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This is the time of the year when people tend to be very generous with their time and money. I am dedicating my post-Thanksgiving blog to promote charitable organizations that serve children. There are many places that are worthy of your checkbook and palm pilot. These are ones that I know and support (I mean, I would support if I wasn’t a teacher at a private school).

But what do I know? Please list in the comments section charities that you support. And remember, before donating to any organization go to http://www.charitynavigator.org/ . This web site evaluates most charities’ financials and let’s you know if they are legitimate.

“And here is tonight’s top 10”

10. Broadtree Adventures in Education

Founded by Lauren Beznos, a friendster, this organization provides outdoor opportunities to inner city Chicago Public School kids.

9. Interfaith Youth Core

You know how people all over the world are killing themselves and others over religion? This organization, founded by Eboo Patel, brings Muslims, Jews, and Christians together to find common ground within their religions. The learning culminates on the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday when hundreds of Muslim, Jewish, and Christian students perform a community service project together.

8. Namaste Charter School
Featured on the Today Show and in People Magazine, this school, founded by another friendster Allison Slade, incorporates healthy living into its educational philosophy. With nutritious lunches and Yoga for inner-city kids, Allison and her faculty are doing what they can to graduate healthy, happy and educated kids.

7. Gus Foundation
Ten years ago a foundation was established to raise money for brain tumor research and treatment at Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago. The organization is named after Gus Evangelides, a 21-month old who died of brain cancer. There are numerous opportunities for giving and to participate in fun events. 

6. Youth Against Multiple Sclerosis
Two years ago I met this amazing 17-year-old, Kaley Zeitouni, who was living her teenage years with Multiple Sclerosis. My mom and aunt both have Multiple Sclerosis, but were relatively healthy until their mid to late 20s. When Kaley was diagnosed she found that there were few resources for kids with Multiple Sclerosis. She, with the help of her teacher and friends, began YAMS to raise awareness about the disease in teens and money for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

5. Seeds of Peace
Seeds of Peace began as an organization that facilitated dialogue between Israeli, Palestinian and Egyptian teens. In the past 12 years, Seeds of Peace has expanded to bring together teenagers from other warring societies to promote peaceful coexistence.

4. UNICEF

It’s hard to click through the UNICEF web site and not leave with tears in your eyes. UNICEF takes on AIDS, immunization, female genital mutilation, famine and natural disaster relief just to name a few important things. It’s amazing how lucky people in the United State are.

3. Big Brothers Big Sisters of America

My junior and senior years of college I was a big sister to Jennifer. Jennifer was an 11-year-old whose father had left the family, her brother was in jail, and she, her mom, and her sister lived on very little income. I did very little with Jennifer except hang out with her and introduce her to my friends in Bloomington. She inspired me to not be so self- centered, and I think I helped her envision a better future for herself. As a teacher I see kids who are incredibly lonely, and the loneliness leads to depression, health problems, self-esteem problems, and ultimately difficulty succeeding in school and in creating relationships with peers. BBSA tackles this problem by matching kids with adults and helping them to foster a relationship that inevitably benefits both.

2.  The Children’s Health Fund

When you were a little kid and you were sick what did you do? Your mom or dad took you to the doctor, right? There was probably no thought as to, “Well, can we afford to see if this is a cold or if it is bronchitis?” Families living in poverty do not have that simple luxury. The Children’s Health Fund brings healthcare to underserved areas through mobile health clinics and through other programs. One of the cofounders is singer/songwriter Paul Simon. The current chair of the advisory board is former NBC anchor Jane Pauley.

1. Feed the Children

To many of us Hurricane Katrina is an unforgettable memory. For the thousands of children affected by the hurricane, their misery is a daily occurrence. Feed the Children continues to serve the victims of last season’s hurricane with food and other resources.

Do you like my choices? Let me know. Do you have charities you support? List them in the comments section.

If the police are absolutely sure that a suspect had something to do with the kidnapping of a baby, should he be tortured to learn the whereabouts of the child?

If there is a chance that a suspect has the knowledge of an upcoming terrorist attack, should he be tortured to gather information that might save the lives of hundreds of people.

If the CIA finds the driver of Usama Bin Laden, and it’s possible he overheard a terror plot, should he be tortured to garner intelligence?

If the FBI finds the wife of a suicide bomber, should she be tortured to see for whom he worked?

These are the questions I posed to my students to introduce a lesson on the changes to the philosophy of crime and punishment during the Enlightenment period (1700s). It’s always easier to learn a history lesson when it directly applies to current events. This week torture has been in the headlines as Republican Senator John McCain successfully attached an amendment to a military spending bill to“…define and limit interrogation techniques that U.S. troops may use against terrorism suspects…” (Babington and Murray) President Bush is threatening to veto the bill; the first time he would use that power since taking office in 2001.

Also in the headlines, in a Nov. 2 article, the Washington Post reported that the CIA has prisons in to interrogate terror suspects throughout the world. The prisons are secret and it’s possible there will be an investigation to see who leaked this confidential information to the Post.

The torture issue was all over the Sunday morning talk shows and it’s this week’s cover of Newsweek Magazine. The Magazine published an article by John McCain discussing how the US’ use of torture is harming our nation worldwide. However, Newsweek also features a poll with the results that “Fifty-Eight Percent of Americans Polled Support Use of Torture by U.S. Military If It Might Lead to Preventing a Terrorist Attack” (NEWSWEEK COVER: The Truth About Torture)

These same issues were addressed in the 1764 essay “Of Crimes and Punishment” by Cesare Beccaria, an Italian Enlightenment philosopher. Like McCain, he spoke out against the use of torture:

…that pain should be the test of truth, as if truth resided in the muscles and fibres of a wretch in torture. By this method the robust will escape, and the feeble be condemned. These are the inconveniences of this pretended test of truth, worthy only of a cannibal, and which the Romans, in many respects barbarous, and whose savage virtue has been too much admired, reserved for the slaves alone. (Beccaria)

So what was going on during 1764 to have Beccaria earn the equivalent to the cover of Newsweek with the mass reading of his publication? The peoples of Europe were becoming ‘enlightened’ in terms of justice. The notion of innocent until proven guilty, the right to a trial, the right to a jury trial, the right to be charged with a crime before being arrested, were all becoming standard practice in much of Western Europe with Central Europe following behind. It was just 12 years before the United States would win the War of Independence and 15 years before the French Revolution, which was a revolution based on the notion of liberty and justice before it spiraled downward i to terror and military dictatorship.

So if the United States is turning to torture as a means to ensure justice, is our society becoming unenlightened? If we are holding people, however wretched they may be, without charge in prison camps throughout the world from Thailand to Cuba, are we heading towards the Dark Ages of our own times?

It reads very Middle Ages when you hear of interrogators using dogs to frighten prisoners and the defamation of the suspects’ holy book to extract information from them. It beckons the question, at one point is the United States causing more terrorist attacks than it is preventing? How many suicide bombers are motivated by the photos from \Abu Ghraib, the endless holding of prisoners at Guantanamo, and the loss of civilian life in Iraq since March 2003?

The questions I began my class with are difficult ones. What is frightening is that I don’t believe the leaders of the Executive Branch have the intellectual prowess and objectivity to properly address them. I would prefer to defer to Senator McCain who served in Vietnam, who experienced the brutalities of war as a POW, who was a Senator during 9/11 and still strongly opposes the use of torture on suspected terrorists. As he told Newsweek in the article Truth about Torture:

"This isn’t about who they are. This is about who we are. These are the values that distinguish us from our enemies."

Don’t be shy. Let’s have a conversation. Post your comments.

To contact your representative about the use of torture in terror suspects go to:

http://www.house.gov/writerep/

To tell President Bush not to veto the bill with McCain’s anti-torture amendment or to ask Vice President Cheney if he would like his legacy to be torture go to:

http://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/

To read the Newsweek articles on torture go to:

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10020629/site/newsweek/

To refresh your memory of Abu Ghraib go to:

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040510fa_fact

or here, but warning it’s very graphic

http://www.antiwar.com/news/?articleid=2444

 

I was 22 years old sitting at a BW3s with a former babysitter. She was interrogating me about my love life and the reminiscing about hers. Suddenly her face turned dark. “When I was 18 I was in love with this guy. He was amazing. But I was doing drugs, drinking, and one night I had sex with him. A few weeks later I was sick. I knew I was pregnant. I made an appointment and a few days later got an abortion. It was the worst day of my life.”

This woman is now in her 40s, works in the medical field and is married with children. She is a wonderful daughter, sister, and a caring mother. But how would her life have been different if she did not have the right to choose?

Another woman who told me she had an abortion was in her 30s, in a bad marriage, and had health problems that would be made worse by a third pregnancy.  Would she die from another pregnancy? No. Would she decline? Maybe. She chose to end the pregnancy. How would her life and health have been different if she did not have the right to choose?

According to Webmd.com 1.3 million women choose abortion each year. It is perhaps the most complicated and difficult decision a woman has to encounter. It is a decision I have never had to make, nor one I plan on needing to make, nor one I think I could make, but it’s my decision – not President Bush’s and certainly not Judge Samuel Alito’s.

As you may know, Judge Samuel Alito was nominated this week to the US Supreme Court by President Bush to appease the Religious Right and social conservatives.  Alito’s nomination was celebrated by his mother who declared Alito anti choice. His anti-choice stance was stated in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey where he voted in favor of spousal notification for abortion even in the event that the woman was in an abusive relationship. Can you imagine a woman having to ask her abusive husband to sign off on her having an abortion? I’m sure that would go over well.

If you are Pro Choice you must act now to prevent Alito from being confirmed.  You need to aid in the fight to preserve a woman’s right to choose. You need to do your part to keep the government out of our personal lives. Do you believe that the right to privacy is sacred? Then it’s time to act.

Go to the Planned Parenthood website and e-sign the ready-made letter. The organization will take care of sending the email to your senators.  Then copy and paste the web site and send it to every person that you know who is pro choice. Urge them to fill it out. It takes less than a minute.

I know, I know. Frequently the anti choice alarm bell is sounded and it’s kind of like the fire alarm at my school: it goes off so often people tend to not take it seriously. But I really believe that Alito is the fifth arsonist to burn the school down. The health and welfare of more than a million women per year is at stake.  Freedom is at stake. What are you going to do about it?

   

Sign the petition

Reasons Women Choose Abortion

Washington Post clips of Alito’s opinions