THE AHMADIYYA POST: September 2011

Education: Children given lessons on how to spot airbrushing to boost self-esteem

Young children are to be given lessons in how to spot airbrushed celebrities to try and boost their self-esteem and confidence.

A teaching pack has been produced by Media Smart in partnership with the Government Equalities Office, and will be given to primary schools to help children understand how magazines alter pictures.

The pack contains 15 slides to try and give students 'a more realistic perception of what is real and what is not'.
Children will also be encouraged to try and spot airbrushing mistakes and errors in photographs.

Equalities Minister, Lynne Featherstone, said the scheme will help children recognise that 'their value is worth so much more than just their physical appearance', but the idea has come under fire from educational groups who say schools should be concentrating on traditional subjects.

Nick Seaton, of the Campaign for Real Education, said: 'This is silly political correctness and ministers should know better than this,' argues Nick Seaton from the Campaign for Real Education.

'It takes time away from raising standards in important subjects such as reading, writing, maths, history and geography.'

The Holy Quran clearly stated 1400 years ago that man was created and shaped perfect and does not need to be altered.

‘God it is Who has made for you the earth a resting-place.... and made your shapes perfect, and has provided you with good things.’ [Holy Quran, 40:65]

Therefore the students should gain self-confidence from this verse and understand that the media industry is trying to distort mankind's perception of itself, causing young children to believe they are not made perfect when they actually are.

The Ahmadiyya Post, Education. Sept 30, 2011

New York: NYPD on Alert for Al-Awlaki Revenge Attacks

The New York City Police Department is on “alert” for revenge attacks following the killing in Yemen of U.S.-born Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said.

“We know al-Awlaki had followers in the United States including New York City, and for that reason we remain alert to the possibility that someone might want to avenge his death,” Kelly said in a statement, without mentioning specific measures.
Al-Awlaki, who masterminded Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab’s attempted bombing of a Detroit-bound airplane in 2009 with explosives hidden in his underwear, has been killed, the Defense Ministry in Yemen said today.

“Having transformed the regional al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula into a terrorist organization with global reach, he targeted Americans like no other, and he was a powerful recruiter of terrorists in the United States,” Kelly said in the statement.

U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a missile from an American drone aircraft killed al-Awlaki in a joint CIA-military operation. He was targeted near the town of Khashef, 170 kilometers (106 miles) northeast of Sana’a, the capital, the Yemeni foreign press office said.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Community is the leading Islamic organization to categorically reject terrorism in any form. Over a century ago, its founder (His Holiness Mirza Ghulam Ahmad) emphatically declared that an aggressive “jihad by the sword” has no place in Islam.

The Holy Quran clearly states:

On account of this, We prescribed for the children of Israel that whosoever killed a person — unless it be for killing a person or for creating disorder in the land — it shall be as if he had killed all mankind; and whoso gave life to one, it shall be as if he had given life to all mankind. [Holy Quran, 5:33]

Hopefully these so-called Muslims can stop taking lives and starting giving life as the Quranic verse teaches. Hateful men, such as Al-Awlaki, and their twisted ideologies have no place in Islam, religion or society.

The Ahmadiyya Post, New York. Sept 30, 2011

Nutrition: How To Get Kids To Choose Healthy Food

Getting kids to choose healthy options at school could be as easy as changing how those options are presented.

Cornell University researchers found that putting fruit in a colorful bowl more than doubles fruit sales in schools.

The finding is just one of the changes being suggested by the Cornell Center for Behavioral Economics in Child Nutrition Programs (also known as BEN) for making school lunchrooms healthier. Cornell professor Brian Wansink, an expert in behavior and food, and his colleagues analyzed lunchroom layouts to see what impacts a kid's food decision-making process.

The lunchrooms were revamped with easy, low-cost/no-cost environmental changes that resulted in an increase in healthy food choices, and schools are working with researchers and policymakers to make important high-level decisions that impact healthy food environments nationwide, Wansink said.

Other findings from Cornell for making lunchrooms smarter include making cereal bowls smaller to reduce serving sizes, making an express checkout line for students if they're buying healthy foods and moving chocolate milk behind plain milk so that kids will choose plain milk, ScienceDaily reports.

Wansink, author of the book "Mindless Eating," has researched a number of other small changes that could impact how much we eat. Among them are stowing away tempting foods, alternating water for every other drink and walking to get candy from a candy dish, instead of having it on your desk, the Chicago Tribune reported.

The arrangement of food in your cabinet is another factor (what you see first is what you eat first, research has found), as is the environment in which you eat.

(Research shows that regular popcorn-eaters who were given stale popcorn at a movie theater ate just as much of the popcorn as people given fresh popcorn. However, people who didn't usually eat popcorn at the movies ate less stale popcorn than fresh popcorn.)

The Holy Quran states:

“O ye men! eat of what is lawful and good in the earth” [Holy Quran, 2:169]

The Ahmadiyya Post, Nutrition. Sept 30, 2011

Technology: Facebook Admits To Privacy Violations, Tracking User Activity

'We didn't mean to track you' says Facebook as social network giant admits to 'bugs' in new privacy row

Facebook has admitted that it has been watching the web pages its members visit – even when they have logged out.

NEW YORK -- As Americans continue to debate the controversial decision by New York City officials to not include clergy-recited prayers in the Sept. 11 memorial ceremony Sunday, a coalition representing major evangelical Christian groups came together Friday near ground zero to call for unity between religions as the nation approaches the 9/11 anniversary.

The meeting and press conference, coordinated by Sojourners, a popular evangelical organization and magazine publisher, and the World Evangelical Alliance, a major international group of evangelical churches, called for Christians to reach out to Muslims and other religious groups to stop violence based on religious extremism and to commemorate 9/11.

“The terrorist attacks on 9/11 may have hit the United States, but they shook the whole world,” said the Rev. Geoff Tunnicliffe, CEO and Secretary General of the World Evangelical Alliance, which represents evangelical denominations and churches in 128 countries. "What can we do to create a better world that is more hopeful and seeks to end these cycles of violence? There is a growing acknowledgment within our global evangelical community that we must build bridges of friendship and trust across ethnic, cultural, and religious divides."

"This is not based upon sociological or political reasons but rather on the example of Christ who broke down barriers and commanded us to love our neighbor as ourselves," Geoff added.

The meeting, which also included video and written statements from a handful of a evangelical minsters from Palestine, Jordan, France, Pakistan and New Zealand, among other places, also sought to emphasize the role 9/11 has played in countries other than the U.S.

"We as Arab Christians looked carefully at this situation [9/11],” the Rev. Dr. Andrea Zaki Stephanou, who lives in Egypt and is General Secretary of the Coptic Evangelical Organization for Social Services, said in a video statement. “We hoped that the outcomes of it would not be more hatred or rejection, but the outcome would be a new understanding of co-existence, a new understanding of peace and a new understanding of how we accept each other as we are."

"It is important for all of us, one decade after this act of September 11th, that we look to the future as people created in the image of God, so that we can live together and we can work together," she added.

Friday's event took place in the New York office of The Christian Post, which overlooks ground zero. Although the speakers Friday said that they supported including clergy and prayers in 9/11 events, such as at the dedication of the Sept. 11 memorial, Sojourners CEO Jim Wallis pointed out that "complaining about not being on stage is not part of unity."

“A lot of people are used to seeing bad religion,” said Wallis. “But the answer to bad religion is not to have no religion or exclude religion entirely, as some have done, but to practice and preach better religion.”

While Friday's group pushed for positive relations between Christians and Muslims in and outside the U.S., the two religious groups have had a rocky relationship in recent years. Persecution of Christian minorities has been reported in several Muslim-majority countries, such as Egypt and Pakistan, and there have also been allegations of unethical conduct among Christian missionaries seeking converts in the Middle East.

Earlier this summer, the World Evangelical Alliance joined with the Vatican and the World Council of Churches to issue a set of guidelines for missionary work with the aim of gaining converts without gaining enemies.

The document, "Christian Witness in a Multi-Religious World: Recommendations for Conduct," told Christians that they have the duty to "share the good news of God's kingdom," but cautions that they should "build relations of respect and trust with all religions." But it also called on missionaries and evangelists to put a stop to "inappropriate methods of exercising mission by resorting to deception and coercive means."

Source/Credit: The Huffington Post. By Jaweed Kaleem. 09 Sept, 2011

UK: Tony Blair denies military action 'radicalised' Muslims

Tony Blair has denied that military intervention in the Middle East has radicalised Muslims and encouraged them to engage in acts of terrorism.

The former prime minister said the fight against Islamic terrorism would only end "when we defeat the ideology".

And Mr Blair said the death of Osama bin Laden was "immensely important".
Speaking to the BBC, Mr Blair also revealed he once almost had to order a passenger jet to be shot down over UK airspace in the wake of 9/11.

In an interview with Radio 4's Today programme, marking 10 years since the 9/11 attacks, the former prime minister said: "The reason why these people are radicalised is not because of something we're doing to them. They believe in their philosophy.

"I see this out in the Middle East all the time. There is this view, which I'm afraid I believe is deeply naive in the West, that somehow these people, you know, misunderstand our motives, that we've confused them, that that's why they've become radicalised.

"Understand one thing - they believe in what they believe in because they believe their religion compels them to believe in it."

Mr Blair added that he did not believe the provision of democracy in Middle Eastern countries "by the way a process, as I say, not imposed as an act of imperialism should radicalise anybody.

"And until we stop accepting that somehow we, by our actions, are provoking these people to be as they are, we will carry on with this problem."

He went on to say that people in Iraq and Afghanistan wanted democracy and that this ideology was not being imposed on them.

"The Taliban party or the Saddam party could have come and won the elections. The fact is the people in those countries were glad to see the back of them. Now what they want is to see the back of the terrorism."

The Ahmadiyya Post, Uk. Sept 30, 2011

Florida: Muslim Republican Heckled As 'Terrorist'

A Muslim activist seeking a position in the south Florida GOP was rejected 158-11 at a raucous meeting

A few weeks ago I profiled Nezar Hamze, a Muslim activist and Republican in south Florida whose quest to join a local GOP committee prompted accusations that he is un-American and that Islam is incompatible with the Constitution.

China has launched its first space lab as part of its preparations for the construction of a fully-fledged manned space station.

The unmanned Tiangong-1 craft took off from the Jiuquan spaceport in the Gobi Desert at 13:16 GMT on Thursday.

The Hubble telescope has captured pictures of the dwarf irregular galaxy Holmberg II blowing huge bubbles of glowing gas.

The bubbles are the lingering remnants of a star formation.

What you see first is what you eat first, a new study suggests.

Cornell University researchers found that we are three times more likely to eat the first food item we see in our kitchen cupboards or refrigerators than the fifth one.

Tens of thousands of Bolivians have taken to the streets to protest against President Evo Morales's handling of demonstrations opposing the construction of a controversial highway through an Amazon rainforest reserve.

Protests took place in several major cities on Wednesday in defence of the reserve, which is inhabited by thousands of indigenous people.

President Terje Anderson welcomes Hadhrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad to Norway. 'The message of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community has always been a total opposition to all forms of extremism and terrorism'.

Earlier today, the Head of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat, Hadhrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad visited Norway’s National Parliament, the Storting, in Oslo. His Holiness, was greeted by a number of national MPs and was given a tour of the Storting, before having a private meeting with President Terje Anderson in the Presidential Office.

Now that you know how important it is to properly fuel your body before you exercise (yes, even if you're trying to lose weight, you do need to eat a snack), let's talk about what to eat après exercise.

"When you exercise, you've created little, tiny tears in the muscles," says Sarah Maughan, registered holistic nutritionist at Totum Life Science in Toronto (she's who I spoke to about pre-workout meals). "And those tears are good -- it's the body's way of building muscle and strengthening."

For well over half a century, the American dream has typically centered on life in the suburbs. A move to the idyllic suburbs—picket fences, sidewalks, cul-de-sacs, the whole deal—has traditionally signified success, a move up the economic ladder.

Some healthful foods have gotten bad raps they just can't shake. Do you avoid peanut butter because you think it's super-fattening? Have you banned egg yolk because you're concerned about your heart health? Get the good truth about these and more "misunderstood" foods and why you should eat them -- in moderation, of course.

SOLO, Indonesia — A suicide bomber blew himself up inside an Indonesian church as hundreds of worshippers were filing out after the Sunday service, injuring at least 22 people, police said.

On a wet Wednesday evening in Seoul, six government employees gather at the office to prepare for a late-night patrol. The mission is as simple as it is counterintuitive: to find children who are studying after 10 p.m. And stop them. In South Korea, it has come to this. To reduce the country's addiction to private, after-hours tutoring academies (called hagwons), the authorities have begun enforcing a curfew — even paying citizens bounties to turn in violators.

ABBOTTABAD: It may have been a mere misplaced dot that led to accusations of blasphemy against a Christian eighth-grader, whose miniscule error led to her expulsion from school and uproar amongst local religious leaders.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Last month Indian activist Anna Hazare’s hunger strike sparked protests across India and garnered attention from international media before forcing the Indian parliament to take up an anti-corruption bill.

You hear so much about Women’s Lib and women’s rights, etc. Islam speaks of a comprehensive fundamental principle, which covers all situations:

Despite fewer super-sized meals, American's waistlines continue to expand, according to a recent study funded by the National Institutes of Health. According to University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers who conducted the study and examined surveys of daily eating habits over a 30-year period, the number of daily meals and snacks consumed by U.S. adults rose to 4.8 in 2006 from 3.8 in 1977.

New York police say at least 80 protesters have been arrested in a march as several hundred demonstators marched through the streets of lower Manhattan.

Saturday's protests were part of a series of demonstrations in the past week against against bank bailouts, the mortgage crisis and the US state of Georgia's execution of Troy Davis.

REUTERS - Saudi Arabia will allow women to stand for election and vote, the king announced on Sunday, in a significant policy shift in the conservative Islamic kingdom.

In a five-minute speech, King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud said women will also take part in the next session of the unelected, advisory Shura Council, which vets legislation but has no binding powers.

The World Bank has announced it is increasing funding for the drought in the Horn of Africa to nearly $2bn. It says that the funds are needed to provide humanitarian assistance to millions of people.

The World Bank says countries across the region face one of the worst droughts in more than half a century.

The Social Good Summit has come to a close but the UN Foundation was busy behind the scenes culling insights from some of the summit’s most engaging speakers.

The foundation’s video footage broaches a range of topics from micro-loans and digital activism to clean cooking with world-renowned chefs. Mashable dug through the videos to find six interesting videos from Summit speakers including Alec Ross, Muhammad Yunus, Christy Turlington and Richard Gere.

Meditation is the art of focusing on a single point, your quiet place within. Of the thousands of thoughts going through your mind every day, each one of them trying to grab your attention. Meditation helps you calm them down, and then you can focus on what really matters. In addition, meditation can be a reminder that all the feelings, emotions, thoughts and behaviours are originating from you and your view of life, not so much the other way around.

To change your body composition in the least amount of time, cleaning up your diet and getting seven to eight hours of quality sleep are both essential. Sleep is extremely important for body composition and helps the body and brain restore and rejuvenate in many different ways.

The United States and China piled pressure on Europe on Saturday to get to grips with its debt crisis before it risks causing bank runs and pushing the global economy into ruinous recession.

The U.S. Treasury chief, in his most explicit warning to date about the crisis, said it was time for the European Central Bank to step up and take a central role to get it under control.

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama says kids and the economy will benefit from the changes he's making in education policy and his plan to spend billions to upgrade schools and keep teachers on the job.

Obama used his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday to push his $447 billion jobs bill through the prism of education. He recapped steps he has authorized to let states opt out of unpopular proficiency standards because Congress has been slow to update the existing law.

The responsibility for care of the aged is gradually shifting to the state. Care of the aged represents a heavy burden on the national economy. However much a state is ready to spend, it can never buy them peace and contentment. The most terrible feeling of having been rejected, left out and abandoned, and the most painful realisation of a growing void of loneliness within, are problems beyond the reach of many to resolve.

Our gadgets are at the centre of our livelihood these days. They keep us connected to the people in our lives, they keep us up-to-date on what's going on in the world, they remind us of our obligations and they help us pass the time when we're waiting in line or riding the train. They remind us to exercise, they entertain us, they play music to lull us to sleep and they capture precious moments on camera. What would we do without them?

Libyan government troops are clashing with supporters of ousted leader Col Muammar Gaddafi in one of his last strongholds, Sirte, reports say.

Black smoke was seen rising from the coastal city after National Transitional Council (NTC) soldiers reportedly entered from the west.

A 12,500-pound decommissioned satellite that was lazily falling toward the Earth over the past two days finally came down around midnight Friday, NASA said early Saturday.

The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) fell back to Earth between 11:23 p.m. Friday and 1:09 a.m. Saturday, NASA said in an update on its website. The Joint Space Operations Center at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California said the satellite penetrated the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, the agency said. It is not yet known when exactly the satellite hit Earth, and whether it ended up in water or on land, NASA said.

From regular aging to genetic predisposition -- have you ever wondered what you can do to help keep your mind sharp and at it's best?

The Race Across America, considered to be the single toughest endurance contest in existence, sends competitors riding 3,000 miles across the continental United States in a matter of days. To finish successfully, cyclists must complete the race in 12 days or less, which means they must ride a minimum of 250 miles per day.

Religious Values Have Become Redundant

Examining the overall religious scenario, one cannot fail to notice that in religion there seems to prevail a paradoxical situation today. In general, religion is losing its grip yet simultaneously tightening it in different areas. In some sections of society, in almost all religions, there seems to be a powerful swing back in the direction of dogmas with medieval rigidity and intolerance of opposition.

A majority of scientists say religion and science don't always conflict, according to new survey results released by Rice University.

I would like to say that today the world is in grave need of such an enlightened approach. We, who are members of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama‘at, also practice and preach such an approach and we always abide by these principles, which is the reason why we constantly raise the slogan of ‘Love for All, Hatred for None’.

You'll probably never get to visit the International Space Station, but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy the view it affords.

YouTube user "yesterday2221" compiled this stunning time-lapse simply using images taken from the ISS that are available online. All the images used in the video were found here, at NASA's "Gateway to Astronaut Photography Of Earth."

Nutrition

Packing in quite a bit of soluble fiber (4 grams per medium apple) for a modest amount of calories (95) makes apples a filling, sweet snack.

Four earthquakes hit Guatemala within three hours, killing at least one person and triggering landslides. The quakes, the biggest a 5.8 magnitude, were centred some 50km (30 miles) southeast of Guatemala City but tremors were felt across the country.

At the end of last week, the FBI made clear that they had ended their anti-Muslim training program, saying "that the agency did host one training session six months ago that described Muslims as more likely to be violent as they increased in devotion to their faith."

Watching too much fast-paced television isn't good for your sleep. Even worse, this can seriously impair your mental functioning during the day, regardless of your age.

A recent study in the journal Pediatrics found that four-year-old children viewing fast-paced television for nine minutes demonstrated impaired executive functioning.

The sky is not falling. A 12,500-pound NASA satellite the size of a school bus is, however. It’s the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite, and it’s currently tumbling in orbit and succumbing to Earth’s gravity. It will crash to the surface Friday. Or maybe Thursday. Or Saturday.

Medical science is working miracles lately. At times it seems like science fiction. We are transplanting faces onto injured individuals. Patients swallow cameras that videotape their travels through the gastrointestinal tract to find growths that would otherwise remain undiscovered.

A strong earthquake shook northeastern India and Nepal on Sunday evening, touching off landslides, wrecking buildings and sending people fleeing into the streets of Katmandu, the Nepalese capital, and other cities. Initial reports indicated that at least 16 people were killed, including 3 outside the British Embassy in Katmandu, where a wall collapsed.

The organizers of an Islamic community center and mosque near ground zero are opening a temporary space at the site. The newly remodeled community space on the ground floor of the building owned by Park51 is scheduled for a grand opening on Wednesday. A photo exhibition will be the first public program.

Based on recurring scientific studies showing their toxicity to our health, here are three foods you should stop consuming today.

Soda

The Star Wars movies weren't especially big on subtlety. Their heroes and villains were cartoonishly one-dimensional, the aliens were grotesquely alien, and the action was over the top. One scene in the first film was a notable exception, though.

I shall now point out the factors which help foster the ego and strengthen the will.

1. The wish to survive. Every animate wishes to survive. Try to kill a small insect. Note how it tosses and twists. This shows it wants to live. The spiritual patient should know that if his sickness is prolonged, he would die. He should, therefore, strengthen his will to survive, which is a natural urge and can be fostered by reflection.

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