Laney and her Yorkie, Kia. These two are inseparable. Kia might as well have Crohn’s disease as she spends hours everyday in the bathroom with Laney!
Please, if you are a parent, please sign this petition. Marijuana is a diverse plant with MANY beneficial properties. My daughter is taking a dangerous chemo drug for her Crohn’s Disease. She is only 7. It will leave her sterile and further injure her liver. Please help her. Please help ALL Kansans with Chronic Illness and Pain without voices. Please sign this all important, historic petition. Stand and scream! Make your voices so loud that the House and Senate WILL HAVE TO LISTEN TO US!
A bill protects individuals, groups and organizations that turn them away for religious reasons
It “seeks to enshrine discrimination,” rights group leader says
If one employee refuses to serve, the employer must ask others to
Denying services to same-sex couples may soon become legal in Kansas.
House Bill 2453 explicitly protects religious individuals, groups and businesses that refuse services to same-sex couples, particularly those looking to tie the knot.
It passed the state’s Republican-dominated House on Wednesday with a vote of 72-49, and has gone to the Senate for a vote.
Such a law may seem unnecessary in a state where same-sex marriage is banned, but some Kansas lawmakers think different.
They want to prevent religious individuals and organizations from getting sued, or otherwise punished, for not providing goods or services to gay couples — or for not recognizing their marriages or committed relationship as valid.
This includes employees of the state.
The politics
The law claims to protect the rights of religious people, but gender rights advocates such as Equality Kansas are dismayed.
“Kansans across the state are rightly appalled that legislators are spending their efforts to pass yet another piece of legislation that seeks to enshrine discrimination against gay and lesbian people into law,” state chairwoman Sandra Meade said.
“HB 2453 is a blatant attempt to maintain second-class citizen status for taxpaying gay and lesbian Kansans.”
Despite the blowback, its chances of passing seem pretty good.
Republicans dominate the state’s Senate and Gov. Sam Brownback is a conservative Christian known for taking a public stand against same-sex marriage.
Brownback has already praised the bill in an interview with a local newspaper.
“Americans have constitutional rights, among them the right to exercise their religious beliefs and the right for every human life to be treated with respect and dignity,” he told The Topeka Capital-Journal.
The details
HB 2453 is titled “An act concerning religious freedoms with respect to marriage” and covers many bases.
It reads, in part: “No individual or religious entity shall be required by any governmental entity to do any of the following, if it would be contrary to the sincerely held religious beliefs of the individual or religious entity regarding sex or gender:
“Provide any services, accommodations, advantages, facilities, goods, or privileges; provide counseling, adoption, foster care and other social services; or provide employment or employment benefits, related to, or related to the celebration of, any marriage, domestic partnership, civil union or similar arrangement.”
Anyone who turns away a gay couple not only can’t face a civil suit, but if anyone tries to sue, they could get nailed with the other side’s legal fees.
There are some small concession in the bill to gay couples.
If an employee at a nonreligious or government business refuses to serve a gay or lesbian couple for religious reasons, the manager is obligated to find another employee who will oblige.
It also explicitly says that the law does not authorize discrimination against anyone, including clergy, who performs or supports same-sex unions.
The trend
The Kansas bill would seem to buck the trend.
Laws approving same-sex marriage have recently passed in many parts of the United States, bringing the total number of states where it is legal to 17. Add to that the District of Columbia.
Worldwide, 16 other countries (and parts of Mexico) also have laws allowing same-sex marriage and domestic partnerships. Most of the nations are in Europe and South America.
Pripyat. Cold, dead and toxic! Ghost City of 50,000!
Modern Day Ghost Towns are fascinating to millions of people around the planet. The mystery, the decimation of civilization, the story…it is all so macabre, beautiful, bizarre and disheartening. The pictures remind us that Armageddon is possible, for any of us, at any time! These dark, haunting images prove that many people have already been through their own, personal apocalypses.
We will start with the biggest nuclear incident of all time…Chernobyl and the city of Pripyat. Pripyat HAD a population of 50,000. That changed in April of 1986, forever!
The deserted city of Pripyat. Pripyat was home to the workers of Chernobyl and their families (approximately 50 000 people). It’s now a nuclear ghost town. The Chernobyl nuclear power station is in the background. ~image courtesy of Google images~
Pripyat is an abandoned city in northern Ukraine, near the border with Belarus. Named for the nearby Pripyat River, Pripyat was founded on February 4th, 1970, the ninth nuclear city in the Soviet Union, for the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.
Abandoned School in Pripyat, the city that rose with Chernobyl and was deserted from the meltdown at Chernobyl. Image courtesy of Google Images.
A solemn reminder of the humanity that once inhabited Pripyat. The city of 50,000 is no more. April 26th, 1986, the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant malfunctioned and a “melt-down” occurred. Over 350,000 people were evacuated from Pripyat and the surrounding area between 1986 to 2000!
The gloomy view of a forsaken amusement park, void of all humanity. Image courtesy of Google Images.
The pulse is absent in this city. All have left, although the insidiously deceptive radiation related illnesses, such as cancer, birth defects, sterility and many other medical issues continue for the people exposed to this disaster!
At its peak in 1959, the population on Hashima was 5,259 people, with a population density of 216,264 people per square mile. For comparison, 2011 Hong Kong has a population density of about 17,000 people per square mile. Image courtesy of Google Images.
Hashima Island, Japan, also known as “Battleship Island” because of its shape. This island was a busy coal mining industry until petroleum hit the market huge in the 1960s. Hashima Island was abandoned in 1974.
Space was very limited in Hashima. The island was only 15 acres total! Buildings went up instead of out. Most buildings averaged 9 stories tall! image courtesy of Google Images.Hashima Island Apartment Stair Wells. Hard to imagine this was home to over 5000 coal-miners on this 15 acre island. image courtesy of Google Images.
The picture explains the dense nature of living on the tiny island shaped like a battleship! Living on the island was probably much like living on a huge ocean-liner. The buildings were all built from concrete to withstand the infamous, Japanese typhoons!
Hashima Stairwell to Hell from Google ImagesWindow View from Hashima Island Apartment Complex. image courtesy of Google images
Hashima is another well-known, modern-day, ghost town. The island is definitely interesting. The history of the island is one of forced labor during war, crowded conditions and greed. The result, a beautifully, macabre and bizarre ghost island!
The once bustling Motor City has become all but a ghost town. image courtesy of Google ImagesMichigan Central Train Station in Detroit Gutted and Rotting. Image courtesy of Google Images.
The once bustling Motor City has become all but a ghost town, with nature having reclaimed whole districts. For decades, the richer suburbs and the financial district managed to survive, while the rest of the town slowly withered. Finally, around the middle of the century, it became clear that metropolitan Detroit was dead. After that realization, it was only a matter of months before all corporate and municipal activity were closed down. The people who had the means to move, did and the poor, stayed behind, without any choice. Left in Dead Detroit Rock City! This story has happened time and again. Hurricane Katrina left most of the poor in her disastrous wake!
Soulless city: The shattered grandeur of Detroit’s United Artists Cinema. image courtesy of Google images.
America should not have crumbling Iconic Cities, such as Detroit. It is a travesty and a shame. Detroit is on its death-bed.
Crumbling despair: Once a home for the rich, a Detroit house teeters on the brink of collapse. image courtesy of Google Images.
There are quite literally, thousands of homes like this in Detroit. The city looks post-apocalyptic!
Many more modern-day ghost towns exist all over the world, many in America! The U.S.A. continues to see more and more empty towns, cities and buildings all over due to recent times of recession. I’ll leave you with one more image of Detroit. Enjoy!
Book Repository in Detroit looks like books are still on the shelves. Notice the hole in the roof letting in the life-giving rays of the sun. Image courtesy of Google Images.
Trees taking back their territory by exploding through the decay, bringing new life to this dead, man-made building. This Detroit Book Repository looks like the book shelves are stocked and ready for reading! Nature is taking back Nature!
Story by Emery Myers
If you enjoyed this article and photo gallery I guarantee you’ll enjoy this article I wrote on another, not-so-well-known ghost town!Check it out here!Neosha the Ghost Town in the Middle of America!
Laney and her Yorkie, Kia. These two are inseparable. Kia might as well have Crohn’s disease as she spends hours everyday in the bathroom with Laney! 
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