona before officials have the chance to remove them. Just last month, The Arizona Republic reported that small businesses and individual schools are suffering most from the departure of immigrant families from the state.
“Supporters say their departure will save the state money because taxpayers won’t have to cover the cost of education or social services for their children,” Daniel Gonzalez writes on July 6. “But the effect of illegal immigrants leaving Arizona is not that clear-cut. Some school districts that serve large immigrant neighborhoods already have seen sharp drops in enrollment. That could save the state money but hurt individual schools because every student equates to $4,404 in per-pupil state funding. Analysts say the flight of illegal immigrants also could lead to a loss of sales tax and other revenue. And their departure is hurting the apartment complexes and stores where they live and shop.”
Arizona officials have been largely unsympathetic, insisting that the closing businesses and hurting consumers are “additional victims of illegal immigration,” having had their industry or success bolstered artificially by the government’s inability to properly regulate the influx of undocumented workers.
In fact, the major bone of contention the Federal government is taking with the state is the disruption of the balance of powers. Determination of citizenship is a uniquely Federal right, long ago addressed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution. To infringe on those articulated responsibilities, as the Arizona law seeks to do, unquestionably undermines Federal effort, authority and power.
“Arizonans are understandably frustrated with illegal immigration, and the federal government has a responsibility to comprehensively address those concerns,” Attorney General Eric Holder’s written statement, released in conjunction with the announcement of the impending lawsuit, states. “But diverting federal resources away from dangerous aliens such as terrorism suspects and aliens with criminal records will impact the entire country’s safety. Setting immigration policy and enforcing immigration laws is a national responsibility. Seeking to address the issue through a patchwork of state laws will only create more problems than it solves.”
The public announcement of the forthcoming lawsuit comes just days after President Obama called out Congress to develop and execute a comprehensive overhaul of the nation’s immigration system. Though he gave some lip service to the frustration of Americans clamoring for a response to the so-called “immigration problem,” he made it a point to criticize the rash actions of Arizona’s legislature and urge for national legislation to prevent other states from following suit.
Obama’s harsh words and the administration’s lawsuit are just two of the most recent moves of protest against the Draconian law. The Americans Civil Liberties Union has already filed a legal challenge to the presumptions of the law. Lucas Guttentag, director of the ACLU’s Immigrants’ Rights Project — the division that officially filed the challenge — confirmed that the ACLU will continue pursuing resolution in spite of the lawsuit.
“The administration’s lawsuit is a cannon shot across the bow of other states that may be tempted to follow Arizona’s misguided approach,” Guttentag says. But there’s still more work to be done.
Advocates for the Arizona measure have likewise criticized the move as “premature,” “irresponsible,” and “with no regard to the citizens most effected” by the law’s “patriotic intentions.” Republican senators John McCain and Jon Kyl were particularly upset, releasing a joint statement blaming the Obama administration for failing to address immigration more comprehensively.
“The Obama administration has not done everything it can do to protect the people of Arizona from the violence and crime illegal immigration brings to our state,” the statement reads. “Until it does, the federal government should not be suing Arizona on the grounds that immigration enforcement is solely a federal responsibility.”
Of course, much of the terror talk rhetoric underpinning the rationale for supporting measures like the Arizona laws does little to actually address the problem. Undocumented immigrants can be vilified and blamed for a myriad of causes such as the rising cost of health care, unemployment and the crashing economy, but penalizing efforts does little to resolve the systemic issues.
“Where is the discussion, in all of this talk about immigration reform, of punishing the businesses that are allegedly giving away those jobs that we’re stealing from white people?” Torrez asks. “I mean, let’s pretend for a second that any suburban white teen or father wants to push a broom and buss tables at McDonald’s, and can’t because you’ve got one of us there. Why isn’t government imposing fines on the manager for paying people under the table and off-the-clock? You want to fix illegal immigration, stop making it so profitable for us to work, live and be somewhat free here.”
Until that happens, she says, as long as the demand is present, so will the supply be.
Do you think Arizona’s laws on immigration are unconstitutional? Do they go too far, or not far enough in crafting true immigration reform? Weigh in!
Photographer Captures Inmates, Finds Healing
They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, but for Deborah Luster, the art represents more than that. Her book, “One Big Self: Prisoners of Louisiana,” is a haunting echo of historical tintype, representing the stories left untold. Her subjects are the inmates of various prisons in the state of Louisiana, and the the fifth installment of the year-long NPR series, “Hidden World of Girls: Girls and the women they become.”
“While I was scouting to photograph in northeast Louisiana, I just kept coming across these little prisons,” Luster tells NPR on June 30. “It was a Sunday afternoon, and I knocked on the prison gate and the warden came out and I asked him if I might photograph some of the inmates there. I photographed there once and realized that it was a project I had been looking for for a long time, something in response to the murder of my mother. It was like it lifted when I went in the gates, it became something else.”
Luster’s mother, Jeanne Tovrea, was murdered by a contract killer in 1988. Her execution-style slaying haunted Luster, who believed that the man responsible would eventually come after her as well. The young woman had met the man eventually convicted of the killing beforehand, and harbored fear that their earlier association would lead him to murder her as well. Photography, she says, gave her the escape from the trauma.
“My mom had photographed constantly, my grandmother had photographed constantly,” she says. “Photography became something that I could think to do to try to dig out of the place I had found myself.”
Still, Luster herself couldn’t have imagined that her desire for healing would lead her to photographing inmates. From the women’s prison at St. Gabriel to the minimum security male prison in Transylvania and the maximum security prison of the Louisiana State Penitentiary, Luster’s photographs documented the untold stories of thousands of forgotten convicts. Her straightforward portraits, often depicting inmates holding objects such as a shoe or a box of candy, began to take on a life of her own. Teaming up with poet C.D. Wright, the two began to interview the inmates, creating poetry reflecting on the still life of the photographs.
“The decision was to photograph the inmates in their whole selves,” Wright tells NPR. “The perspective was that everyone is a whole person, that they’re not just the sum of their worst acts or even their best acts.”
Together, Luster and Wright collaborated on “One Big Self.” Depicting dozens of inmates over the course of her three-year project, Luster returned the majority of the photographs to the subjects themselves.
“I returned 25,000 prints to inmates,” Luster says. “They made themselves so vulnerable for me, and it’s not often that you have an encounter like that. I know a lot of it was that they were actually posing for the people that they loved — their husbands, their wives, their children.”
Featuring Wright’s poetry alongside Luster’s photographs, the book offers a jarring view into the hidden worlds of family, crime and incarceration, a particularly important study of intersections for the Bayou state. Last week, the Department of Justice released figures that reflected a drastic decline in prison populations in 24 states. In the 26 states that reported increases in population, Louisiana ranked third.
Such figures would likely not shock Luster’s subjects. At the Louisiana State Penitentiary, known more colloquially as Angola and The Farm, 90 percent of the inmates serving time will die in the prison. According to Assistant Warden Cathy Fontenot, about 74 percent of the prison’s population are “lifers,” or individuals serving a life-time sentence. Each year, around 32 Angola residents die, versus the just four that are paroled. In fact, Angola boasts the highest number of lifers of any prison in the United States.
Rather than view these individuals by their crimes and their placement within the system, Luster sought to produce “an authentic document to ward off forgetting,” showcasing inmates as they would prefer to be seen. Their reasons for posing, their used possessions change, but for many, the portrait sessions provide a rethinking of the relationship with violence.
“The last photograph for many of them is their mug shot,” Wright says. “Debbie is working out a long-term relationship to violence. This is a very sympathetic project for someone who is a survivor of such a violent act. America is a theme park of violence. It was important that these photographs were very posed and dignified.”
Interestingly, these days, Luster often finds herself thinking of her mother, and the influence Tovrea still holds over her work.
“My mother, I think it’s the kind of thing she would have done,” Luster says. “She had this way of looking right through the veneer, right into people. She could see the bottom in people. She liked to photograph her family, the food on your plate, you brushing your teeth. She photographed what she loved — and that’s what she loved.”
Such a perspective is one that Luster wants to share about the inmates. Despite being convicted of crimes, she argues, these are still individuals who should not be forgotten.
“Hidden World of Girls: Girls and the women they become” is a collaborative effort in conjunction with The Kitchen Sisters. “One Big Self” is also the subject of a forthcoming art exhibit.
Do you think projects like “One Big Self” can help understand violence and assist victims in recovering? Or does it glamorize the already fetishist nature of crime? Weigh in!
Rape-aXe Preventive Condom Ignites Controversy [Vlog]
Earlier this month, it was announced that Sonette Ehlers, a South African physician, had invented the world’s first female condom that would also serve as a deterrent against sexual violence. Featuring a row of deadly teeth designed to latch on to the genitalia of the would-be sex offender, the device can only be removed with the intervention of a licensed medical professional. But despite the obvious breakthrough encompassed in proposing a proactive measure against sexual violence, a number of questions are causing many anti-rape activists to be cautious in handing out their praise.
In what is sure to be only the first of many vlogs, Ashley-Michelle Papon gives a brief video response to the Rape-aXe.
Photo: Rape-aXe.com
Alternative Schools for GLBT Youth Proposed
For many gay rights activists, 2010 will be the year remembered for ups and downs in the name of advocacy. While the community won many deserved victories in the name of equality, including the beginning steps to repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” there were a number of reminders that we have a long way to go, particularly for students. Names like Ceara Sturgis, Lawrence King and Constance McMillen became household fixtures, synonymous with the woeful ineptitude of public schools to properly implement anti-bullying measures.
In the interim, there may be some hope. Leaders within several major metropolitan communities have been tossing around the idea of opening an alternative high school that would provide a safe learning environment for students that identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered. The push comes just days after multiple studies found record-breaking rates of absenteeism and poor academic achievement among students who feared repercussion for disclosing their sexual orientation.
“If we keep doing nothing, we are going to keep getting these horrifying levels of harassment, greater rates of skipping, not going to college and more tragic violence like the murder of Lawrence King,” Kevin Jennings, the founder and executive director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), tells CNN. “Those are our choices. We can continue to do nothing, and we know the results, or we can save young people’s lives and offer them an education and a future.”
The concept of gay-inclusive schools isn’t a new one. The Alliance School in Milwaukee and The Harvey Milk School in New York have both been operational for a number of years as qualified educational alternatives for teenagers. Both schools rankled the ire of the socially conservative, who viewed the schools as forcing a liberal agenda into the public education system. The arguments eventually shut down plans for a similar school in Chicago in 2008.
“It’s not to take away my compassion for anybody here. I try to raise my children righteously via the word of God via the Bible because this is my belief,” LaShawn Greer is quoted as saying to National Public Radio two years ago over the proposed Chicago school. “I cannot support with my own tax dollars paying for something that I don’t agree with.”
However, such an argument, according to Melinda Pratty, a college student and law school hopeful in eastern Kansas, obscures the issue.
“When it comes to our education, there’s a separation from religious beliefs there, too,” she says. “If you own property in this state, a portion of your taxes go to fund the public schools. You don’t get to decide which students in public schools are worthy of the money you are obligated to pay the government. These are the same rehashed arguments that tried to prevent integration of public schools with African-American students 50 years ago.”
Not surprisingly, the discussion about creating schools designed to provide safe alternatives for gay and trans students has yielded numerous comparisons to the struggle for racial acceptance and integration decades ago. Looking to the historic Brown v. Board of Education for inspiration, advocates are quick to remind supporters of the implications of “separate but equal.”
“If we create ‘Homo High,’ we don’t have to prohibit this behavior in other schools,” Rick Garcia, the political director for the LGBT advocacy group Equality Illinois, tells The Southern Poverty Law Center. “The reality is, we have to live as neighbors. We have to learn to tolerate one another, if not accept one another. All our kids should be safe in all our schools; segregation is not the answer.”
Of course, there is something to be said for Garcia’s concerns. Public schools are not typically known for safeguarding the rights of vulnerable students likely to be further victimized. And, in the case of gay and trans teens, schools often appear to be particularly negligent; indifferent and unwilling to change, making the idea of an alternative school particularly attractive in contrast to the outdated system.
Of course, the answer doesn’t have to be either/or. Not every student who identifies as gay or trans will opt to attend a school with this primary demographic. Similar to race or religion, a student’s sexual identity merely represents one facet of their personality, rather than the only determining factor. Likewise, the best approach would be as equally multi-faceted: Support the construction of such schools while simultaneously working to improve the structure with current institutions of education.
“If I were a high school student, and the only person openly gay at my school, I might really consider changing schools,” Pratty says. “But my peer group is important to me, too. The extracurricular activities are important, and so are the teachers I’ve come to know and count on for the last few years. Being gay is just one part of my personality, so how can the assumption be made that alone will decide where I feel comfortable attending school?”
While there are a number of advocates who agree with Pratty, sexual orientation is steadily becoming a major issue in how well students fare in educational settings. A 2008 study by GLSEN found that 86.2 percent of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students reported varying degrees of harassment and assault during school hours due to their sexual orientation. In all, 61 percent of students that identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered indicated that they felt unsafe at school, a number that correlated with a high drop-out rate.
Far more troubling, however, is that schools may be ultimately powerless to enact wide-sweeping reform within their administrations. Only 11 states have any kind of provisions offering protection from discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation, but fail to acknowledge trans status. States seems to be taking their cues from federal legislation, as the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act contains no language recognizing transfolk as a protected class, either.
However, America is losing the luxury not to act. Seven months ago, the Federal Bureau of Investigation found that hate crimes on the basis of sexual orientation had climbed 11 percent since 2008. This seems to illustrate a clear and present need to act in the interest of providing safe alternatives for students.
WEIGH IN: Could the creation of separate schools to protect gay and trans students give current public school administrations the excuse they need to avoid implementing more serious action against sexual orientation-specific bullying? Are such schools socially progressive or the modern segregation?
