Free Republic

I was asked by the Young Adult group in my parish to address some ads on our local buses and subway trains here in Washington. The members of the Young adult group found the ads offensive and troubling, especially since they were aimed at kids. The ads are posted by the American “Humanist” Association (AHA) and are indeed aimed at kids and teenagers. The focus of the message is “Kids without God: You’re not the only one.” I have altered the ad at the upper right of this post to avoid listing its website but as you can see God...

A study of how older teenagers use social media has found that Facebook is “not just on the slide, it is basically dead and buried” and is being replaced by simpler social networks such as Twitter and Snapchat, an expert has claimed. Young people now see the site as “uncool” and keep their profiles live purely to stay in touch with older relations, among whom it remains popular. Prof Daniel Miller of University College London, an anthropologist who worked on the European Union-funded research, wrote in an article for the academic news website The Conversation: “Mostly they feel embarrassed even...

Mayoral Candidate Allegedly Beaten Up By Two Teenage Girls At Mall Of AmericaErin FuchsDec. 28, 2013, 10:50 AMLetajia Shapree Cutler-Cain A 63-year-old runner-up for mayor of Minneapolis was allegedly beaten up by two teenage girls at a Mall of America Starbucks this week, CBS Minnesota reports. The teen girls allegedly attacked Mark Andrew and said "we're going to kill you" after he tried to chase down a guy who snatched his phone. It's possible the girls were working with the thief. The girls, age 18 and 17, were arrested and are in police custody. The 18-year-old was identified as Letajia...

Another shooting, another son of divorce. From Adam Lanza, who killed 26 children and adults a year ago at Sandy Hook School in Newtown, Conn., to Karl Pierson, who shot a teenage girl and killed himself this past Friday at Arapahoe High in Centennial, Colo., one common and largely unremarked thread tying together most of the school shooters that have struck the nation in the last year is that they came from homes marked by divorce or an absent father. From shootings at MIT (i.e., the Tsarnaev brothers) to the University of Central Florida to the Ronald E. McNair Discovery...

The statistics are truly shocking. Children aged 12 to 17 are one of the largest consumer groups of online porn. Experts say this early exposure to sexually explicit video can hook kids on hardcore and often violent imagery. Shelley Lubben is a former adult film actress turned anti-porn advocate. In 2008, she created the pink cross foundation which offers resources for teens struggling with porn addiction. "We are raising a whole generation of porn addicts," says Shelley, "When you view pornography, it creates a chemical reaction in your brain, and for a youth who is in puberty, it's like a...

First the city banned smoking in most public places. Now it’s moving to snuff out the use of smokeless electronic cigarettes as well. The City Council announced Wednesday that it will hold a hearing Wednesday on a bill prohibiting the use of the battery-operated, tobacco-free vaporizers in restaurants, offices, parks, beaches and other places where smoking regular cigarettes is not allowed.

WASHINGTON (WJLA) - Phoebe Connolly says she had no idea what was coming when she biked through a group of teens in Columbia Heights. "My whole head went flying to the side," she explains. "It was a hard punch. One kid came from the side and pretty much cut me off. "He just like threw a hook with his left hand, and just got me right in the face," she continues. "And he said 'wa-pow' as he hit me in the face." Phoebe says she was able to pedal away, but was left sore and with a bloody nose. Otherwise,...

A rash of violent anti-Semitic attacks in Brooklyn, New York recently left a local rabbi wondering if the wave of assaults is part of a game of “Knock out the Jew.” Those were the words that Rabbi Yaacov Behrman had for CBS New York this week when he weighed in on a string of recent incidents that have taken Brooklyn by storm. The CBS affiliate reported that the New York Police Department is now investigating the series of crimes - at least one of which was captured on a surveillance camera. In that incident, Behrman said a local Jewish man...

A pro-life student group today released a new video showing young girls not legally old enough for sexual relations were unable to buy the sudafed cold medicine but could easily purchase the Plan B drug. Although sex with a girl 15-years-old or younger if statutory rape, the girls had no problems getting the drugs at nationally-known stores. Earlier this year, the Food & Drug Administration announced that “Plan B,” also known as the “morning after pill”, should be sold over the counter to anyone of any age. Before that it could only be sold to those 17 and older. Plan...

For the first time at Calabasas High School, a same-sex couple has been crowned as homecoming queen and queen. Lily Cohen and her partner, Greta Melendez, were nominated by their classmates for titles that historically have been awarded to a male and a female student. But times are changing. [Snip] “I was just shocked because it’s just amazing to see how much our school has changed in the past four years,” Melendez said. “When I was a freshman, we wouldn’t have gotten that reaction. I went through a lot of bullying.”

A group of 10 black youths blocked a white couple’s car in the New York borough of Brooklyn, brutally beating the husband and slamming the wife’s head into the pavement by her hair as they shouted racial epithets, officials said. Ronald Russo, 30, and his wife, Alanna, 30, were stopped at a red light Monday night when the group crossed Avenue U at East 58th Street, the New York Daily News reported. Mr. Russo honked his horn when the light turned green to get the youths out of the way, but they then began kicking the car, according to the...

A Chicago-area high school pulled a senior student from class on Thursday after he showed up to school wearing a Jesus costume for Halloween. Shortly after, the school then reversed its decision and allowed the teen to return to class wearing the costume. Angenetta Frison, mother of Marshon Sanders, a senior at Highland Park High School in Chicago's northern suburbs, said in a statement to a local news outlet that her son was asked to remove his Jesus costume after two teachers at his high school reportedly complained that the costume was offensive. The costume consisted of a long white...

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Two teenage girls suspected of shoplifting were stopped as they were leaving the Victoria’s Secret store in Herald Square, and a security guard checking their bags found what appeared to be a dead baby, police said Thursday. The girls, both 17, were stopped by a store security guard. It was then that one of the girls admitted she had “a baby in the bag,” CBS 2 reported. The guard called police. The girl later told police that she had given birth Wednesday and did not know what to do with the stillborn baby, which had matured...

A 17-year-old North Andover High School student was stripped of her captain's position on the volleyball team and suspended for five games after she went to a party to pick up an intoxicated friend, reports The Boston Herald. Erin Cox received a call from a friend, who was allegedly intoxicated, and asked her to pick her up from a party on Main Street in Boxford. Being a good friend, Erin went to pick her up, but instead met police just as they arrived at the house, the newspaper reports.

An Alabama high school student killed himself after he was threatened with severe legal consequences — including registration as a sex offender — because he went streaking at a football game. The student, 15-year-old Christian Adamek, died from wounds he sustained while attempting to hang himself, according to The Daily Mail. Adamek ran naked across the field at a September 27th football game between his school, Sparkman High School, and Grissom High School. The incident was recorded and put on Youtube, and many students remarked that the prank had made Adamek — already a popular student, according to reports —...

Attorney Benjamin Crump said he wants to bring national attention to Georgia after the death of 17-year-old Kendrick Johnson. Crump is no stranger to the national spotlight. He represented Trayvon Martin's family and helped pushed for prosecution in that case. A jury exonerated neighborhood watch George Zimmerman. Crump is now representing Johnson's family. The teen was found dead in his high school gym in January. His body was stuck upside down in a rolled-up wrestling mat. Investigators with Lowndes County Sheriff's Office ruled his death accidental. Today Crump joined Johnson's parents outside the Superior Courthouse in Lowndes County. He called...

This isn’t the Los Angeles Unified School District, either, but a school in relatively conservative Orange County that seems to have a strange and inconsistent notion of stamping out images of firearms. Sophomore Haley Bullwinkle had already worn the NRA t-shirt she received as a gift from her father to her high school several times without anyone questioning her about it. Last week, though, she got sent to the principal’s office and was told she had to remove it because the T-shirt from the nation’s largest gun-safety instruction organization promoted gun violence. What about the school’s drill team, Haley’s father...

..In this ironic case, the 13-year-old unidentified girl, and the 12-year-old boy, are both on the sex offender list and are the victims in the case, because they had consensual sex with each other. The two violated a Utah state law that criminalizes having sex with a person under 14 years of age. Although they were both children, Utah State officials found them guilty of sexual abuse of a child....

Two boys playing on a girls’ volleyball team at a New York high school could see their playing time spiked when league officials consider modifying a rule that allows them to play with the fairer sex. Seniors Andrew Lafortezza and Jason Elbaum both played for the co-ed volleyball club last season at Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua. But due to budgetary constraints, the Quakers were unable to field a boys’ team this year, prompting the teens to seek a spot on the girls’ squad, which they earned after receiving approval from league officials in August. ... Kim Cleary, the...

"CNN reports that Jared James Abrahams, a 19-year-old computer science student, has been arrested for allegedly hijacking the webcams of young women — among them reigning Miss Teen USA Cassidy Wolf — taking nude images, then blackmailing his victims to send him more explicit material or else be exposed. Abrahams admitted he had 30 to 40 'slave computers' — or other people's electronic devices he controlled — and has had as many as 150 total. His arrest came six months after a teenager identified in court documents as C.W. alerted authorities. She has since publicly identified herself as Cassidy Wolf,...