How safe is "cloned" consumption?

US administration may allow cloned milk and meat for human consumption

Jumping to conclusions is a folly.  Just 4 years of research and conclusion that cloned food is okay for human consumption, sounds like an extreme case of jumping the gun.

We know too little about cloning to judge its long term effects on human body and mind.  The current environment, which has anyways led to a flurry of carcinogens in the atmosphere, is bad enough.  We are still grappling with issues such as the use of pesticides and hormonal injections.  Even after decades of research, there is no conclusive evidence to make a confident decision on their effect on humans.  

Cloning is still in its experimental stage.  We hardly know enough about cloning to know about its after effects.  To say, cloning is newer than mobile phones, and we are still trying to understand if the mobile waves can cause brain tumor.  I personally would not want to put anything inside my body that is genetically modified and hails from the realm of the unknown.  Human life is the most precious, but more precious, is human health.  

Would you like to eat an experiment?  I refuse to be made a guinea pig of scientific “jumped” conclusions.

Should teacher-student relationships be allowed on campus?

Should Student-Teacher Affairs be permitted on campus?

This has turned into such a global debate.  Some studies from people like Pat Sikes even claim that an erotic charge in a teacher leads to better learning.  I am not sure how much the studies are true, but as a firm defender of individual rights, I opine that student-teacher affairs should be permitted on campus.

It’s partly true that a teacher is in a position to take undue advantage of students on campus due to their position.  Even law has identified teacher-student relationship as one where undue advantage could exist and any acts committed on recommendation of the teacher may not be fully consensual by the student.  

However, when the issue is looked at as a whole with full spotlight rather than in bits and pieces, the justice seems to be in allowing these relationships to happen.  

Individual rights, the mark of the 21st century, not only consist of freedom of speech, religion, travel and vote.  They carry onto mean that a person is free to believe and act as per his/her wishes, as long as he/she is not jeopardizing that which does not belong to him.  This also means that a person is free to choose a sexual or romantic partner.  

Imposing rules as to who can have an affair with whom, is like creating a whole new caste system within the society.  At a time when the older civilizations are finally being groomed by western concepts to let go of racial or caste based boundaries, here we are creating them all over again.  The American universities that fire professors for having affairs with their students, are breaching the basic tenets on which the constitution of the country is based upon.  They are also indirectly saying that they neither have faith in the character of their professors, nor in the law of the land.  Hence, this raises another question.. if the American education system has lost trust in the character of their teachers, what are we expecting them to teach the students?  And if we in the east blindly follow what a few American universities have decreed for their educators, are we also saying that we do not trust the character of the teachers within our system?  If so, why are we allowing them to teach and guide our nation?

France riots 2005 - a beginning of a new Dark Age?

Gosh! Looks like a scene out of a Hollywood blockbuster doesn’t it?

But this is true, its happening, and its happening in the place almost every human drools for.. the heart of Europe, France!

Honestly, if it were a picture out of Asia or S. America or something, this wouldn’t even have made international news. But it happening in one of the Veto nations, has its own aftershocks across the planet.

Immigration is an interesting proposition staring the world in its face. And especially Muslim immigration. In France too, it’s the North African Arab population that’s being blamed.

I am unable to understand the game. Is it the whites vs. the blacks? Or the whites vs. the immigrants? Or the whites vs. the blacks vs. the browns vs. the Asians? Or is it Christians vs. the Muslims and at times, other religions? Oh boy the world seems to be more complicated than it ever was. The lines between friends and enemies is blurred beyond recognition. As much as I hate “ghettoism” and segregations based on race, community or religion, I guess free thinkers like me are going to have a difficult time in the near future. Simply because, the 21st century is proving to be a radical thought driven century.

I fear. I fear because this time, the western world is facing the brunt. I have always been an admirer of the western world. Notwithstanding that they made colonies and looted countries in the past, it is the west that has given the values of equality, liberty and individual freedom. I shudder to consider a life in the dark ages. The west stands as a shining example of what the world can become, and has always striven to become. An attack on the west, a depletion in their forces, spells doom.

I wonder who will dominate after the west is depleted. Radical religious forces? Freedom hating communists? Monarchs? Democracy, freedom of speech, freedom to travel and indulge in business, equal justice, a “servant” government rather than a “ruler” government… all the new age adages will be thrown in the trash bin.

Is the fall of the west, the mark of the entry of the dark ages?