Sunday, June 04, 2023

And the Rest of It

Social policy is good for business, if nothing else:

 

(Sidebar: I'll just leave this right here.) 

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Only a small number of people with gender dysphoria have surgery to align their bodies with their desired sex — but the rate of complications is high.

One of the largest surveys of trans adults earlier this year indicated that one in six (16 percent) go under the knife to alter their physical appearance.

But research suggests that up to half of trans men and women suffer post-op issues or pain so severe they need medical attention or additional surgery months later.

The complex operations involve crafting the genitalia of the opposite sex using veins, arteries, muscles and skin from other body parts. The surgeries are risky due to surgeons having to connect delicate and complicated networks of blood vessels, as well as creating the ability to urinate. ...

Patients are often left with infections, pain and difficulty using the toilet or having sex post-surgery.

One of the biggest studies of its kind by the Women's College Hospital (WCH) in Ontario, Canada, earlier this year found that more than half of trans women who had 'bottom' surgery were in so much pain years later they needed medical attention. 

For trans men who often have a mechanical device implanted, studies suggest a fifth need the implant removed within a year.

 


The Kim dynasty knew it could control people through food and if nineteenth century Irish citizens could have eaten what Britain exported, a few more people would be alive today: 

But now Dutch farmers are turning against the EU—and their own prime minister—in a bid to fight for their most basic liberties.

That’s because EU climate laws have led the Dutch government to commit to reducing nitrogen emissions by 50 percent by 2030. To achieve this, the government has threatened to withdraw farmers’ licenses to farm because of their high nitrogen emissions, mainly stemming from cow dung and fertilizers. Without their licenses, farmers won’t be able to borrow money, putting many in financial peril. Farmers feel they are being scapegoated even though they farm efficiently. Nitrogen emissions in the Netherlands have fallen 50 percent since 1990—while airlines and other emitters show little restraint in the face of climate change.

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Up to 65,000 dairy cows may have to be removed from the national herd every year for three years at a cost of €200m if the farming sector is to meet its climate targets.

Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue said earlier this year that his Department was considering the option of a voluntary dairy reduction scheme, that 2022 would be a reference year and it was his intention to start the scheme in 2023.

To address the gap to target, Department officials believe 10pc of the livestock herd would need to be displaced by other activities over the coming years, which is the equivalent of approximately 740,000 animals.

It says, based on the latest data, the suckler herd is already at this level of reduction and when its followers (calves/stores) are included, this would bring the sector closer to compliance with the first carbon budget period, while certainly ensuring compliance with the second carbon budget. “The suckler herd will reach its own equilibrium,” it said.

 


Some people are, well, special:

The Federal Court of Appeal has overturned a judge’s declaration that four Canadian men being held in Syrian camps are entitled to Ottawa’s help to return home.

In a ruling released today, a three-member panel of the Court of Appeal says the federal government is not obligated under the law to repatriate the men.

 
But it wants to.
 
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A man who brutally attacked a mother outside her children’s daycare will serve four years in prison instead of nine years after Alberta’s top court found a judge failed to properly assess how the accused’s Indigenous background affected his level of culpability.

In a decision released Tuesday, the Alberta Court of Appeal more than halved the sentence being served by Rockie Ryan Rabbit, whose random attack on a woman outside Seven Stones Daycare two years ago shocked Edmontonians.

Rabbit told court he was suffering from methamphetamine-induced hallucinations and believed the victim — a recent immigrant from Eritrea — had killed or kidnapped his daughter. After approaching the woman and looking in her backpack, Rabbit slammed her to the ground and began strangling her with both hands.

Two of the women’s three children, aged six and eight, sobbed uncontrollably as they watched the attack from inside the daycare. Rabbit — who was on release for assaulting his brother — stopped only when police arrived four minutes later.

During Rabbit’s sentencing last year, Alberta court of justice Judge Carrie Sharpe took the unusual step of going above the prosecution’s recommended sentence of six years in prison.

The Alberta Court of Appeal, however, found Sharpe failed to properly apply the principles laid out in the Supreme Court’s 1999 Gladue decision, which requires courts consider the role systemic factors such as discrimination, abuse, alcoholism, drug use and family separation played in an Indigenous person’s offending.

The appeal court said Sharpe was wrong to conclude that Gladue factors — which courts have long said lessen an Indigenous offender’s “moral blameworthiness” — take a back seat in cases of serious violence.

 


An Egyptian police officer murders three Israeli soldiers:

An Egyptian policeman crossed the border and killed three Israeli soldiers on Saturday morning, the Israeli military said, in a rare instance of deadly violence on the frontier.

The first two soldiers were killed while manning a guard post near the border in the Negev Desert, Israel said. The pair – a man and a woman belonging – had begun their shift late on Friday night. Their bodies were discovered early on Saturday morning after they did not respond to radio calls.

That triggered a manhunt during which the third soldier and the gunman were killed in a confrontation on Israeli soil hours later. A fourth soldier was lightly wounded and evacuated to hospital.

One of the victims was identified as Sgt Lia Ben Nun, 19, a combat soldier in the Bardelas Battalion, one of five mixed-gender units within Israel’s Border Defense Corps. The soldier killed in the later attack was named as 20-year-old Staff Sgt Ohad Dahan. The identity of the other soldier was not immediately made public.


 

I don't know, Japan and South Korea.

Can you trust Biden?:

Japan, South Korea and the United States have agreed to work toward launching a mechanism to share real-time warning data on North Korean missile launches “before the end of the year,” the countries’ defense chiefs said Saturday.

In a joint statement released after a trilateral meeting on the sidelines of a regional security conference in Singapore, Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada, South Korean Defense Minister Lee Jong-sup and U.S. defense chief Lloyd Austin said they had discussed “ongoing progress” in consultations, calling the mechanism “a major step for deterrence, peace and stability.”

“At this meeting, we confirmed the progress of our study on the real-time sharing of North Korean missile warning data and agreed to make further progress toward the launch of initial operations within the next few months,” Hamada told reporters at the Shangri-La Dialogue conference. “The specific details and the timing of the operational launch are still being worked out, but we will make every effort to achieve this at the earliest possible time.”

The measure — the latest in a series of trilateral moves in response to the growing nuclear and missile threat from North Korea — comes amid a thaw in once-chilly ties between Tokyo and Seoul.

 


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