Disturbing

Violence is not uncommon. But it is disturbing to note that the age of those that commit violent crimes is dropping. The latest news is about a pair of 12 year old girls. I still cannot digest that they stabbed their "friend" 19 times, and for what? To please a fictional horror character they found on the Internet. I'm not blaming the Internet for this. But, I'm thoroughly upset that the parents had not notice that these two girls were planning such a thing since February this year. - News courtesy: CNN.

The other day, one of the cable channels was airing a program on children who became killers. I just could not watch it and I turned away. The world out there is becoming scary every day. As a father, I'm not only worried about children becoming victims in such situations; I'm equally worried that we have not done anything about educating our parents community on how to help children especially on the Internet.

I had been to a DARE graduation recently. For those that have not heard about it, DARE is a program at schools to teach students about making right decisions. It teaches them the ill effects of bad habits and encourages them to stand up against bullying. Well, that is a good start. But just not enough. We are now talking about children committing criminal acts, instigated by faceless elements that no government seems to have control over. Parents will need to be guided to take more responsibility here.

As parents, we need professional guidance on how to herd our children away from such devilish elements. I would like to strongly recommend parent education to the PTA, and see how this can be addressed across all towns and cities. Any thoughts, well, and actions?
 

Are Female Hurricanes Deadlier?

I read an interesting article published by CNN about a study conducted on how hurricanes with female names caused higher degree of impact. The study revealed that storms that had female names seemed to cause far more damage than their "male" counterparts. The real reason the study concluded was because many people undermine the potence of a storm with a female name! Sexists.

Now to some intriguing statistics that got me thinking.

* The study was conducted between 1950 and 2012. Thats about 62 years. The study range is considerable.

* Until 1979, all storms carried Female names. This renders the data from the first 29 years unreliable.  

* Two storms that caused huge devastations were not included in the study and were called "Statistical Outliners". They were Katrina (2005) and Audrey (1957).

The study however says that the conclusion is not just based on data. And that some psycho-analytic experiments were conducted to back up the claim. In those experiments, participants were observed to simply underestimate the impact of a storm judging their intensity by their names.

My take: There could be some truth in what the study concludes. Take that with a grain of salt. Not being judgemental - sexism is still rampant in our society, world-wide. It is thus not surprising why a "female" storm is perceived to be less deadly. To me, the learning from this study is how social-psychology plays a large part in saving people's lives! The question is, should we go by the result of this study and call all storms with male names?