No One Was Prepared For The Diarrhea Plane

Darren Orf
Sat, September 16, 2023 


On September 1, 2023, a passenger on board a Delta Airlines flight from Atlanta to Barcelona experienced extreme diarrhea, forcing the aircraft to make a u-turn.

The incident highlights the complexity of addressing a potentially wide variety of medical emergencies that occur during a flight as the flight attendants had no means to clean the mess, such as hazmat or PPE suits.

Previous flights have highlighted a lack of medical resources onboard planes when an emergency occurs.

Lots of things can go wrong when flying at 30,000 feet—an airplane malfunction is the least of your worries. Increasing amounts of turbulence due to climate change certainly isn’t great, and bad weather can send wait times soaring. Then there is the laundry list of possible medical emergencies, both expected and unexpected, that can occur at any moment en route.

On September 1, the 336 passengers aboard Delta Airlines Flight 194, a red eye flight from Atlanta to Barcelona, definitely experienced the latter.

After only two hours into the flight, the airline crew experienced a nightmarish “biohazard issue” after a passenger “had diarrhea all the way through the airplane,” according to the pilot’s in-flight announcement that was later posted to X, formerly Twitter.



Passengers later confirmed that the mess did indeed run the length of one cabin aisle. DL194’s flight data on FlightRadar24 shows the aircraft’s about-face over the skies of Virginia.

Although the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) requires aircraft to carry at least one sealed emergency medical kit containing 25 specified instruments and medications along with first-aid kits and automated external defibrillators, these kits clearly don’t include PPE or hazmat suits. One passenger told Futurism that flight attendants created makeshift biohazard suits from aprons in an attempt to clean the spill.

Ultimately, their efforts were fruitless. Upon the plane’s return to Atlanta, the carpet was ripped up from the cabin and replaced as passengers boarded a different plane and finally set off for their intended destination. This time, things went without a hitch.

With some two billion commercial passengers boarding planes every year, it’s inevitable that some will experience a medical event, especially in the unique and sometimes stress-inducing confines of an aircraft cabin, and this isn’t the first time that flight attendants didn’t have the tools they needed to get the job done.

In March 2022, a passenger (and thankfully a wilderness first responder) aboard a Frontier Airlines flight saved a woman’s life, but not after some quick thinking; the airline’s medical kit didn’t contain an oropharyngeal airway, a tool to help the woman breathe. Similarly, in June 2022, a doctor assisted in a medical emergency aboard a Delta flight and found the first aid kit sorely lacking.

The FAA has solicited ideas for new items to be added to an aircraft’s medical emergency arsenal. Perhaps the epic tale of the Diarrhea Plane will convince the administration to recommend a hazmat suit or two.

Passenger on Ill-Fated Diarrhea Plane Says Flight Attendants Were Forced to Craft "Makeshift Biohazard Suits"

Maggie Harrison

FUTURISM
September 7, 2023

On Friday, an international Delta flight bound for sunny Barcelona was forced to U-turn back to its starting point, Atlanta, for an exceedingly rare air travel horror: a passenger had suffered diarrhea throughout the plane's aisle so extensively that completing the flight was deemed untenable.

News of the incident first hit Reddit's r/ATC subreddit, to which a user shared alarming FAA flight information marking the ill-fated flight's decision to turn around.

"DIVERT TO ATL — PASSENGER DIARRHEA ALL OVER A/C," the flight strip read. "BIOHAZARD."

The news then trickled to other social media platforms, going mainstream viral on X-formerly-Twitter when another netizen shared a short clip of one of the plane's pilots' blunt conversation with air traffic control.

"This is a biohazard issue," the pilot can be heard saying. "We've had a passenger who's had diarrhea all the way through the airplane, so they want us to come back to Atlanta."

Yes, diarrhea, all through the airplane. It really did happen, and in an official statement to Insider, a representative for Delta described the incident as an "onboard medical issue," adding that its teams "worked as quickly and safely as possible to thoroughly clean the airplane and get our customers to their final destination."

"We sincerely apologize to our customers," the rep continued, "for the delay and inconvenience to their travel plans."

We tracked one of the plane's unlucky passengers down — and they confirmed that the diarrhea was, in fact, "ALL OVER" the cabin aisles, just as that flight strip read.

"I woke up and there was a bit of a strange smell," the passenger, who chose to remain anonymous while speaking of his Diarrhea Plane experience, told Futurism, adding that the flight attendants were forced to perform some DIY ingenuity to deal with the excrement.

"They found everything they could use," said the passenger, explaining that the airline staff used aprons to craft "makeshift biohazard suits" to wear while dealing with the defecatory disaster. Blankets and napkins, meanwhile, were utilized to cover the feces.

The airline's staff "tried to handle it," said the passenger, but "it was just so bad."

The passenger also noted their empathy for the person who had the unfortunate accident, explaining that the individual wound up staying in the lavatory until the last few minutes of the flight.

"They just kind of kept [the person] in there," the passenger added.

You might be imagining that Delta obviously just got these travelers a new plane, right? After all, this one was covered in human feces. But alas, there seemingly weren't enough jets to go around, and according to the passenger, the airline ultimately settled the issue by simply ripping out the Airbus' soiled carpets and giving the passenger plane an extra-thorough clean before reboarding it.

"They actually took out all the carpets for one section of it," the passenger said. "We were waiting three hours at the airport while they were trying to clean it, but they couldn't clean it, so they had to rip off the carpet and change it."

"Then we were back on," they added. "No problem."

The passenger also noted that the plane's staff fully switched over for the second flight attempt, which we're glad to hear. Anyone who's forced to make a biohazard suit out of aprons and proceeds to manage an in-flight diarrhea crisis for the next several hours deserves some time off, not to mention a raise.

Fortunately, the passenger said, the flight's second go-round went off without a hitch.

"It was just so late, we passed out," the passenger recounted. "No issues after that, but it was certainly an ordeal."

Mexican Anti-Abortion Activists Look to U.S. for Inspo After Their Country Decriminalizes Abortion

Susan Rinkunas
September 7, 2023·

Protestors rally for International Safe Abortion Day on September 28, 2022, in Mexico City, Mexico.

On Wednesday, Mexico’s Supreme Court struck down all federal penalties on abortion, saying that the national regulation was an unconstitutional violation of women’s rights and that criminalizing abortion was “gender-based violence and discrimination.” The ruling will require all federal health institutions to offer abortions to anyone who requests them. A patchwork of state restrictions remains, with 20 states still criminalizing abortion, but the ruling is a massive win for Mexican activists in the Marea Verde or “Green Wave” movement, whose supporters wear green bandanas.

The decision also highlights just how extreme the United States has become on abortion in the eyes of the rest of the world. In the last three decades, about 60 countries have expanded abortion rights, while only four countries have rolled back access: El Salvador, Nicaragua, Poland, and the U.S.

It’s all the more striking to read that statement when you remember that Mexico is a predominantly Catholic country. However, experts have noted that abortion restrictions are more correlated with creeping authoritarianism than they are with religion. A 2021 New York Times analysis contained this chilling sentence: “Curbs on women’s rights tend to accelerate in backsliding democracies, a category that includes the United States, according to virtually every independent metric and watchdog.”

Rebeca Ramos, executive director of GIRE, an abortion rights group that sued over the 1931 Mexican regulation that criminalized abortion, also made the connection between abortion and participation in society.

“We’re on a very good path,” Ramos told the Times. “This is a recognition that women and people with the ability to gestate have agency and we are first-class citizens. That democracy is coming to us, as well.” As a side note, Mexico’s next presidential election is in June 2024—both leading candidates are women.

The U.S. is, decidedly, not on a good path.

JEZEBEL

HEAR, HEAR!
Xi says China, US 'should and must' achieve peaceful co-existence

Reuters
Mon, September 18, 2023

Xi Jinping attends BRICS Summit in Johannesburg

BEIJING (Reuters) - Chinese President Xi Jinping told two US Flying Tigers veterans who fought for China during World War II that China and the US "should and must" achieve peaceful co-existence, offering further cues for both sides to lower persistent tensions.

In his reply to a letter from former pilot Harry Moyer and pilot gunner Mel McMullen, Xi said the people of China and the United States had shared the same enemy in their fight against Japan and had forged a "profound" friendship, according to Chinese state media on Tuesday.

"Looking to the future, China and the United States, as two major countries, bear more important responsibilities for world peace, stability and development," Xi said.

"They should and must achieve mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, and win-win cooperation."

His call for stable and peaceful ties followed a series of meetings and talks between US and Chinese officials in recent months aimed at reducing tensions and restoring channels of communication including contact between their militaries.

The American Volunteer Group, known as the Flying Tigers, was a fighter group, comprising former US pilots hired by the Republic of China led by Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang, to fight against Japan in 1941-42.

The airmen, whose planes were iconic for their shark faces, were widely known in China for their feats of bravery in the face of larger Japanese forces as they took to the skies from rural runways paved by Chinese people by hand.

"Currently, China-US relations face many difficulties and challenges," Chinese Vice President Han Zheng told U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly on Monday.

"The world needs stable and healthy China-US relations," Han said.

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Editing by Michael Perry)

China Ousted Foreign Minister Over Affair in US, WSJ Says

Bloomberg News
Tue, September 19, 2023 

(Bloomberg) -- China removed Qin Gang from his job as foreign minister after an investigation concluded he had an affair and fathered a child while serving as ambassador to the US, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Top officials in China were told in August that a Communist Party inquiry into Qin uncovered “lifestyle issues,” the newspaper reported Tuesday, citing people familiar with the situation whom it didn’t describe. That phrase usually means sexual misbehavior of some type in the parlance of Chinese officialdom.

Two of the people said the affair led to the birth of a child in the US. The WSJ added that Qin is assisting a probe into whether the affair compromised national security. China is locked in an ideological battle with the US, its chief economic and geopolitical rival, which has seen Beijing intensify a national security drive.

Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said at a regular press briefing in Beijing on Tuesday that she didn’t have any new information to offer about Qin.

China stripped Qin of his post in July, just seven months after he started the job — the shortest stint in the role in the nation’s history. No explanation was given, and his predecessor, Wang Yi, returned as foreign minister.

The episode raised questions over President Xi Jinping’s decision-making and the stability of the government running the world’s No. 2 economy. Those concerns are being rekindled by the current unexplained absence of Defense Minister Li Shangfu amid media reports he’s being probed for corruption.

The ruling Communist Party’s senior ranks are now being scrutinized for their dealings with foreigners, the insiders told the WSJ, adding that the top brass in China’s military were also in the spotlight.

See: China Defense Chief Mystery Adds to Leadership Turbulence

Few Chinese officials have risen as swiftly through the diplomatic ranks as Qin. His big break came in 2015 when he was given oversight of protocol at the foreign ministry. The next six years saw him organize state visits of top leaders to China.

It was likely in that job that Qin gained access to Xi. He was pictured beside the Chinese leader during a meeting with then President Donald Trump in Beijing in 2017.

Also: Ouster of Xi’s Handpicked Foreign Minister Halts Rising Career

In 2021, Qin was sent to Washington while he was still relatively unknown outside diplomatic circles. He showed a flair for public relations, embracing American culture by attending a baseball game and riding in a Tesla Inc. car with Elon Musk.

He also made moderate remarks on hot topics, arguing Beijing would’ve tried to stop Russia from invading Ukraine if it had known its plans and playing down the risk of a war with Taiwan.

--With assistance from Colum Murphy.

BODY POLITIC ERASURE

Mental health among Afghan women deteriorating across the country, UN report finds

YOU WOULD GO MAD IF YOU WERE ERASED

RAHIM FAIEZ
Tue, September 19, 2023 

 Afghan women wait to receive food rations distributed by a humanitarian aid group, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Tuesday, May 23, 2023. The mental health of Afghan women, who have suffered under harsh measures imposed by the Taliban since taking power two years ago, has deteriorated across the country, according to a joint report from three U.N. agencies released Tuesday, Sept. 19, 2023.

 (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File) 

ISLAMABAD (AP) — The mental health of Afghan women, who have suffered under harsh measures imposed by the Taliban since taking power two years ago, has deteriorated across the country, according to a joint report from three U.N. agencies released Tuesday.

Nearly 70% reported that feelings of anxiety, isolation and depression had grown significantly worse between April and June, an increase from 57% in the preceding quarter, according to the report from U.N Women, the International Organization for Migration and the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan.

Afghan women were interviewed online, in-person and in group consultations as well as via individual telesurveys. In total, 592 Afghan women across 22 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces took part.

The women spoke of suffering from psychological problems including depression, insomnia, loss of hope and motivation, anxiety, fear, aggression, isolation and increasingly isolationist behavior, and thoughts of suicide.

The Taliban, upon taking power in 2021 as U.S. and NATO forces were pulling out of the country following two decades of war, promised a more moderate rule than during their previous period in power in the 1990s. But they have instead imposed harsh measures, many of them targeting women.

They have barred women from most areas of public life and work and banned girls from going to school beyond the sixth grade. They have prohibited Afghan women from working at local and non-governmental organizations. The ban was extended to employees of the United Nations in April.

Opportunities to study continued to shrink as community-based education by international organizations was banned and home-based schooling initiatives were regularly shut down by the de facto authorities — a term use by the U.N. for the Taliban government.

Afghanistan is the only country in the world with restrictions on female education and the rights of Afghan women and children are on the agenda of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Taliban spokesmen were not immediately available to comment on the report Tuesday, but in the past Taliban officials have cited Shariah, or Islamic, law to support their policies regarding women and girls.

Last month, Mohammad Sadiq Akif, the spokesman for the Taliban’s Ministry of Vice and Virtue, said that women lose value if men can see their uncovered faces in public.

The report found that 81% of women had not engaged at all with local Taliban authorities on issues important to them between April and June 2023. This finding was consistent with engagement levels in the previous quarter, said the report.

Forty-six percent of women said international recognition of the Taliban government should not happen under any circumstances, while 50% warned that recognition should only occur under specific conditions contingent on improving women’s rights. These include restoring education and employment and forming an inclusive government.

The women expressed concern that recognition would only encourage the Taliban government to continue becoming stricter in their policies and practices against women and girls.

Afghan women specifically urged the international community to continue political and economic sanctions against the Taliban, including by not granting exemptions to a travel ban. They urged an increase in engagement with the Taliban on gender equality and women’s rights, including by engaging community and religious leaders in awareness and advocacy efforts.

The women said they want support for initiatives that provide counseling and psychological services and they want access to international scholarships and safe migration options for women and girls to study and work overseas.

Chandrayaan-3: How important are India's Moon mission findings?

Geeta Pandey - BBC News, Delhi
Mon, September 18, 2023 

A photo of the Vikram lander taken by Pragyaan rover


Last month, India made history when it became the first country to land a lunar mission near the Moon's south pole.

Chandrayaan-3's lander and rover - called Vikram and Pragyaan - spent about 10 days in the region, gathering data and images to be sent back to Earth for analysis.

Earlier this month, scientists put them to bed as the Sun began to set on the Moon - to be able to function, the lander-rover need sunlight to charge their batteries. The country's space research agency Isro said it hoped that they would reawaken "around 22 September" when the next lunar day breaks.

Isro has provided regular updates on their movements and findings and shared images taken by them.

These updates have excited many Indians, but others have been asking about the significance of these discoveries.

The BBC asked Mila Mitra, a former Nasa scientist and co-founder of Stem and Space, a Delhi-based space education company, to pick some of Chandrayaan-3's major findings and explain their significance.

The distance covered - and craters avoided

Hours before the rover was put to bed on 2 September, Isro said Pragyaan "has traversed over 100m [328 feet] and is continuing".

That's quite a long way to travel for the six-wheeled rover, which moves at a speed of 1cm per second.

What is also significant, Ms Mitra says, is that it has been able to stay safe and avoid falling into the craters that dot the Moon's little-explored south pole region.

The rover, she says, has a special wheel mechanism - called rocker bogie - which means that all its wheels don't move together, helping it traverse up and down, but it may not be able to climb out if it falls into a deep crater. So it's important to make it go around the craters or even retrace its steps. And that, Ms Mitra adds, is done by scientists at the command centre who are "watching the Moon through the rover's eyes".

"The rover is not automated and its movements are controlled from the command centre which acts on the basis of the pictures it sends.

"There's a slight delay before they reach the command centre because of the circuitous route they take - Pragyaan sends them over to the lander which sends them on to the orbiter to pass them on to Earth."

Isro released a graphic of the path taken by the lunar rover

So, by the time the command reaches the rover, it's a few steps closer to the threat.

But the fact that it has managed to navigate safely around two craters shows that it's able to communicate really quickly with the command centre, Ms Mitra adds.
Blowing hot and cold

The first set of data collected from the lunar topsoil and up to the depth of 10cm (4 inches) below the surface from a probe onboard the Vikram lander showed a sharp difference in temperatures just above and below the surface.

While the temperature on the surface was nearly 60C, it plummeted sharply below the surface, dropping to -10C at 80mm (around 3 inches) below the ground.

The Moon is known for extreme temperatures - according to Nasa, daytime temperatures near the lunar equator reach a boiling 120C (250F), while night temperatures can plunge to -130C (-208F). And temperatures of -250C (-410F) have been recorded at craters which never receive any sunshine and remain permanently in shadows.

But, Ms Mitra says, this wide variation in temperature is significant because it shows that Moon's soil - called lunar regolith - is a very good insulator.

"This could mean it could be used to build space colonies to keep heat and cold and radiation out. This would make it a natural insulator for habitat," she says.

It could also be an indicator of the presence of water ice below the surface.
A clue into the Moon's evolution

When a laser detector mounted on the rover measured the chemicals present on the lunar surface near the south pole, it found a host of chemicals such as aluminium, calcium, iron, chromium, titanium, manganese, silicon and oxygen.

But the most important of the findings, scientists say, relate to sulphur. The instrument's "first-ever in-situ - in the original space" measurement "unambiguously confirms" the presence of sulphur, Isro said.

Sulphur's presence on the Moon has been known from the 1970s, but scientists say the fact that the rover has measured sulphur on the lunar surface itself - and not inside a mineral or as part of a crystal - makes it "a tremendous accomplishment".

Ms Mitra says the presence of sulphur in the soil is significant on a number of counts.

"Sulphur comes usually from volcanoes so this will add to our knowledge of how the Moon was formed, how it evolved and its geography.

"It also indicates the presence of water ice on the lunar surface and since sulphur is a good fertiliser, it's good news as it can help grow plants if there's habitat on the Moon."
Was it really a Moonquake?

The Vikram lander carries an instrument that measures vibrations emanating from its own studies and experiments as well as those from the rover and its activities.

Isro said while the Instrument for Lunar Seismic Activity (Ilsa) had its ear to the ground, it also recorded "an event, appearing to be a natural one" and was investigating its source.

Isro said the lander recorded an event "appearing to be a natural one"

This event had much larger amplitude which means it was much stronger, Ms Mitra says, adding that there could be several explanations for this.

"It could be some space debris - such as a meteorite or an asteroid - hitting the surface. Or it could be seismic which would make it the first Moonquake recorded since the 1970s. In that case, this could lead to an explanation of what's under the Moon's surface and its geography."
What's lunar plasma?

When Isro posted on X (formerly Twitter) that a probe on the lander had done the "first-ever measurements of the near-surface lunar plasma environment" of the south polar region and found it to be "relatively sparse", many wondered what it meant.

Ms Mitra explains that plasma refers to the presence of charged particles in the atmosphere which could hinder the radio-wave communication that Chandrayaan-3 is using.

"The fact that it's very sparse or thin is good news as it means it will disrupt the radio communication a lot less."
When the lander hopped

The last thing the Vikram lander did before being put to bed in early September was what Isro called a "hop experiment".

The agency said the lander was "commanded to fire its engines, it rose up by about 40cm [16 inches] and landed at a distance of 30-40cm".

On Monday Isro released images of the pre- and post-hop of Vikram lander

This "successful experiment" means the spacecraft could be used in future to bring samples back to the Earth or for human missions, it added.

Now, could this short hop mean a giant leap for India's future space plans?

Ms Mitra says the "hop tested restarting the engine after a lunar landing to make sure it is still operating fine".

It also demonstrated that the craft has the "capacity for lift-off in a lunar soil environment since so far the testing and real lift-off has only been from Earth", she adds.

BBC News India is now on YouTube. Click here to subscribe and watch our documentaries, explainers and features.

India government presents bill to reserve 3rd of parliament seats for women

Updated Tue, September 19, 2023 

A member of media works outside the India's new parliament building before its inauguration in New Delhi

By Rupam Jain

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -The Indian government on Tuesday moved a bill to reserve a third of seats in the lower house of parliament and state assemblies for women, reviving an old proposal expected to boost the standing of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party among women.

The contentious legislative proposal has been hanging for decades due to opposition from some heartland political parties and needs the approval of both houses of parliament and a majority of state legislatures to become law.

Its revival comes months before general elections are due by May 2024 when Modi seeks a third term. Analysts say the chances of the bill getting passed in parliament have brightened as opposition to it has shrunk over the years.

It is the latest in a series of moves by the government that the ruling nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has projected as "pro-women"

"We want more and more women to join the development process of the country," Modi told a special five-day parliamentary session.

Women make up almost half of India's 950 million registered voters but only 15% of parliament and about 10% of state legislatures, pushing the world's largest democracy to the bottom of global rankings on gender parity in legislatures.

The 33% reservation for women will not apply to the upper houses of parliament and state legislatures.

Opposition lawmakers welcomed the revival of the proposal but pointed out that implementing it could take years as it requires boundaries of constituencies to be redrawn, which in turn can only be done after a population census.

FIGHT FOR GENDER BALANCE

India's once in a decade census was due to be completed in 2021 but was delayed because of the pandemic. Technical and logistical hurdles have set the survey back further.

"That means till 2029 this reservation won't be implemented," Priyanka Chaturvedi, a lawmaker from the opposition Shiv Sena (UBT) party, told reporters, referring to when general elections become due after 2024.

"They (government) have opened the doors but still there is no entry for women," she said.

Law Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal said the 542-seat lower house has 82 women members at present and if the bill is approved the number will rise to at least 181.

Successive governments have sought to address this imbalance since the mid-1990s. But it has been repeatedly blocked by Hindi heartland parties, with some of their lawmakers aggressively disrupting proceedings and snatching and tearing copies of the bill before being physically escorted out of the chambers.

Opponents of the move say reservation for women will only benefit educated and urban women and deprive their disadvantaged rural counterparts from so-called backward castes. They want a quota for women from backward castes within the overall quota for women to ensure what they say will be a true gender balance.

(Reporting by Rupam Jain, Blassy Boben, Shivam Patel; Editing by YP Rajesh, Muralikumar Anantharaman, William Maclean)

Israeli military sentences commander to 10 days in prison over shooting of Palestinian motorist

Associated Press
Tue, September 19, 2023 

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israel on Tuesday sentenced an army commander in the occupied West Bank to 10 days in military prison after an investigation into his shooting last week of a Palestinian motorist who was found to be innocent.

The Israeli military said that security forces stationed at the Israeli settlement of Rimonim, east of Jerusalem, had received reports of gunshots in the area and, sometime later, spotted a Palestinian vehicle fleeing the scene that they believed to be behind the shooting.

The forces opened fire at the Palestinian man's car, the military said, hitting and wounding the driver. The army arrested him and took him to a hospital for treatment before releasing him the next day.

An Israeli military investigation determined the army's shooting was the result of mistaken identity. “This is a serious incident in which the force acted contrary to procedures,” the army said, announcing that the force's commander had been sentenced to 10 days in military prison.

Palestinian media identified the driver as 22-year-old Mazen Samrat from a village near the Palestinian city of Jericho.

Rights groups and other critics have accused Israeli soldiers and police officers of being too quick to pull the trigger, particularly in response to a recent surge in attacks by Palestinians that have killed 31 people so far this year.

They have noted that Israeli military investigations into accusations of crimes committed against Palestinians rarely lead to prosecutions in the West Bank, which Israel captured along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip from Jordan in the 1967 Mideast war.

According to Israeli human rights group Yesh Din, of the 248 investigations into cases of harm inflicted on Palestinians opened by the Israeli military in the West Bank between 2017 and 2021, only 11 indictments were issued. There were over 1,200 complaints of wrongdoing by Israeli forces during that period, meaning that officers prosecuted 0.87% of the time, Yesh Din reported.

Penalties for Israeli soldiers raise a host of thorny political issues in the country, which has compulsory military service for most Jewish men. Right-wing lawmakers responded angrily to the sentencing of the commander on Tuesday. “Wake me up and tell me it’s a bad dream,” Tally Gotliv, a lawmaker with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, adding that the commander was “punished for being a hero.”

The Israeli military said that all army divisions would take a “learning break” to review lessons from the incident in an effort to prevent its recurrence.

Man Shuts Down Pro-Life Protester By Using The Bible

Isaac Serna-Diez

Mon, September 18, 2023 

Man talking to a protestor

Jason Selvig from The Good Liars comedy duo recently interviewed a pro-life protester and posted the resulting interview onto X (formerly known as Twitter), where the clip quickly went viral and caused a debate in the comments.

During the interview, the woman argues that God has a plan for all life before they are even in the womb, meaning that abortion is taking away from God’s plan. Selvig, however, uses another part of the Bible to argue the opposite.

Jason Selvig shut down a pro-life protestor by using the Bible.

The woman at the start of the interview says, “We need to abolish abortion, no exceptions.” Her sign reads and implies that this is the “#1 issue” we as a country are facing, as another sign reads, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you,” a quote from Jeremiah 1.

RELATED: Doctor Who Grew Up On Food Stamps Responds To Woman Concerned That Her Tax Dollars Pay For The Program

She proposes her interpretation and uses it to inform her argument on why abortion is immoral, but Selvig does the same thing to argue the opposite about how God doesn’t seem to value life as much as the woman thinks.

“Didn’t he kill all the firstborn sons in Egypt?” Selvig responds, referring to the book of Exodus. Selvig implies that, because God punished the Egyptians by killing all of the firstborn sons in Egypt, the argument that God values every life that is formed isn't a strong one.

After his question, the woman says that she’s “done” with the interview since Selvig’s point directly contradicts hers, and this seems like a common theme for The Good Liars' videos.

They interview conservatives and try to “own” them, and although these videos are mean-spirited, this particular video raises a very good point that many people seem to miss about the debate regarding morality in politics.

The Bible is not a good argument for political reform or legislation.

The “separation of church and state” isn’t written in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, but instead is written in an 1802 letter by President Thomas Jefferson — one of the Founding Fathers. In this letter, he states that the First Amendment is a means for building “a wall of separation between church and state.”

The First Amendment, though widely understood as the freedom of speech, also states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” This is known as the Establishment Clause.

RELATED: ChatGPT-Written Bible Verse On How Jesus Feels About Trans People Sparks Discussion About What The Bible Actually Says About Gender

While I could go on for days about how the Establishment Clause affects US politics, the important thing to note is that using religious beliefs and ideas to influence legislation is a bad idea to begin with.

The Bible is a religious text that could be interpreted in many different ways — Selvig’s conversation with this stranger exemplifies this perfectly.

Using the Bible, or any religious text for that matter, as a means to argue the morality of legislation is not a valid way to enact the change you want. There are dozens of arguments against people who use the Bible to spread hate toward LGBTQ+ groups found within the Bible itself.

Everyone is entitled to believe in what they want to believe in. Pro-choice and anti-abortion protesters will likely disagree with each other until the end of time, but they are both allowed the freedom of speech to speak out about what they believe in.

Proposing an argument for the legislation those people would like to see without using the Bible will provide them with stronger points that will better suit their beliefs.

Isaac Serna-Diez is an Assistant Editor for YourTango who focuses on entertainment and news, social justice, and politics.

This article originally appeared on YourTango

KETTLE CALLING POT BLACK
Alberta premier brands federal minister's net-zero speech at oil conference 'tone-deaf'

Story by Joel Dryden •CBC

Expecting to draw around 5,000 delegates from more than 100 countries around the world, the World Petroleum Congress had barely kicked off Sunday before rifts between Alberta and Ottawa concerning energy policy took centre stage.

The World Petroleum Congress is a five-day conference being held in Calgary for first time since 2000. The theme for this year's conference is "Energy Transition: The Path to Net Zero."

During the opening ceremonies on Sunday, Canadian Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson told the crowd that, as a global community, in order to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, "meaningful progress" needed to be made by 2030.

"We cannot get to net-zero by 2050 if we begin our journey in 2040," Wilkinson said, according to a copy of his prepared remarks provided by his office on Sunday evening, prior to the speech.

Wilkinson also issued a "call to action" to Canadian oil and gas companies to aggressively take up the challenge of decarbonization.

"A call to action to enhance the long-term competitiveness of the sector while concurrently playing an important role in the global fight against climate change," the remarks read.

Wilkinson then goes on to "acknowledge the net-zero commitments that have been made by many of the largest Canadian energy companies."

But Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, speaking to reporters on Monday, said it was the "wrong place" for Wilkinson to make that speech.

"What he was tone-deaf to is the amount of work that's been done by our industry to align with the carbon-neutral target, and to essentially act as if the industry was winding down, and that is not the case," Smith said.

"That's why I had to counter his message. This is not an industry that's winding down. It's an industry that's transitioning away from emissions."



During the opening kick-off for the World Petroleum Congress on Sunday, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Jonathan Wilkinson warned against moving slowly when it came to efforts to decarbonize.

(Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)

When asked by a reporter whether the World Petroleum Congress's international stage was an appropriate place for the federal and provincial government to spar over energy policy, Smith said she didn't like to fight with her federal counterparts.

"But I'm not going to allow them to take swipes at our industry and have it go unanswered, and talking about this industry winding down, being on its last legs, only having 25 million barrels a day of production by 2050, at a time when everybody's here to celebrate production and investment," Smith said.

"And, we're trying to make Canada an investment magnet. I would say that was the wrong place for him to make that speech."

Jim Reiter, Saskatchewan's minister of energy and resources, is also attending the conference. He was also critical of the speech, saying that he thought Wilkinson had been "dismissive" of what industry was doing.

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"They need to stop doing the virtue signaling and actually do what's best for emissions," Reiter told reporters.




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Wilkinson says comments misinterpreted

Speaking to CBC Radio's The Homestretch on Monday afternoon, Wilkinson was asked about the premier's comments.

"I actually think that perhaps the premier has misinterpreted some of the comments. What I said was, we do need to reduce production emissions in order to actually have a competitive industry going forward. That is not different from what Saudi Arabia says," Wilkinson said.

"I met with the Saudi minister of energy this morning, and we both are very focused on getting to a point where we actually have net-zero production emissions on a go-forward basis."

Last week, the head of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said demands for fossil fuels would peak in 2030, citing new projections.

"This age of seemingly relentless growth is set to come to an end this decade, bringing with it significant implications for the global energy sector and the fight against climate change," Fatih Birol wrote in an op-ed in the Financial Times.

Wilkinson told The Homestretch those projections were not a surprise.

"At the end of the day, if you believe that climate change is real, if you believe that you have to actually get to a point where you are net-zero by 2050, as a global community, then you have to assume that some of those combustion applications are going away," Wilkinson said.

"Premier Smith is very focused on production emissions. But we also have to be focused on the consumption of it through cars, and buses, and trains and planes. Those also create emissions. A net-zero world means that you've actually addressed all of those."


Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, left, tours the Saudi Arabia pavilion with Saudi Arabia's minister of energy, Abdulaziz bin Salman Al-Saud, at the World Petroleum Congress in Calgary on Sept. 18. 

(Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press)© Provided by cbc.ca

He added that countries must take action to ensure they're winning the environmental war while creating economic opportunity in a low-carbon world.

Speaking on Monday morning at the World Petroleum Congress about the IEA projection, Saudi Arabia's energy minister, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman Al-Saud, said such forecasts are not always reliable and said the IEA had "moved from being a forecaster and assessor of the market to one practicing political advocacy."

Smith agreed with Al-Saud's point of view.

"His advice was, you take a measure of prudence so that you don't end up creating disruption and instability in the markets and then you can always increase," Smith said.

"I think that that kind of approach actually is a lot more practical than trying to rely on predictions for what has become ... increasingly, unfortunately, a political activist organization."

Conference runs until Thursday

Speaking about the conference, which runs until Thursday, Warren Mabee, director of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Policy at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont., previously told CBC News he'd be watching to see if those in the energy sector would demonstrate clarity around their climate plans.

"If you look at it from an environmental perspective, it's not moving fast enough. If you look at it from a corporate perspective, there's a real need to continue to service the existing markets," he said last week.

"It is important that energy continues to flow and that people have the energy they need in order to transition their economies. This can't all happen overnight."