The Unrealistic Optimism of Cancer Patients

NYTimes

For almost four decades, researchers and patient advocates have debated the ethics of informed consent in early-phase clinical trials, studies that test only toxicity and dosing and offer little, if any, therapeutic benefit to those enrolled. A major part of the debate has focused on the motivations of patients who participate. Some research on patient motivations has had disturbing ethical implications, indicating that patients may never fully understand the purpose of trials, despite explanations by the researchers. Others have been more reassuring, noting that patients are driven by a sense of altruism and a desire to help others who may one day suffer from the same disease.

More recently, a few studies have offered what appears to be the happiest of hypotheses. Patients may simply be optimistic and have strong needs to express hope. And because optimism has long been considered an effective coping mechanism for patients with terminal diseases, other researchers have also then assumed that optimism in this context poses few ethical issues.

Now one group of ethicists has just published a study challenging that assumption. It turns out that when it comes to being hopeful, not all optimism is created equal. [...]

Supreme Court rules for anti-gay protesters at military funerals

NYTimes

The case arose from a protest at the funeral of a Marine who had died in Iraq, Lance Cpl. Matthew A. Snyder. As they had at hundreds of other funerals, members of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kan., appeared with signs bearing messages like “America is Doomed” and “God Hates Fags.”

The church contends that God is punishing the United States for its tolerance of homosexuality.

The father of the fallen Marine, Albert Snyder, sued the protesters for, among other things, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and won a substantial jury award that was later overturned by an appeals court.

Supreme Court: Can police interview "abused" child without consent of parents?

Fox News

The facts of the case are fairly straightforward. In 2003, an investigator for the Oregon Department of Social Services had reason to believe that Nimrod Greene may have sexually abused his daughters. That investigator and a sheriff's deputy went to the school of the nine year old girl, described in court documents as S.G., and pulled her out of class to ask if she'd been harmed.

The young girl denied abuse for most of the interview but later said she changed her story in an effort to end the inquiry. Greene was indicted on several counts of felony sexual assault but those charges were dismissed after a jury couldn't reach a verdict. The father eventually pleaded guilty to another unrelated incident of sexual abuse.

The mother filed a lawsuit saying the investigator and deputy had no right to pull her daughter out of class without approval from her or a court. [...]

U.K. Court: Anti-Gay Couple Can't Be Foster Parents

Fox News

A British court has ruled that a Christian couple can no longer care for foster children because of their opposition to homosexuality.

Eunice and Owen Johns provided foster care for nearly two dozen children in the 1990s — but after Great Britain instituted equality laws, they were banned from the program in 2007.

Social workers red-flagged the couple during an interview when they explained that they did not approve of homosexuality because of their Pentecostal faith.

The Associated Press reported that judges at London’s Royal Courts of Justice determined that laws protecting homosexuals from discrimination take precedence over the couple’s religious beliefs.[...]

Ethiopians as Jews - 2 letters of Rav Moshe Feinstein

Concerning the status of Ethiopians as Jews - there is a teshuva printed in the Igros Moshe which refers to a previous letter on the subject. This other letter was not published in the Igros Moshe but was published in HaPardes (59:1) in 1984. There are clear differences between the two letters and it seems strange that the second letter was not included in the Igros Moshe - especially since it was addressed to Mordechai Tendler who was involved in editiing the Igros Moshe. I am publishing them both here.   HaPardes is available at Hebrew Books

Violence in Chareidi schools

BCHOL

אלימות מזעזעת ב'חיידר' אשדודי: ילד דקר את חברו בראשו • מחריד
האלימות הגואה ברחוב הישראלי הגיעה גם לכיתות ה'חיידרים': ילד כבן 13, תלמיד 'חיידר' אשדודי ידוע, שלף במהלך קטטה מברג מכיסו, ודקר את חבירו בראשו • הרב חיים ולדר ל'בחדרי חרדים' בעקבות האירוע: "האלימות המילולית בציבור החרדי מפחידה אותי הרבה יותר" • ויש תמונות מהזוועה

Chabad Seminar: identifying, reporting and preventing child indecent abuse

Collive

As part of a series on protecting children, an educational seminar to take place March 8th, 2011, at 8:00 PM, at Bais Rivka, 310 Crown Street, Brooklyn, is going to revolve around identifying, reporting and preventing child indecent abuse - a largely unaddressed issue in our community.

Noted lecturer and Chabad.org columnist Mrs. Bronya Shaffer is coordinating the event and believes it should be mandatory given the necessity to address child indecent abuse issues.

(As of now, participating schools include Bais Rivka High School, Bnos Menachem, Darchei Menachem, Bnos Yisroel, Beis Chaya Mushka, Oholei Torah, Lubavitch Yeshiva and is being endorsed by Igud Hamenahalim.)

In an article titled Creating a Sane Environment: Protecting the Innocence of Children, Rabbi Manis Friedman chillingly surmises that close to half the people he has met were abused.

That is a staggering figure from someone who has been working in our educational system for decades and certainly reflects national survey averages of a 25% rate of childhood indecent abuse (this is an average of slightly varying statistics from different agencies and includes both men and women).

The panel will consist of Dr. David Pelcovitz, Rabbi Shloime Sternberg, Professor Gavriel Fagin and Assistant District Attorney Henna White. Mrs. Shaffer will emcee.