Being Kind to Animals

Businesses often send their representatives to college campuses at the beginning of semesters to sign up students for their products and services. It may be a gym or a spa offering annual membership at discount prices, a beauty parlor promising to “remake your looks and how you feel about yourself,” or a local deli extolling the manifold delights of its sandwiches.

Sometimes, though, volunteers show up to sell not a thing but an idea. Such was the case recently at a community college campus in Northern California. Mike Sage, a 65-year-old software engineer at a high-tech company in Silicon Valley, was handing out brochures to persuade students to become vegetarians.  “It’s good for you and it’s good for the earth,” he was saying. The brochure was prepared by an organization committed to stopping cruelty to animals. Mike is associated with the Santa Clara County Activists for Animals (SCCAA), “an all-volunteer organization dedicated to reducing and eliminating the suffering of animals and to raising community awareness of animal issues.” SCCAA is driven by compassion to prevent cruelty to animals, “especially those used for food, clothing, and entertainment.”

With the increasing awareness of animal cruelty, surely the number of vegetarians in the United States is increasing?

“Not really,” says Mike. “As some people become vegetarians, some vegetarians go back to a meat-based diet. Lapsed vegetarians keep the overall conversion rate down.”

According to Vegetarian Times, 3.2 percent of U.S. adults - 7.3 million people - follow a vegetarian-based diet. Approximately 0.5 percent - 1 million - of those are vegans, who consume no animal products at all. In addition, 10 percent of U.S. adults - 22.8 million people - say they largely follow a vegetarian-inclined diet.

Mike has taken time off from his vacation hours to stand under a hot sun to talk with students. Many are receptive and politely accept the brochures. A few wave him off. He is undaunted.

“You must feel passionately about this, to use up your vacation time like this!”

“I cannot think of a better way to use my vacation time,” he says.

Most Americans are unaware of the torture and cruelty the food-industrial complex inflict on animals to keep the grocery stores stocked with meat, although the 2008-documentary “Food, Inc.” was a gruesome eye-opener for many. This year alone, for instance, Governor Jerry Brown of California signed into law about a dozen animal welfare bills.

But progress is slow and consumer craving for red meat continues to grow. Mike, a vegan since 2007, and others like him, know it is an uphill battle to persuade people to give up meat from their diets. “But we have a network of dedicated people all over the country. We will never give up. Humane treatment of animals makes us better human beings. As a popular poster says, be kind to animals by not eating them. It’s really as simple as that.”

Killers in Libya Must be Served Justice

The death of J. Christopher Stevens, U.S. ambassador to Libya, at the hands of extremists has shocked civilized people everywhere. Libyan Prime Minister Abdurrahim Keib declared: "This is a criminal act that will not go unpunished. This is part of a series of cowardice acts by supporters of the former regime who want to undermine Libya's revolution.” Libyan President Mohamed Magariaf vowed to bring the perpetrators to justice. "We refuse that our nation's lands be used for cowardice and revengeful acts. It is not a victory for God's Sharia or His prophet for such disgusting acts to take place," he said. "We apologize to the United States, the people of America, and the entire world. We and the American government are standing on the same side. We stand on the same side against outlaws."

The deaths of embassy officials in Libya and Egypt came about because of a crude video posted on the Internet that depicted Islam and Prophet Muhammad (saw) in a negative light. There are fringe groups in Muslim countries waiting to exploit things like this for political gain, always in the name of Islam. Because they have no political legitimacy, they resort to murder and mayhem to convince Muslims that they are acting to protect the honor and dignity of Islam. The majority of Muslims have rejected them again and again and stand united today in unequivocally condemning them. 

Mitt Romney, Republican nominee for the President of the United States, is already politicizing the crisis. “I’m outraged by the attacks on American diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt and by the death of an American consulate worker in Benghazi,” he said. “It’s disgraceful that the Obama administration’s first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks.”

Fact is, the Obama administration did no such thing. As soon as the news of the deaths came to light, both President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton condemned the attacks on the embassies in unambiguous terms. This will not stop the Republicans, however, from escalating their baseless attacks on President Obama in the coming days.  Party stalwarts are already calling Obama a coward for not standing up to the threats posed by “Muslims” against America. Whatever it takes – lies, distortions – to win the election is game for the Republicans.

President Obama must not allow the exigencies of the election to define his response to the attacks on the U.S. embassies in Libya and Egypt. So far, he has not and it is unlikely that he will in the future. But politics is a strange profession and the pull of power can distort anyone’s perspective. It remains to be seen how the President walks this minefield as the November election draws near.

But the bigger question is how to contain and defeat extremists who claim to act in the name of Islam but whose only aim is to seize power so that they can practice their savage ideologies. Almost always, their first victims are women. They want women to be confined to homes, remain illiterate, serve their desires and receive rigorous punishment and even death for what they alone define to be moral infractions. These self-styled custodians of “virtues” are corrupt to the core. They are nihilists whose only signature mark is destruction.

As the New York Times reported, President Obama said of the Americans murdered in Libya: “These four Americans stood up for freedom and human dignity. Make no mistake: we will work with the Libyan government to bring to justice the killers who attacked our people.” He praised the Libyan government, noting that Libyan security forces fought back against the mob, helped protect American diplomats and took Mr. Stevens’s body to the hospital. “This attack will not break the bonds between the United States and Libya,” he said.

Ambassador Stevens taught English as a Peace Corps volunteers in Morocco from 1983 to 1985. He worked tirelessly with Libyan rebels in overthrowing the regime of Dictator Muammar Gadhafi last year. He had nothing to do with the hate video posted by an American Islam-hater. Yet he and three of his staff paid the ultimate price at the hands of a band of fanatics. We must do whatever we can - even if it is as minimal as protesting - to thwart the extremists.

 

Walking for the Children of Syria

Today, Saturday, September 8, 2012, concerned Americans throughout the United States will be walking for the children of Syria. Cities where the organized walks will take place include Atlanta, Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Charleston, Dallas, Houston, Indianapolis, Little Rock, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Sacramento, San Diego, Tempe, Washington, DC and Wichita.

Syrian children have borne the brunt of dictator Bashar Assad’s brutality more than any other segment of the population since the genocidal crackdown began 16 months ago. Close to 2,000 children have already perished. The Free Syrian Army (FSA) is steadily gaining ground against government troops but the cost continues to be high. France, more than any other Western powers, is helping FSA with funds and supplies. Although Zero Hour is approaching for Bashar Assad, Syrians, particularly Syrian children, are in dire need of help from conscientious people everywhere.

The Walk for Children of Syria organization is raising funds for the most vulnerable victims of Bashar Assad. Locally, in Northern California today, we will be walking across the fabled Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, from 11 am – 2 pm.

All proceeds will go to UNICEF for immediate distribution within Syria.

The life-and-death question is: "When will the carnage in Syria end?" While Syrians flee in thousands to neighboring countries like Turkey and Jordan, orphans have become the most heart-breaking symbol of the genocide wrought by Assad. The least we Americans can do is to join the walk for the children of Syria if it is taking place in or near our respective cities.

Khan Academy Benefits Students

Hundreds of thousands of students from around the world have found a reliable and competent teacher in the 35-year-old Salman Khan, the creator of over 3,300 digital lectures from math and science to economics and humanities. The online videos run anywhere from 10-20 minutes each, focused on a single topic (solve for variables x and y in a system of linear equations, for example) that students can follow and practice repeatedly until they get it.

Though not a professionally-trained teacher, Khan is a born teacher. But his success hasn’t gone down well with professional teachers, particularly math teachers, who are complaining that Khan’s videos do more harm than good. Call it a case of sour grapes.

These “purist” math teachers seem unable to accept the fact that Salman Khan has attracted a world-wide following for the simplicity and elegance of his math and other online lectures. They are nervous because Khan is attempting to reverse traditional teaching: Instead of learning new ideas in the classroom and practicing at home, often without any help, students get ideas by using his videos at home and practice their content in the class, with teachers working as one-on-one tutor.

Pilot projects testing Khan’s idea are sprouting all over, spanning continents. Results are positive. Students learn at their own paces and get personalized help from teachers when stuck, leading to a greater mastery of their subjects than in the traditional one-size-fits-all classrooms. His lesson pages have tallied close to 200 million views worldwide. Surely that says something.

Professional teachers and educators are quibbling over subtle “gaps” in Khan’s logic as he tries to explain, for instance, the mathematics of multiplying two negative numbers that gives a positive result. They are aghast that he uses the term “associative” instead of “commutative” to describe a property of multiplication. They take him to task for mixing up terms like “minus” and “subtract.”

What they overlook is that Khan’s videos are serving their purpose: teaching students what they need to learn, from the slums of Ghana to the resource-starved schools of America, in a fun, focused and interactive way. This is the case with Jennifer, for instance, a precocious 6^th-grader from San Jose, California. “I don’t have to listen to my math teacher going on and on about ratios. These videos tell me what ratio is and how I can use it to solve real problems. Once I get the idea, I am on my way.”

Salman Khan’s videos are without any glitz or gimmicks. In fact, they are almost primitive in their simplicity, in contrast to other educational videos in the market that seem more like some Hollywood production, using the best graphics and animation tools that money can buy. They dazzle but rarely teach. They are all sound and fury, signifying practically nothing.

Instead of lamenting the lack of depth or formal structure in Khan’s videos, professional teachers and educators can help raise the standard of K-12 education in America and elsewhere by incorporating the videos in their classrooms and coming up with suggestions that can genuinely improve the quality of the lessons. They should be guided by the interest of the students and not by any feeling of encroachment on their “territory” by an “outsider.”