by Sean David Hobbs and Sinan Targay
Saturday's pro-government rally followed a night of violent clashes with protestors in and around Gezi Park, the site of the near three-week long protests that have since spread nationwide. Police used tear gas to drive protestors from the area surrounding the park. Reports put the number of injured at 150, six of them seriously. Five casualties have so far been reported since the unrest began 18 days ago, with thousands injured. Reporter Sean David Hobbs is a long-time resident of Istanbul who has been following the protests since they first began.
by Anthony Advincula
Diabetes-related mortality rates have reached an all-time high in New York City, with people of color hit the hardest, according to a report released this week by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. Approximately one person dies of diabetes-related causes every 90 minutes in the city— a mortality rate that has nearly doubled in two decades, from 6 percent in 1990 to 10.8 percent in 2011, says the report.
by William O. Beeman
The Iranian presidential elections did not turn out as expected—happily for many Iranians, and not so happily for Western critics of Iranian society. The victorious Mr. Rowhani, seen as the most moderate of all the six candidates, was not predicted to win by Western pundits, who followed their own ideological bias, predicting that the election would be rigged by ultra-conservative mullahs and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps to favor the most conservative contender.
by Gabrielle Acierno
Whether your understanding of mental illness is limited to what you’ve seen on the silver screen, or as intimate as a firsthand struggle, the topic has occupied a continual space in our national discussion, eliciting controversy and fascination. Today, there are nearly 60 million Americans who suffer from a mental illness, and it continues to present a quality of life, household and community issue.
by Corey Dade
Wednesday will mark the 50th anniversary of the assassination of civil rights leader Medgar Evers, and the timing couldn't be more significant: Any day now, the Supreme Court could strike down a pair of landmark remedies owed in part to Evers' activism. Uncertainty hovers over observances that began at Evers' gravesite at Arlington National Cemetery last week, as the civil rights community warily awaits rulings that might fundamentally change, if not outright limit, minorities' access to college and participation in elections.
by Maya Rhodan
A new report by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention shows that the teen birth rate for African Americans has declined by 60 percent between 1991 and 2011 – a rate 10 percent greater than the overall dip in teen birth rates. Over the past decade, the national teen birth rate has declined from 31 out of every 1,000 girls between 15-19 giving birth in 2011, compared to 61 girls per 1,000 in 1991. In 2007, the Hispanic teen birth rate was 21 percent higher than the Black teen birth rate; in 2011 it was only four percent higher.
by Adrienne T. Washington
Preeminent Harvard Law Professor Charles Ogletree said the Supreme Court’s ruling Monday legitimizing Maryland law enforcement’s use of an overreaching procedure of collecting genetic data in serious crimes will likely lead the way to more troubling privacy violations of the 4th Amendment's protection against “unreasonable search and seizure.”b ‘This opens up a Pandora’s Box on how far law enforcement can go with technology as evidence tools going forward,” Ogletree said.
by Enzo Scavone
People working on a makeshift stage, waiters rushing to deliver drinks to early arrivals, and quirky individuals retiring to the corners appearing to practice some sort of presentation -- we’re at an open mic. The general assumption is that at open mics, drunk temps and shy housewives get on stage to live out some persona they desperately resolved to keep hidden -- choosing stability over a starry-eyed ideal of a life on the stage. This is not really the case.
by Laura Waxmann
Murillo is one of thousands of veterans who have been charged with a crime and deported. There are no solid figures on how many veterans currently share Murillo’s predicament, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) does not provide numbers. It is estimated that about 70,000 U.S. residents served in the U.S. military between 1999 and 2008. Deported veterans are not eligible for VA Benefits.
by D.L. Chandler
A group of Black and immigrant Greeks have banded together to form a self-defense group to counter the attacks of a gang that targets citizens of color in the country. Nicknamed the “Black Panthers,” the group uses cell phones, social media, and neighborhood patrols to record any activity perceived as a threat from the far-right neo-Nazi Golden Dawn Party. Regarding the massive economic crisis in Greece, the Golden Dawn Party has risen in power and blame immigrants for the high unemployment and crime.
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