Wanderlust

Tag: race issues

  • Students made to look black in French art school photo

    Undoctored École Émile-Cohl image Image copyright École Émile-Cohl Image caption The original, undoctored image as posted on the college’s website

    A French private art college has apologised after one of its promotional images was doctored to include more black students.

    The photo of a class trip to an art gallery was posted on a US promotional website for Lyon’s Émile-Cohl art school.

    Students noticed it was altered to darken the skin of white students, with black students digitally inserted.

    The school has apologised, and blamed the doctored image on a US PR company.

    Social media users posted comparisons of the original image and the altered version on Twitter.

    On its website, a statement by Émile-Cohl college says the school was first alerted to the image by students. They say it was “retouched to change the physical appearance” of some students.

    It removed the doctored image from the website and apologised to those concerned, “because it goes without saying that we disapprove of this process”.

    The photo was intended to be used as promotional material for a new college subsidiary in Los Angeles.

    The college director Antoine Rivière said in an interview with French news magazine L’Express the college sent several photos to a US communications firm “to enhance the reputation of our school there”.

    The image was changed without their knowledge, he says.

    “This is the antithesis of what represents Émile-Cohl,” he told the magazine.

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  • Bill Leak dies: A brilliant cartoonist who polarised Australia

    Bill Leak poses in front of two painting of Australian comedian Barry Humphries Image copyright News Corp Australia Image caption Bill Leak has been celebrated for his wit and distinctive style

    Loved and loathed, he was to his admirers a genius of wit and originality who confronted tough topics, while to his detractors he fuelled race tensions and polarised a nation.

    Bill Leak, who created some of Australia’s most recognisable and inflammatory cartoons, has died of a suspected heart attack in hospital. He was 61.

    Last year, his caricature of an indigenous man with a beer can who could not remember his son’s name was labelled “disgusting” and “discriminatory” by Aboriginal leaders. The artist had also faced death threats and was forced to move out of his home after publishing an image of the Prophet Muhammad following the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris.

    “[He was] a giant in his field of cartooning and portraiture and a towering figure for more than two decades,” said Paul Whittaker, editor-in-chief of The Australian newspaper, where Mr Leak worked.

    The cartoonist was born in Adelaide but raised near Sydney, where he trained at the Julian Ashton Art School in the city’s historic Rocks district. He would later travel to Europe to soak up the region’s art, and it was in the early 1980s that he got his big break with The Bulletin magazine.

    Image caption Bill Leak’s most controversial cartoon sparked a racial discrimination complaint last year

    “He had terrific control over the pen. He also had a mind which seemed uncontrollable. It would go in any direction and he was totally unpredictable, so it was combination of his drawing skills and his quirky sense of humour,” Mr Foyle told the BBC.

    “I don’t think Bill was ever surprised about the controversy he caused. He enjoyed it and on many occasions tailored his cartoons to cause a stink. Bill enjoyed being in the limelight.”

    Mr Leak won nine Walkley awards that recognise journalistic excellence in Australia, and had worked for Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp Australia newspapers since 1994.

    His distinctive style won many fans, but he often drew intense criticism for his views – particularly in recent years. Last year’s depiction of the indigenous man sparked a complaint to Australia’s Human Rights Commission, with a claim it had violated a controversial race discrimination law.

    One indigenous advocacy group at the time called the “disgusting, disrespectful, and hurtful”, adding: “Those involved in publishing such a clearly racist cartoon should be ashamed and should issue a public apology to all Australians.”

    Emotional reactions

    Tributes on social media have praised his fearlessness, lamenting the loss of an artist who was “supremely talented, principled, brave, witty & decent”, and “a true warrior for freedom of speech”.

    Others, though, had far more brutal assessments. Several posts after his death did not just attack Mr Leak’s views, but the cartoonist personally – demonstrating how polarising he had become within sections of the community. Others swiftly condemned the critical posts.

    Image copyright @annabelcrabb Image copyright @JacquiLambie

    Those close to Mr Leak say while he made a career rattling cages, an avalanche of criticism of his work in recent years had become too heavy a burden.

    “Basically he was hounded to his death. He’s had the most incredibly stressful couple of years,” Spectator Australia editor and long-time friend Rowan Dean told the BBC.

    “There were death threats after he did a cartoon that showed the Prophet Muhammad, which led to him having to move his house. He was Australia’s version of Salman Rushdie for a while.”

    ‘Racist’ cartoon draws praise and criticism The racial discrimination law dividing Australia

    “He did a very poignant but accurate cartoon about Indigenous Australians, disadvantage and the lack of parenting amongst Indigenous Australians and for that he was hounded mercilessly by our Australian Human Rights Commission. The pressure that he was under was just enormous.”

    Defending his cartoon at the time, Mr Leak wrote: “I was trying to say that if you think things are pretty crook for the children locked up in the Northern Territory’s Don Dale Youth Detention Centre, you should have a look at the homes they came from.”

    Image caption Leak’s final cartoon accused education minister Rob Stokes of ignoring radicalisation in Australian schools

    Many of his fellow cartoonists share the thought that Mr Leak was pilloried to the point of submission.

    Mark Tippett, a Sydney-based caricature artist, told the BBC that his death was a terrible reminder of the battles they often face.

    “What do we do as satirists if we can’t satire anymore?” he asked. “Do we have to ask permission before we can put pen to paper? It just can’t go on this way. It [his death] makes us more defiant. We can’t go into a shell.”

    “What he was trying to do is make his messages as simplistic as possible for many people to understand. His style would appeal to the masses because it was so clean and recognisable. You just don’t see that every day.”

    Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has remembered his friend of more than 30 years.

    “I can’t believe that Bill Leak is dead,” Mr Turnbull posted on Facebook. “Who had more life, more energy than him? So many more cartoons to draw, paintings to paint, politicians to satirise.”

    Image copyright ABC Image caption Mr Leak in a recent interview on Australian television

    Indigenous leader Warren Mundine said Mr Leak “was just an incredible cartoonist”. He told the Australian Broadcasting Corp: “I’m just in shock. I was only with him the other night at his book launch and had a beer with him.”

    Left behind are the cartoonist’s wife Goong, his stepdaughter Tasha and his sons Johannes and Jasper.

    His friends have remember a gifted man.

    “Bill was an absolute genius,” said Mr Dean. “Here was a man who was one of Australia’s greatest political talents. Probably one of the world’s greatest satirists, certainly a brilliant cartoonist and also a brilliant portrait painter.”

  • Jeff Classes, Trump’s new legal professional general, dogged via racism claims

    Media captionJeff Classes is a former federal prosecutor

    President Donald Trump’s now showed nominee for attorney general, Senator Jeff Classes, has been dogged by way of allegations of racism, which overshadowed his affirmation procedure.

    He was once one in all Mr Trump’s earliest supporters in his White Space bid. As a key loyalist, he used to be a senior adviser to the brand new York wealthy person on politics, national security and coverage.

    He was also a vice-chairman at the Trump presidential transition group.

    The senator’s previous comments approximately race have drawn scrutiny and proved a roadblock in his political profession.

    The KKK joke

    A Senate committee denied Mr Classes a federal judgeship in 1989 after lawmakers heard testimony that he had used a racial slur.

    Symbol copyright AP Symbol caption Mr Sessions was once an early supporter of Mr Trump

    Democrats were outraged whilst Senator Elizabeth Warren, who opposed Mr Periods’ appointment as attorney common, was once silenced via Republicans at the same time as looking to read a letter through Coretta Scott King that criticised him.

    Writing in 1986, the civil rights activist alleged that he had “used the awesome powers of his place of work in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters”.

    Mr Classes’ supporters deny he’s a racist, pointing to his votes to increase the Vote Casting Rights Act and to award the Congressional Gold Medal to Rosa Parks.

    Immigration ‘hoax’

    He has spent much of his profession preventing immigration battles, ranging from amnesty bills on creating a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants to visa programmes for international staff.

    Mr Sessions helps restricting legal immigration, arguing that it protects American jobs.

    He additionally backs Mr Trump’s plan to construct a wall alongside the us-Mexican border.

    In a 2005 Washington Submit op-ed, he argued that, “legal immigration is the main source of low-wage immigration into the United States Of America”.

    The executive, he argued, have to be inquisitive about “slowing the pace of recent arrivals in order that wages can upward thrust, welfare rolls can reduce and the forces of assimilation can knit us all more intently in combination”.

    Much of his strident view on immigration was once laid out last yr in his 25-page manifesto, “Immigration Manual for the new Republican Majority”. In The document, he argues immigration was accountable for task losses and welfare dependency.

    He called claims by generation entrepreneurs that immigrant workers with elite skills have been part of the innovation process a “hoax”.

    What’s his historical past?

    Born Jefferson Beauregard “Jeff” Sessions III, the SIXTY NINE-yr-vintage was Alabama’s attorney normal earlier than he joined the Senate in 1996.

    As a senator he sat at the Senate Armed Services And Products Committee, the Judiciary Committee and the Finances Committee.

    The lawmaker, who helped Mr Trump craft his international coverage plan, used to be one in every of the few Republicans to come back to his defence after he proposed a temporary ban on Muslims entering the united states.

    Symbol copyright AP Symbol caption Mr Classes proven all through his graduating yr at Wilcox County High School

    While asked if he supported a temporary ban in his hearing, Mr Periods stated he did “now not give a boost to the idea that Muslims as a spiritual workforce need to be denied admission to the United States”.

    He has backed Mr Trump’s amended idea, now an government order, banning folks from nations with a historical past of terrorism, which is now being challenged in courtroom.

    Homosexual marriage opposition

    Like many Republicans, Mr Sessions has adverse the LGBT-rights movement, and particularly the legalisation of same-intercourse marriage.

    In 2000 and 2009 he voted towards regulation which would make bigger the definition of a hate crime to include offences in keeping with sexual orientation.

    In 2015 after the Ultimate Courtroom voted to permit same-intercourse marriage throughout the u.s., he dubbed the decision an “effort to secularise, by way of drive and intimidation”.

    But Mr Sessions testified in Tuesday’s hearing he may practice the law of the land on homosexual rights.

    As Alabama’s lawyer common in 1996, he fought vigorously to stop an LGBT-rights conference from assembly on the University of Alabama.

    He promised to prosecute faculty administrators under a state legislation passed in 1992 that made it unlawful for public universities to fund a group that promotes “movements prohibited through the sodomy and sexual misconduct laws”.

    Whilst the college pledged to allow the convention to fulfill, he sought a court order to prevent it, however in the long run the 1992 order used to be overturned by way of a federal judge.

    What approximately Guantanamo?

    Mr Classes has challenged calls to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay, and he has additionally puzzled whether terrorism suspects have the fitting to be attempted in civilian courts.

    During his affirmation listening to, Mr Sessions mentioned he commonplace the law “absolutely” prohibits waterboarding.

    He also stated Guantanamo Bay was once a “secure position” that matches the purpose of holding prisoners “marvellously smartly”.

    Gun crime

    The National Rifle Affiliation (NRA) applauded Mr Sessions’ appointment as The Usa’s top prosecutor, saying he could “make The United States a more secure place by way of prosecuting violent criminals at the same time as protective the second Amendment rights of regulation-abiding gun house owners”.

    Mr Classes is rated A+ by the group, indicating that he has a pro-gun vote casting document.

    He has prior to now voted towards background exams at gun shows, and in favour of banning court cases in opposition to gun producers, and permitting firearms in checked baggage on trains.

    In a statement at his affirmation hearing he promised a crackdown on gun violence, saying: “If I Am confirmed, we will be able to systematically prosecute criminals who use guns in committing crimes.”

    Many in the regulation enforcement community have voiced strengthen for Mr Classes, believing he will be a robust recommend for the police.

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  • Corbyn a ‘danger’ to British Jews, says ex-leader rabbi

    Video Corbyn a ‘danger’ to British Jews

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  • South Africa rejects Donald Trump’s tweet on farmer killings

    Donald Trump Symbol copyright Reuters Image caption Donald Trump’s tweet adopted a work on Fox Information about South Africa’s planned land reforms

    South Africa has accused US President Donald Trump of looking to sow department after his tweet referring to the “large-scale killing of farmers”.

    He stated he had requested his secretary of state to look into the matter of “seizing land from white farmers”.

    South Africa’s presidential spokeswoman stated Mr Trump was “misinformed”.

    Last month, South Africa mentioned it will cross beforehand with plans to amend the charter, allowing land to be expropriated without repayment.

    Reality Test: Are farmers at the next chance of homicide? Is South Africa ’s land reform an election gimmick? South Africans’ anger over land set to blow up

    The redistribution of land used to be a fundamental idea of the governing African National Congress (ANC) all the way through its struggle against white-minority rule.

    South Africa’s land problem

    The Natives Land Act of 1913 limited black other folks from buying or renting land in “white South Africa”, resulting in the pressured removals of black other folks After the top of apartheid in 1994, the ANC govt mentioned it desired to return 30% of this land to its earlier homeowners through 2014 It’s predicted that 10% of commercial farmland has been redistributed.

  • US students topple Accomplice soldier statue in North Carolina

    University of North Carolina police surround the toppled statue of a Confederate soldier nicknamed Silent Sam Symbol copyright Reuters Image caption The statue of a Accomplice soldier nicknamed Silent Sam used to be erected in 1913

    Student protesters toppled a controversial Confederate monument on the School of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on Monday night.

    The statue of a Accomplice soldier, nicknamed Silent Sam, has been a target of vandalism and protests for decades.

    A Few 250 protesters additionally argued with a handful of counter-protesters, some in Confederate flag T-shirts, media stated.

    Symbols for the losing aspect of the yankee Civil Conflict have become a massive flashpoint in a national race debate.

    Monday’s motion is the most recent transfer to dismantle Accomplice memorials, which critics name racially offensive, considering the history of slavery within the southern US states.

    Image copyright Sara Davis/Getty Image caption The Silent Sam statue earlier than it was once pulled down

    Protesters, together with scholars, university body of workers and local residents, pulled down the 1913 statue the usage of rope and buried its face in filth, pupil paper The Daily Tar Heel mentioned.

    “Closing night’s movements were illegal and threatening, and we are very fortunate that nobody used to be injured,” the school stated in a statement on Twitter.

    “The police are investigating the vandalism and assessing the full volume of the damage.”

    Protesters collected to precise their frustration at inaction by school leaders and to toughen a student facing possible sanctions for splashing pink ink and blood on Silent Sam in an April protest.

    “it is time to rip down Silent Sam. it is time to tear down UNC’s institutional white supremacy,” pupil Maya Little, who faces charges, instructed the group on Monday.

    No clashes were stated. no less than one person used to be arrested on fees of concealing their face all over a public rally and resisting arrest, the college mentioned.

    Symbol copyright Reuters Image caption Some 250 protesters included scholars, faculty and native residents

    more than 110 symbols have been got rid of due to the fact 2015, and greater than 1,740 proceed to face, in step with the Southern Poverty Regulation Center.

    But some southern states have bolstered their regulations to give protection to Confederate statues.

    The contemporary motion to take away Confederate symbols from the 1861-1865 civil struggle accelerated after the 2015 shooting of nine black churchgoers through a gunman in Charleston, South Carolina.

    Media playback is unsupported on your device

    Media captionWhy did violent protests begin in Charlottesville over plans to remove a statue?

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  • Officer wins go well with over declare he was mocked for black ancestry

    the officer Symbol copyright Court records

    A white US police officer who discovered he has sub-Saharan African ancestry through DNA checking out has gained a payout after claiming racial abuse.

    Sergeant Cleon Brown, a police officer in Hastings, Michigan, sued the drive after alleging his colleagues racially taunted him over his DNA take a look at results.

    He claims they mocked him after he found out that he used to be 18-33% “sub-Saharan African”.

    Sgt Brown will now receive $65,000 (£FORTY NINE,000) from the town’s insurers.

    The 19-yr veteran of the police force to start with sought a minimum of $500,000 in his lawsuit, consistent with US media.

    Symbol copyright Court Docket information

    in one incident, Sgt Brown claims that he came upon a black Santa Claus figurine in his Christmas stocking with “18%” written on it.

    “I call it immediately up racism,” he told WDIV-News.

    This week, the town council agreed to the settlement, announcing it is going to permit Hastings “to focal point its efforts and resources on extra productive endeavours”.

    “Town did not believe the lawsuit had advantage,” Town Supervisor Jeff Mansfield informed local media.

    “but when comparing the cost to the associated fee and disruptive impact of shielding the case, it was in town’s highest interest to resolve the case on the terms in the mediated cost settlement.”

  • London Breed turns into San Francisco’s first black feminine mayor

    London Breed at city hall Symbol copyright Getty Images Symbol caption London Breed joins a small membership of about 19 other black female US mayors

    A black girl is to lead San Francisco for the first time in its history – at a time when African-American citizens have gotten increasingly scarce within the gentrified US town.

    The ascent of London Breed to the mayoralty is all of the extra outstanding given she was once raised in poverty by means of her grandmother in public housing.

    Winning with simply over 50% of votes, the 43-year-antique stated she felt humbled.

    Ms Breed is the only feminine mayor out of the top 15 biggest US cities.

    Image copyright Fb

    San Francisco is these days grappling with rampant homelessness, rubbish-littered streets that experience been likened to growing-international slums, and a assets-price increase that is using running households out of town.

    Symbol copyright Getty Images Symbol caption San Francisco is these days grappling with rampant homelessness

    Rival candidate Mark Leno, who could had been the town’s first homosexual mayor, conceded the knife-part race on Wednesday.

    Ms Breed isn’t the primary feminine mayor of San Francisco – that was Dianne Feinstein in 1978; she is now a California senator.

    She joins a small club of about 19 different black feminine US mayors.

    But she leads a city where FIVE% of residents are African American, and most commonly dwelling in public housing, in line with the San Francisco Chronicle.

    Image copyright Getty Pictures Image caption The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco

    A lifelong San Francisco resident, Ms Breed took a point at School of California, Davis, earlier than getting a master’s in public administration at the College of San Francisco in 2012.

    She started her career within the town executive as an intern earlier than mountaineering its rungs.

    In a 2016 interview with the San Francisco Examiner she recalled her formative years of urban deprivation in the city she now runs.

    She informed the newspaper “Five folks dwelling on $900 per 30 days.: ‘Recycling’ meant consuming out of antique mayonnaise jars. Violence used to be never far away.

    “And as soon as a week, we took Grandma’s pushcart to the community room to assemble govt-issued groceries.”

    Ms Breed’s sister died in 2006 of a drug overdose and her brother is in jail, in line with SF Weekly.