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Casting a Wider Net: Malaria and Ebola
This week, the Union for Reform Judaism and the Religious Action Center sent a check for $5,000 to our partners at Nothing But Nets to fund anti-malarial initiatives in Liberia, the country at the heart of the Ebola epidemic. But why fight malaria when Ebola is killing so many?
A Ballot Initiative That Could Reform California’s Criminal Justice System
The United States has a problem with mass incarceration. Though our country only makes up 5% of the world’s population, we have 25% of the world’s incarcerated population. One in 99 adults live behind bars, marking the highest rate of imprisonment in American history! One in 31 adults are under some form of correctional control, which includes prison, jail, parole and probation populations. In California this November, voters have an opportunity to change that.
Teens Connect to Judaism Through Justice
Every year, nearly 2,000 high school-aged Reform Jewish students participate in the Religious Action Center's L'Taken Seminar in Washington, D.C. At the beginning of December, Rabbi Greg Litcofsky, took the confirmation class at his congregation, Temple Emanu-El of West Essex, to Washington D.C. to participate in the L’taken Seminar. The program is designed to expose students to a variety of public policy issues, explore the Jewish values surrounding these issues and teach the skills of an effective advocate. Below, Rabbi Litcofsky and one of Temple Emanu-El’s students, Annabelle Hanflig, reflect on their experience.
During Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the Fight over Breast Cancer-Related Patents Continues
Last year, Angelina Jolie made national news after revealing that she had undergone a preventive double mastectomy because she had a BRCA1 gene mutation which dramatically increased her risk of developing breast and ovarian cancers. Last week, Myriad Genetics, Inc., a company well known for its breakthrough research showing the connection between BRCA gene mutations and an increased risk for breast and ovarian cancer, was at the Federal Circuit defending some of its patents related to the BRCA genes. BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes produce proteins which suppress tumors, and consequently people with BRCA mutations are at a greater risk for certain cancers. This case is especially important to Ashkenazi Jews because Jews of Ashkenazi descent are more likely to have harmful BRCA1 and BRCA2 gene mutations than the general public.
When Personal Safety Proves an Obstacle to Voting
During my senior year of college, I worked as a courtroom advocate at the St. Louis County Domestic Violence Court, a division of the court system that deals exclusively with orders of protection in cases of domestic violence. I worked with petitioners to create or improve their safety plan (i.e. what strategies did they use to keep themselves as safe as possible from their abuser?) and to connect people to resources available in our community, like counseling programs, employment assistance, shelters and transitional housing, and legal services. Throughout my year at the court, I watched hundreds of petitioners share evidence of their abuse before the judge, who asked the same, simple question every time: "Does your abuser’s behavior make you fear for your safety?"
Go Forth To the Polls This Election Day and Make Your Voice Heard
We are less than a week away from Tuesday November 4: Election Day 2014.
The election this fall is a very exciting and important time for voters across the country to make their voices heard, with numerous opportunities to weigh in on races for the House and Senate, state legislature, state executive positions, and mayoral and city council races. In addition, 40 states will also be voting on 139 ballot measures, such as Massachusetts’ Ballot Question 4 on Paid Sick Days and Nebraska’s Initiative 425 on raising the minimum wage. Four states will be voting on minimum wage ballot measures this election day. There are also important ballot initiatives happening in other states: Washington State’s Ballot Initiative I-594 which would require universal background checks for all gun purchases, California's Proposition 47, which would dramatically change California’s criminal justice system, and Tennessee’s Amendment One, which would undo language in the state’s constitution saying that the right to choose is a fundamental right. It is crucial that individuals get to the polls to make their voices heard on these important policy areas!
Reform Movement Distressed by Attack in Jerusalem
In response to today's apparent terrorist attack in Jerusalem, the Union for Reform Judaism's President, Rabbi Rick Jacobs, issued the following statement:
Force Feeding, Guantanamo Hunger Strikes, and What Our Rabbis Teach
Torture, while cruel and inhumane, is not something that we often hear about from mainstream media, nor is it something we have written about very recently at the Religious Action Center. The Reform Jewish position on this issue is clear: in a post-9/11 world we understand the need for enhanced national security, and yet we believe that security must be balanced with the importance of civil liberties and bodily autonomy. Experts agree that torturing prisoners or holding them in extended solitary confinement go beyond the practical needs of national security (since torture is found to be an ineffective way to obtain information) and abandon the constitutional right to due process as well as fundamental Jewish values. Nearly six years after President Obama came into office and promised to close Guantanamo Bay, the detention center stays open and the 149 individuals held there remain.
Words Not Spoken . . . Words Not Heard
Words are powerful. In Genesis, chapter one, God creates through words: “God said, ‘Let there be light!’—and there was light. . . . God said, ‘Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters,’. . . . God now said, ‘Let us make human beings in our image,’ ” (Genesis 1:3, 6, 26).
We Can Still Work with Russia for Nuclear Disarmament
In college, I spent a semester working at a London-based Jewish non-profit that focused on development projects within Ukraine’s marginalized Jewish population, and during that semester I found myself learning a great deal about Ukraine and the people who live there. As someone who cares about the people in Ukraine, and as someone who cares about the world around Ukraine, the violence that erupted this summer is scary and depressing. The news was at times hard to believe, from hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians being displaced, to ever-bleaker prospects among the LGBT community there, to the still-unresolved tragedy of the Malaysia Airlines jet being shot down by pro-Russian separatists.