Piracy on the High Seas

Maybe I have just been out of the loop and uninformed, but I had no idea that pirates still existed. I can’t really say that before this chain of events I even believed pirates ever really existed. For me; pirates were one of those things that you don’t really believe in but you don’t put in the complete fairytale category. When I saw in the news that Somalian pirates had hijacked a US crew ship and had taken the captain hostage I was shocked. How could this have happened? I had no clue that there were modern day pirates and that ships were still being hijacked at sea.

I was amazed when reading these articles

U.S. Crew Ship: Pirates Holding Captain

They outran the pirates for between three and five hours,” Murphy said. “They were finally overtaken, substantial gunfire involved.”   -from CBS News

Pirates Vow to Kill U.S., French Sailors

“We have decided to kill U.S. and French sailors if they happen to be among our future hostages,” said Abdullahi Ahmed, a member of a pirate group based at Harardhere, a coastal town in central Somalia.”      -from CNN.com

New Wave of Somali Pirate Attacks

US President Barack Obama promised on Monday to “halt the rise of piracy” in one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.   -from BBC News

 Halt…I didn’t even know it was taking place. I found some very interesting info on this Q&A of Somali Piracy.  It was devastating to hear of Somalia’s extremely poor economy which plays a major part in why some of these young men have become pirates. Read more here —>Young Somalis Lured by Piracy Riches

Now the question arises on how the captured pirates should be punished –> Obama Seeks to Halt Piracy on High Seas

 

Chris Brown & Rihanna (my two cents)

We have all seen and heard the mountain of news stories, radio talk shows, blog posts etc concerning the incident between Rihanna and Chris Brown. Media outlets such as TMZ  and Access Hollywood have had day to day coverage on the story. For a while I stopped paying attention because it was becoming too much of a media circus. The truth has become too far and beyond and the here say and exaggeration overpowered the real issues of the case.

For those of you who know me personally you know that I take domestic violence very seriously. I in no way support abusers and I take a strong stand against violence against women.

With that being said, I would like to first address  the fact that I along with everyone except Chris Brown and Rihanna were not present the night of the incident. We are only partakers of what the news media chooses to report. What has been reported ranges from allegations of Rihanna giving Chris Brown herpes, to Rihanna attacking Chris Brown in the car because Leona Lewis text him. Then there was the story that it wasn’t Leona Lewis, but another woman that text Chris Brown that sent Rihanna into a frenzy that led her to hit Chris Brown with her shoe. The stories have been never-ending and recently it was reported that Rihanna has decided to tell the police the true story about the night’s events. This story includes a woman texting Chris Brown, Rihanna becoming enraged and attacking him as he drove. Chris tried to get control of her while remaining in control of the car and the fight ensued. This led to both parties throwing blows in the moving vehicle and outside of the vehicle.  

The many comments I have heard and seen concerning Rihanna’s decision to remain in a relationship with someone who allegedly  beat her have been for the most part negative and ignorant. When a woman stays with an abusive partner there are underlying issues and that issue is not just the fact that she loves him. If you allow someone to physically abuse you it is guaranteed that you have some emotional issues going on as well. Physical abuse and emotional abuse go hand in hand. Even if the abuser isn’t saying things that have you emotionally distressed the victim’s own self esteem issues feelings of worthlessness are .  Many people wonder why and how a woman can continue to love and stay with a man that abuses her, but if you are an emotional wreck and don’t really know where to turn or how to get out of the situation, you will remain in the situation. Many times women are embarrassed to seek help. So many times women hear all of the negative remarks about women remaining in these situations being stupid and deserving what they get, they are afraid to speak up and seek help for themselves.

The news has also reported that Brown is now seeking a plea deal in which he would not have to serve any jail time. This could only happen if the federal charges he is facing are dropped to misdemeanors. How could the courts allow that to happen, well if the recent reports are true and Rihanna is going to admit to initiating the fight by slapping Chris Brown first, then proceeding to hit him in the face with her shoe the felony charges have a great chance of being reduced to misdemeanors because of Rihanna’s actions. For many people the news of the plea deal is shocking, but as I stat4ed before, we don’t know the whole or true story, so in the end we have two adults who have decided that regardless of what happened that night they want to be together….that is their choice.

Diddy who is friend to both Rihanna and Brown recently caught flack for allowing the pair to reconcile at his Miami home. While on the  Ellen DeGeneres Show Diddy talked about his decision to allow the couple to spend time together at his home.

Here is the video of Diddy explaining his reasoning behind his decision

In my opinion the media’s attack of Diddy over this is ridiculous. Rihanna and Chris Brown are adults. If they come to a friend and ask a favor, why wouldn’t he grant that favor. How many of us in our everyday lives have known that our friends relationships had major problems and we allowed them time to talk it out. Not because we approved of any negative behavior, but because we were their friend.

Then there is the entire show that Oprah dedicated to the topic of Dating Violence & Battered Women. Oprah is beginning to pluck my last nerve. I know that many of you are strong supporters of Oprah Winfrey but I am not for many reasons. I won’t go into detail here because that would be an entire blog entry in itself, but I will say that sometimes we need to realize that everything isn’t our business. Everything isn’t an opportunity for us to speak up and speak out on, especially if we are going to make accusations and pass judgments when we don’t know the facts.

Along with Oprah was Tyra Banks, who recounted on the show her own personal battle with and abusive boyfriend. Banks stated that the boyfriend was not physically abusive, but was very jealous, controlling and emotionally abusive.

Banks and Winfrey’s message was that Love Doesn’t Hurt and that if a man hits you once he will hit you again. Winfrey went on to say that regardless of if Rihanna hit Brown first, he had no right to hit her.

I know I may get ridiculed for this, but I don’t agree with that statement. I in no way approve of men battering women, but human nature does not always allow the first reaction of walking away. It is 100% wrong for a man to hit a woman, just as it is 100% wrong for a woman to hit a man. We should all live by the golden rule we learned way back in kindergarten which is “everyone keep their hands to their self’. This action will keep everyone out of trouble. Now in the event that a woman does hit a man he should walk away. But how many times can you walk away from someone hitting you? How many times have the people who are passing judgment just sucked it up and walked away when someone/anyone hit them? So just as Chris Brown is being verbally pounded and chastised for laying hands on Rihanna if she started the attack, she also needs to be counseled and talked to profusely about keeping her hands to herself.

I know that many people who are watching the news coverage of the Chris and Rihanna ordeal was swayed to believe everything the news reports. It is hard not to look at Chris Brown as a monster who deserves to be thrown underneath the jail. But I can personally speak on behalf of abused women and I can also speak on behalf of one of the many people who witness on a regular basis women who cannot control their anger when it comes to their man. Just as I have a personal account of being a battered woman I also know many women who will throw blows and start fights with men and live this dramified life every day.

To end this I would like to say that Domestic Violence is wrong…end of story.

But for those of us who were not there we can’t say how it happened, who started it and what the outcome should be. For our own lives are oftentimes not as much of a clean slate as we would like them to be. If we can throw stones at Chris Brown for hitting a woman and we can ridicule Rihanna for reconciling with him, we should also throw stones at our self for the bad relationship we remained in for way too long. We should ridicule our self for slapping our ex boyfriend because we found out he was cheating. We should reminisce on each time we started drama and lived to tell about it because each one of those incidents could have been one where someone took our drama serious and ended our life.

John 8:7

He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.

South Memphis, TN (drugs, violence, murder)

While driving home a few days ago my son asked me why there were teddy bears on the telephone poles. I knew the answer, but having to tell a nine year old child that those teddy bears were placed there because someone was killed in that location was not an easy thing to do.

I told him that those teddy bears meant that someone was killed at that spot and their friends and family placed the teddy bears there in remembrance and to show how much they loved them. It was a tribute to a loved one they lost.

So as we drove along, mind you this is the neighborhood I grew up in, we passed approximately 4 utility poles adorned with stuffed animals in a two mile radius. My son didn’t ask any further questions, but it saddened me that in just within two miles at least four people had lost their life within a year’s time.  I can accurately say that it has been within a year because I have seen the stories on the news, time and time again of murders, shootings and stabbings in this part of South Memphis. The stories below are just a fraction of what has been going on in the past year in this area

Body found burning in garbage can behind South Memphis home

Man shot in Killed in the Driveway of South Memphis Home

Clerk Shot in head at South Memphis Store

Store Clerk Shot During Robbery in South Memphis

18 Year Old Stabbed and Killed by 13 year old at South Memphis Apartment Complex

Why is this area so saturated with crime? 

I remember growing up in this neighborhood and being afraid if I heard that someone was killed, not that crime was not an issue back then, but it was definitely not as prominent as it is today.  Drugs are being sold in huge capacity and murders are taking place almost daily. It is frightening to know that people are losing their lives almost daily where I was born and raised. Drug addicts adorn almost every nook and cranny of the neighborhood and honestly the people who were fighting for a better community seem to have given up. The fight seems like a lost battle when the majority is crime, drugs and murder and the minority are the law abiding citizens who want things to be better.

I read this at the Thaddeus Matthews blog- Are Neighborhood Stores Contributing to the drug trade?

That was quite interesting to me. I had no clue those were being sold and I definitely didn’t know what they were used for, but I do know that most of the corner stores in the neighborhood have drug sells going on right at their front door. Drug dealers stand in front of the stores each and every day selling dope, and of course the store owners (mostly Iranian or Asian) know that the drugs are being sold, but nothing is done about it. Then a portion of the store owners have illegal dealings going on aside from the drugs being sold along with and outside of the guys slinging dope outside the store’s front door.

I have lived in Memphis, TN all of my life and I am appalled that we are ranked number two in the nation for violent crime; appalled but not in disbelief.  I hear the stories each and every day and many are so close to home that it makes me shiver. I remember watching the show The First 48  and seeing the Memphis episodes and shaking my head because there is so much murder and sadness. Then when the Lester Street Murders happened I was so shaken that it took me a while to realize that it was real. Six people including two children had indeed been murdered in my hometown. It was such a horrible event but even with that tragedy still fresh in our minds murders, robberies and every other act of violence were still taking place as if this mass murder had not just taken place. This city has taken a violent and destructive turn, one in which I cannot explain and have no answer to how things can change. When will the violence end?