Sometimes the label, the stereotype, the charge, is as bad as the conviction -- legal or otherwise. Either way, a life can be destroyed....A report in a newspaper, an arrest -- and the label -- can send an innocent man or woman to Hell on Earth...
We must not forget some of our most basic constitutional and civic rights: 1. the right to individual privacy; 2. the right to a fair trial and not to be judged guilty before the conclusion of a fair trial; the right not to be scapegoated and/or witch-hunted; the right not to be 'profiled' and 'prosecuted' differently than a person of a different class or subset of people, whether that be based on religion, sex, race, culture, ethnic group, skin colour... The worst part about 'prosecution missions' is that they can turn into profiling, labeling, stereotyping, discriminating -- yes, Government sanctioned forms of discrimination and/or reverse discrimination -- and witch hunts' like what actually happened with St. Joan of Arc, and in The Salem Witchhunt, as well in the 'McCarthyism' era with the 'witchhunting' of 'communists'...
The worst part of the internet is that people of bad intentions are preying on, and exploiting, people's loss of privacy. From internet scams, to stolen identy, to adware and malware, to viruses, to people peering into your private life that you don't want anything to do with, it is getting worse and worse...The internet has become a way for people of any type of motivation and intention -- good, bad, or ugly -- to get basically inside your front door and into your private life without needing your permission or any legal permission to do so.
We need to seriously think about what is happening here to our loss of privacy and civil rights...
-- dgb, May 13th, 2010.
-- David Gordon Bain
...........................................................................................................................................................
Joan of Arc
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For other uses, see Joan of Arc (disambiguation).
Saint Joan of Arc
Painting, c.1485. Artist's interpretation; the only portrait for which she is known to have sat has not survived. (Centre Historique des Archives Nationales, Paris, AE II 2490)
Saint
Born ca. 1412
Domrémy, France
Died 30 May 1431 (aged 19)
Rouen, France (Then England)
Venerated in Roman Catholic Church
Anglican Communion
Beatified 18 April 1909, Notre Dame de Paris by Pope Pius X
Canonized 16 May 1920, St. Peter's Basilica, Rome by Pope Benedict XV
Feast 30 May
Patronage France ; martyrs; captives; militants; people ridiculed for their piety; prisoners; soldiers; Women Appointed for Voluntary Emergency Service (U.S. WAVES); U.S. Women's Army Corps
Saint Joan of Arc or The Maid of Orléans (French: Jeanne d'Arc,[1] IPA: [ʒan daʁk]; ca. 1412[2] – 30 May 1431) is a national heroine of France and a Catholic saint. A peasant girl born in eastern France, she led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War, claiming divine guidance, and was indirectly responsible for the coronation of Charles VII. She was captured by the Burgundians, sold to the English, tried by an ecclesiastical court, and burned at the stake when she was nineteen years old.[3] Twenty-four years later, on the initiative of Charles VII, Pope Callixtus III reviewed the decision of the ecclesiastical court, found her innocent, and declared her a martyr.[3] She was beatified in 1909 and canonized in 1920.[2] She is, along with St. Denis, St. Martin of Tours, St. Louis IX, and St. Theresa of Lisieux, one of the patron saints of France.
Joan asserted that she had visions from God that told her to recover her homeland from English domination late in the Hundred Years' War. The uncrowned King Charles VII sent her to the siege at Orléans as part of a relief mission. She gained prominence when she overcame the dismissive attitude of veteran commanders and lifted the siege in only nine days. Several more swift victories led to Charles VII's coronation at Reims and settled the disputed succession to the throne.
Joan of Arc has remained an important figure in Western culture. From Napoleon to the present, French politicians of all leanings have invoked her memory. Major writers and composers who have created works about her include Shakespeare (Henry VI, Part 1), Voltaire (La Pucelle d'Orléans), Schiller (Die Jungfrau von Orléans ), Verdi (Giovanna d'Arco), Tchaikovsky (Орлеанская дева), Mark Twain (Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc), Jean Anouilh (L'Alouette), Bertolt Brecht (Die heilige Johanna der Schlachthöfe), George Bernard Shaw (Saint Joan), and Maxwell Anderson (Joan of Lorraine). Depictions of her continue in film, television, video games, song, and dance.
............................................................................................................................
Salem witch trials
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“Salem Witches” redirects here. For the minor league baseball team, see Salem Witches (NEL).
1876 illustration of the courtroom; the central figure is usually identified as Mary Walcott
The Salem witch trials were a series of hearings before local magistrates followed by county court of trials to prosecute people accused of witchcraft in Essex, Suffolk, and Middlesex counties of colonial Massachusetts, between February 1692 and May 1693. The episode has been used in political rhetoric and popular literature as a vivid cautionary tale about the dangers of religious extremism, false accusations, lapses in due process, and governmental intrusion on individual liberties.[1]
Despite being generally known as the Salem witch trials, the preliminary hearings in 1692 were conducted in a variety of towns across the province: Salem Village, Ipswich, Andover and Salem Town. The best-known trials were conducted by the Court of Oyer and Terminer in 1692 in Salem Town. Over 150 people were arrested and imprisoned, with even more accused but not formally pursued by the authorities. At least five more of the accused died in prison. All twenty-six who went to trial before this court were convicted. The four sessions of the Superior Court of Judicature in 1693, held in Salem Village, but also in Ipswich, Boston and Charlestown, produced only three convictions in the thirty-one witchcraft trials it conducted. The two courts convicted twenty-nine people of the capital felony of witchcraft. Nineteen of the accused, fourteen women and five men, were hanged. One man (Giles Corey) who refused to enter a plea was crushed to death under heavy stones in an attempt to force him to do so.
......................................................................................................................
McCarthyism
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A 1947 propaganda comic book published by the Catechetical Guild Educational Society warning of the dangers of a Communist takeover.
McCarthyism is the political action of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term specifically describes activities associated with the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by heightened fears of communist influence on American institutions and espionage by Soviet agents. Originally coined to criticize the anti-communist pursuits of U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, "McCarthyism" soon took on a broader meaning, describing the excesses of similar efforts. The term is also now used more generally to describe reckless, unsubstantiated accusations, as well as demagogic attacks on the character or patriotism of political adversaries.
During the post–World War II era of McCarthyism, many thousands of Americans were accused of being Communists or communist sympathizers and became the subject of aggressive investigations and questioning before government or private-industry panels, committees and agencies. The primary targets of such suspicions were government employees, those in the entertainment industry, educators and union activists. Suspicions were often given credence despite inconclusive or questionable evidence, and the level of threat posed by a person's real or supposed leftist associations or beliefs was often greatly exaggerated. Many people suffered loss of employment, destruction of their careers, and even imprisonment. Most of these punishments came about through trial verdicts later overturned,[1] laws that would be declared unconstitutional,[2] dismissals for reasons later declared illegal[3] or actionable,[4] or extra-legal procedures that would come into general disrepute.
The most famous examples of McCarthyism include the speeches, investigations, and hearings of Senator McCarthy himself; the Hollywood blacklist, associated with hearings conducted by the House Committee on Un-American Activities; and the various anti-communist activities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) under Director J. Edgar Hoover. McCarthyism was a widespread social and cultural phenomenon that affected all levels of society and was the source of a great deal of debate and conflict in the United States.
