Friday’s Odds and Ends

Today I thought I would celebrate a few strong women I’ve discovered via the Internet. This first one comes from Upworthiest.com. It is an inspiring story from a 21-year-old woman who challenges us to look at people with disabilities with a new perspective. She has cerebral palsy and wishes that people saw her as an intelligent person who is attending college and not a 2-year-old who is miserable in her challenged body.

It’s human nature to focus on the differences, especially when those differences has someone in a wheelchair and appearing to be non-functioning, but this young woman, whose name was not given, asks us to find the common ground – person to person. Here is a link to her video.

Trisha Prabhu is another amazing young woman. Only 14-years old, she is one of Googles 15 Global Science Fair finalists, with her project ‘Rethink’ which asks teens to rethink a post they are going to make on social media. Trisha came up with the idea for combating cyber bullying after she heard about the 12-year-old Florida girl who committed suicide after experiencing cyber bullying.

 ‘Rethink’ picks up on words like stupid, loser and ugly and then alerts the teen that this post could be hurtful and asks them to reconsider. “It tells the cyber bully when they’re about to post something offensive it goes, ‘whoa are you sure you want to post that on a social media site? That could be offensive.’ It has them rethink what they’re about to do,” Prabhu said.

The best thing about her project is that in her experiment, 93 percent of adolescents changed their minds and decided not to post.

Something horrible that is an ongoing problem in India and Iran is the number of women who have acid thrown on them because they are not wearing the “proper” head covering. These women are terribly disfigured and many of them hide away in shame. Others, however, look for ways to increase awareness of this terrible practice. Some survivors of acid attacks in India have taken part in a photo shoot that introduces a new line of clothing designed by a woman who had acid thrown in her face by her stepmother. This happened in 2008, and Rupa suffered extensive damage to her face, neck and upper body. 

Delhi-based designer Rupa invited a number of her friends to model the new creations for her line, Rupa Designs, and here is a link to the full story.

Now to end on a fun note. Remember, it is so important to have a little fun every day. These are actual  ads that were published in a Yorkshire newspaper.

FREE YORKSHIRE TERRIER
8 years old,
Hateful little bastard.
Bites!

FREE PUPPIES
1/2 Cocker Spaniel, 1/2 sneaky neighbor’s dog.

FREE PUPPIES
Mother is a Kennel Club registered German Shepherd.
Father is a Super Dog, able to leap tall fences in a single bound.

COWS, CALVES: NEVER BRED
Also 1 gay bull for sale.

JOINING NUDIST COLONY!
Must sell washer and dryer £100.

WEDDING DRESS FOR SALE
Worn once by mistake.
Call Stephanie.