Watching the World
BEACHES DESEGREGATED
On November 16, 1989, the president of South Africa declared that the country’s beaches would henceforth be open to people of all races. According to The New York Times, President F. W. de Klerk also promised that the Separate Amenities Act would be repealed soon; it went into effect 36 years ago and has been used to keep anyone who is not white out of certain public swimming pools, parks, libraries, and transportation systems. The country’s Conservative Party, unhappy about the prospect of a repeal of the act, accused de Klerk of putting South Africa on the road to becoming “totally racially mixed.” But some of the public facilities in question, including many beaches, were already quietly desegregated before the president’s speech. The repeal would not integrate the country’s segregated hospitals, schools, or neighborhoods.
AIDS IN THE 1990’S
At a conference in Marseilles, France, Dr. Jonathan Mann, director of the World Health Organization’s Global Programme on Aids, warned of a huge global spread of AIDS in the 1990’s. As many as ten million may now be infected with the virus in 152 countries around the world. By the year 2000, AIDS may kill six million people. The report in The Times of London notes that Africa is hardest hit. In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, 42 percent of women working in bars and restaurants reportedly carry the virus. In Côte d’Ivoire, three out of ten adults were said to be infected. Of the crisis in the United States, the Hudson Institute warns that “a catastrophe is sweeping over America.” It forecasts that the AIDS virus will infect some 14.5 million Americans by 2002 and kill more Americans in the 1990’s than all the wars in the nation’s history combined.
“BIOLOGICAL FILTERS”
Dutch officials are taking innovative measures to clean up the pollution of the 3,027-acre [1,225-ha] lake Zoommeer in the Netherlands. They plan to use mussels as pollutant eaters. As reported in the International Herald Tribune, published in France, these mussels can act as “biological filters.” Experiments have shown that mussels consume and eliminate toxic chemicals and metals. Their contaminated wastes settle to the bottom where they can be dredged up. Scientists claim that the mussels can eliminate over 50 percent of PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) and 30 percent or more of cadmium from the water.
BAD DATES
Many laboratories that carry out radiocarbon dating of human artifacts are considerably less accurate than they claim to be, according to a study commissioned by Britain’s Science and Engineering Research Council. Samples of known age were sent to 38 labs around the world to be dated. Only seven of the labs produced results that were deemed “satisfactory.” Reports Britain’s magazine New Scientist: “The margin of error . . . may be two to three times as great as practitioners of the technique have claimed.” Such wide variance undercuts the dogmatic assertions often made about the age of ancient artifacts, especially when these contradict Bible chronology.
POACHING FOR ORIENTAL MEDICINES
Conservation officers in the Canadian wilderness have recently found more and more bear carcasses with the paws hacked off and the gallbladder missing. Maclean’s magazine of Canada reports that just these parts from one bear can earn a poacher up to $5,000. They are sold as ingredients for traditional Asian medicines, supposedly able to relieve pain and inflammation or to increase a person’s sexual prowess. They are a small part of a booming trade in organs and other parts of wild animals; not all of the trade is illegal. The velvet from the antlers of deer and elk, the reproductive organs of seals and tigers, dried seahorses, and even deer fetuses are all eagerly sought.
POLICING PARTIES
A wild party in Bracebridge, Ontario, Canada, has led to a new police program in the area. Parents left their 15-year-old son in charge of the home and his 10-year-old brother while they were away. He hosted a party for about a hundred youths, which soon got out of control. Neighbors called the police, but the boy wouldn’t let them in the house. Later, the ten-year-old called the police. The youths had forced him to drink beer until he was drunk and then had roasted his pet tropical fish and eaten it in front of him. By the time the police came back with a search warrant, the youths had done $13,000 worth of damage to the house. Since then, a new program enables parents who are leaving teenagers in charge of their home to notify police in advance, authorizing them to enter the home if they suspect any violations of drug, alcohol, or criminal laws.
DO-IT-YOURSELF ABORTIONS
In the wake of recent legislation that gave states in the United States more power to restrict abortions, scores of women’s self-help groups are reviving and publicizing methods for women to perform abortions on themselves. The New York Times reports that hundreds of women have recently performed such abortions on one another, and that articles, books, and videotapes outlining the methods are widely distributed. One feminist told the Times that such options give women more power. But even some groups that favor abortion oppose the self-help abortions, decrying the danger.
PRIESTLESS CHURCH SERVICES
The shortage of Catholic priests in the United States has grown so severe that a recent gathering of the country’s bishops approved a Sunday service for parishes without priests. A deacon or a layperson, male or female, may lead the new service. It will include hymns, psalms, Scripture reading, the Lord’s Prayer, and Holy Communion if bread is available that has been consecrated by a priest or brought from an actual Mass. The bishops emphasize that the new service is not a Mass. But as more parishes are forced to do without priests, the service may be in great demand.
CONFUSED TIGERS
Some 500 Bengal tigers in the Sundarban Tiger Reserve in India had been killing about 60 people a year, according to The New York Times. In an effort to reduce the number of human casualties, a new measure has been adopted by the Indian Forestry Service. Because of the claim that the tigers attack people only from behind, the Forestry Service issued face masks to be worn by workers on the backs of their heads. During a period of three years, no one wearing a mask was killed. In contrast, none of the 29 people killed by tigers during the last 18 months of the three-year period were wearing the mask. One woodcutter was attacked from behind by a tiger when he sat down for lunch and took off his mask. Among local residents, there are some who argue that these “clever tigers cannot be fooled for long.”
UNTIMELY HUMOR
A recent movie, which brought its North American producers $125 million (U.S.) in just two months, portrays sadism and extreme violence in a humorous light. A review of the film in Brazil’s magazine Veja describes one example. A driver’s head is cut off by a surfboard. “As the decapitation is shown, the scene is more funny than shocking,” notes the review. “The result is that the countless scenes of shootings, murders, and massacres, all bathed in much blood, . . . convey comicalness instead of repugnance. The spectator winds up being entertained with violence. . . . The violence, the brutal lacerating of bodies, the inconceivable suffering, are transformed into an excuse for jokes.”
EMBARRASSING DEBTS
Europeans who fail to pay their bills may soon find someone dressed in an elaborate costume—as a pink panther, for instance—on their doorstep or at their workplace to remind them to make payments. The International Herald Tribune of Paris reports that it is all part of a new strategy that debt collectors in Spain launched a year ago to encourage debtors to pay up. The theory is that costumed debt collectors will draw so much attention that the borrower will be embarrassed into honoring his debts. The director of one agency claims that the strategy “nearly always” works.