links for 2011-04-16

"What is particularly disturbing for campaigners is that the gender imbalance appears to be worst in some of India's most prosperous states, undermining claims that education and economic prosperity are determining factors. Worse still, the census suggests the situation has got worse rather than better in the past 10 years. 'It's extremely alarming and everybody should be worried,' said Girija Vyas, head of India's National Commission for Women."

"A judge will rule later this month on whether he breached the Racial Discrimination Act, but in the meantime the issues he stirred up continue to simmer. Debate has long raged about the influences of biology, culture and perception on Aboriginal identity. In Tasmania, where most Aborigines were killed following white settlement, descendants of the survivors – all of them light-skinned – argue bitterly about who can claim indigenous heritage."

"Dot Scott, president of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said even such programs may not be enough to get blacks involved in 150th-anniversary events.

"'It's almost like celebrating with the enemy,' she said. 'I personally began to have a feeling of why would I want to be a part of it?'"

"Donnelly has warned on his internet site, 'It is not a stretch to picture a revolt in Los Angeles, whose population is comprised of over 50 percent illegal aliens.' He has also written: 'The facts are incontrovertible that allowing an illegal invasion of the United States will destroy the American Southwest, and very probably wipe out the freedoms we American Christians enjoy, as Muslim Extremists blend in with the so-called ‘innocent’ illegal aliens, and eventually proselytize them.' For these comments, and others, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) has listed Donnelly an extremist with a dangerous ideology. SPLC describes Donnelly as, 'an antigovernment 'Patriot' who grossly exaggerates the criminality of undocumented immigrants (who studies have shown are on average much less criminal than native-born Americans).'”