Humanity: Good News, Bad News

[chi_z]

that's probably the toughest issue in structuring a society, sounds like a life's work type of thing.

[Lord J Esq]

Bad News:
Cheerleader in Texas Loses Final Court Challenge for Refusing to Cheer for Basketball Player Who Raped Her; Must Pay School District $45,000 in Court Costs

This isn't some lower court decision, either. She lost in the lower courts, lost in federal appeals court, and now the U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear her case.

The article takes the trouble to explain the courts' reasoning. By being a cheerleader, this person was representing her school in an official capacity. Thereby, she waived her right to free speech--in the form of withholding her cheerleading when her rapist was taking a free throw--while serving in that capacity.

Stories this disgusting usually have more in the background that we don't know about, but whatever other circumstances may be in play here, it is ethically inexcusable for a court to saddle a young person, who has been sexually assaulted, with tens of thousands of dollars in court costs for a "frivolous" lawsuit against her school district. This tells young people and poor people not to challenge the crimes committed against them. That's deplorable.

At this point, everybody emerges looking bad, but I hope the school district will show some grace and waive its entitlement to that compensation. Court costs can't usually be discharged in bankruptcy, and she's going to be stuck paying off this $45,000 probably for a good part of her life unless she can land a lucrative job at a young age or solicit charitable contributions from a sympathetic public (which would be difficult since she has not publicly released her identity).

Ugh.

[tushantin]

Bad News:
Cheerleader in Texas Loses Final Court Challenge for Refusing to Cheer for Basketball Player Who Raped Her; Must Pay School District $45,000 in Court Costs

Stories this disgusting usually have more in the background that we don't know about, but whatever other circumstances may be in play here, it is ethically inexcusable for a court to saddle a young person, who has been sexually assaulted, with tens of thousands of dollars in court costs for a "frivolous" lawsuit against her school district. This tells young people and poor people not to challenge the crimes committed against them. That's deplorable.

Ruined a good day. Here I am, celebrating mother's day and giving her a great time, and there's the news reminding me that there are young women out there having a miserable time and especially being oppressed by manipulative and broken systems.

Where the Anonymous when you need em?

[alfadorredux]

I do understand why the court reached the verdict that it did, but the case was not truly frivolous and the sentence (as distinct from the verdict) was not just: awarding the school district one penny and no court costs would have been more reasonable--especially since, if the court considers its time to have been wasted, it's the school district that's really at fault (they could just have turned a blind eye to one cheerleader not cheering, which would have been the humane thing to do under the circumstances, but someone obviously took it upon themselves to make an issue of it).

[Shee]

Wow.  Really disheartening.

[Syna]

The case is bad enough, but the comments on articles for the case is enough to make me want lobotomies for the masses.

[Romana]

Good News: Canadian researchers find a simple cure for cancer

Bad News: Major pharmaceutical companies are not interested 'cause they can't profit off it

Edit: Wow this article is 3 years old

[Thought]

First, even under the best circumstances, it isn't a "cure" for cancer but a treatment.
Second, since the drug is already developed one doesn't really need pharmaceutical companies, one just needs human trials.
Three, it looks like at least in some instances, DCA actually promotes tumor growth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dichloroacetic_acid

[Mr Bekkler]

First, even under the best circumstances, it isn't a "cure" for cancer but a treatment.
Second, since the drug is already developed one doesn't really need pharmaceutical companies, one just needs human trials.
Three, it looks like at least in some instances, DCA actually promotes tumor growth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dichloroacetic_acid

1. Treatment that kills cancer cells and doesn't kill healthy cells = a cure once it's killed them all.
2. The drug is developed, like acetaminophen, but would you have ever heard of that one if Tylenol or some other big name wasn't on it?
3. "In some instances" is in mice, when using the chemical for over a year, in doses "much higher than suggested therapeutic doses in humans". Theoretically, the human body should never encounter enough to produce such a reaction, even during treatment.

4. the article is 4 years old, not 3.

[tushantin]

Bad News: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/05/15/guatemala.violence/index.html 

[Thought]

Bekkler, "cure" is a term that holds a lot of meaning when discussing cancer and it used very carefully by doctors and patients. So far, DCA has not shown that it deserves that title. Most current treatments for most cancers only send cancer into remission, but there tends to be high probabilities of recurrence. Even the most "curable" cancers tend to still have around a 10% rate of recurrence. While DCA has been shown to be effective against cancer, that treatment did not actually send the cancer into full remission. Since the results of the stage II trials just came out last year, it is too soon for long-term follow-up studies to have been performed. As such, there is not even an inkling of what the recurrence rates might be. DCA just doesn't fit the definition of a "cure" for cancer yet.

The importance of a pharmaceutical company in drug development is the actual development of the drug. Government funded research makes the first important steps by identifying potential drugs. These tend not to be actual usable chemicals or compounds. It takes intensive funding to take the results of government funded projects and turn them into actual treatments. For example, government funded research might turn up the result that this particular cluster of neurons in the brain controls X functions but not Y functions. A pharmaceutical company can then uses that information to develop drugs that target those neurons. The reason that new drugs tend to cost a lot of money is because the companies had to sink a lot of money into their development. DCA already exists, thus drug companies have no actual role to play. While they might be able to advertise them, most competent doctors get their information for new treatments from professional journals, which are not funded by pharmaceutical companies. All that is needed to turn DCA into a viable treatment is extensive human trials. These are certainly helped by pharmaceutical companies funding them, but the government is another major funder of these as well. It might help to have more money, but the lack of a patent isn't nearly as crippling to this sort of drug as it is being made out to be.

As for your point #3, it looks like your information is coming from the "Carcinogenicity" section of the wiki article, which relates to DCA's ability to cause cancer. If you look up under "Concerns about pre-trial use" you'll find research about it increasing cancer growth, which is a different matter. Unfortunately I've only been able to find the abstract about the research (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20537792).

The reason for my negativity regarding this is that the popular sentiments going around DCA seem to be harmful. First, people are expecting the fulfillment of a promise that is to incredibly unlikely, given the current data, that "science" cannot hope to meet it. Second, it unnecessarily villainizes pharmaceutical companies. At the end of the day, these are still for profit businesses. Sure, it sucks that they aren't funding projects that they can't make money off of, but why should they be villainized when McDonald's isn't criticized for supporting local co-opts? Pharmaceutical companies aren't actually needed for DCA, so they are actually a red herring. It would be tolerable if it motivated people to urge the development and enhancement of non-profit drug development agencies, but it does not.

[Mr Bekkler]

I just figured you had more to say, and my response was fueled by the information from the article and your wikipedia link. Didn't mean to ruffle your feathers or anything but I appreciate the response and the extra information and insight on your opinion, Thought!

[Licawolf]

Bad News: http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/05/15/guatemala.violence/index.html  

  sigh...everyday news

From today local newspaper: 9 bodies abandoned in a bullring, with signs of strangulation.

 

[Arakial]

NSFW: Language

Original Post: http://www.reddit.com/r/videos/comments/hjpxn/if_you_think_america_is_fucked_up_heres_a/

Direct Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_profilepage&v=jl2JQfxnnHU

Pretty sure one can figure out which one this is...

[tushantin]

Heard an interesting, and yet unsurprising, story today.

Our hardware bloke took a piece of work and promised to come by 2pm. Didn't turn up, leaving all the work on my shoulders. A lady turned up with two kids and asked me get some information from the net for school project, but I just didn't have the time thus gave them a net access on some other computer. The kids were unable to use the computer properly (they were 13 years old, by the way) and the lady asked me for some help. I sighed, and decided to help them anywhos, printing two articles (over 30 pages worth) for them. Since there were a lot of prints, I decided to give em a discount.

And here's the story: The kids were supposed to get info from the net, simply write things down exactly what is specified onto pages with pen and submit the presentation, for which they simply get a "Good Job" from the teacher, while those hard worked presentations go into the storage room, never to be touched again. This was their Summer Homework and the teachers hardly take a look at what's written, which means pictures are essential for evidence that they've completed the work (apparently teachers cannot read). If they don't finish the presentation, they're either punished or failed. So what did we really learn? We learned how to unproductively copy info from websites, word for word, and put it into books. What was the cost? An arm and leg. Two hungry people could have been fed that day with the amount of money wasted.

This isn't the case with just Sumer Homework, though; the same routine takes place for every assignment in class regardless of whether the children have actually learned something. The kids told me that they were forced to memorize things, whether or not they even understood the meaning of it. They couldn't even question things, lest the teacher gets irritated and punishes them for it. The info they sought was about Kerala (which is way down south of India), and Jammu & Kashmir (which is at the extreme north). Just for the heck of it, I asked them a simple question any idiot would know, and that was what were these places (that is, cities or states) and where they were situated. Answer? Surprisingly, they didn't know the answer; they wondered whether the places were cities, and situated in Maharashtra (it's like thinking Brazil was within Kansas). And it struck me then: they were being trained to be closed-minded laborers than rational and productive thinkers. In comparison, farming seems to be a much better choice.

So tell me. What is the point to schools again?