美同性婚姻合法

Same Sex Marriage Legalization May Have Cut Teen Suicide Attempts

Wed, Feb 22, 2017
By Sy Mukherjee

Policies legalizing same sex marriage are correlated with fewer youth suicide attempts, especially among teenagers who are sexual minorities, according to a new study.

Researchers from Johns Hopkins' Bloomberg School of Public Health analyzed data from both states that had and hadn't legalized same sex marriage prior to 2015, when the Supreme Court issued a decision legalizing it across the country. "After same-sex marriage laws were implemented, the proportion of high school students reporting suicide attempts in the past year decreased by 0.6 percentage points, equivalent to a 7% decline," wrote the authors. States that had not legalized same sex marriage did not see these declines.

The analysis is based on government surveys of more than 700,000 public high school students. Since the suicide attempt and sexual orientation data is self reported, the researchers warned that there may be some shortcomings to the analysis.

But the results were striking. Not only did suicide attempts fall 7% among all students in the 32 states that had already legalized same sex marriage - it fell 14% among gay, bisexual, transgender, and other sexual minority teens.

Teen suicide is already a major public health scourge and one of the leading causes of death among young people (other than automobile accidents). But it's a bona fide crisis among lesbian, gay, and bisexual youth, 40% of whom have seriously contemplated suicide, according to the CDC.

While the new study doesn't point to any definitive cause-and-effect between same sex marriage and reduced suicide attempts, it does suggest that a generally more accepting policy environment could help reduce bullying and stigma.

"As countries around the world consider enabling or restricting same-sex marriage, we provide evidence that implementing same-sex marriage policies was associated with improved population health," wrote the study authors. "Policymakers should consider the mental health consequences of same-sex marriage policies."


http://fortune.com/2017/02/21/same-sex-marriage-teen-suicides/


Structure of the Lead：
WHO-not given
WHEN-not given
WHAT-same sex marriage are correlated with fewer youth suicide attempts
WHY-not given
WHERE-not given
HOW-not given


Keywords：

1. correlate:關聯

2. implement:實行

3. proportion:比例

4. orientation:傾向

5. scourge:災難；禍害

6. bona fide:真實的

7. contemplate:打算

8. stigma:汙名

翁山蘇姬

Aung San Suu Kyi 'utterly failed' to address Rohingyas' plight, says Obama-era human rights envoy

Mon, Feb 27, 2017
Writer is not found

GENEVA (REUTERS) - The UN Human Rights Council must set up a commission of inquiry into Myanmar's human rights record, as it has done for North Korea and Eritrea, and not spare its leader because of her iconic status, a former US human rights envoy said on Monday (Feb 27).

Keith Harper, who served as US President Barack Obama's ambassador to the Geneva-based council from 2014 to January this year, said Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi had "utterly failed" to address the plight of the Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar's Rakhine State.

But he said Western diplomats and human rights advocates saw her as a hero and might let Myanmar off the hook, and he feared the new US administration, which has not yet named his replacement in Geneva, might seek to play down the situation.

"For far too many, her iconic status as pro-democracy crusader makes it difficult to hold accountable a Suu Kyi-led government no matter the well-documented human rights violations," Harper wrote.

"Her Nobel Prize has become a most awful kind of shield from proper scrutiny."

The Human Rights Council is expected to debate Myanmar during a three-week session starting on Monday, and Harper said it should order a full inquiry, which he described as "heavy medicine reserved for the most horrendous human rights cases".

A report by the UN human rights office, based on testimony of Rohingya Muslims who had fled to Bangladesh, said Myanamar's security forces had probably committed crimes against humanity with a campaign of killings and gang rape.

Senior UN officials later told Reuters they believed more than 1,000 people had been killed.

Harper, writing on the Just Security online forum, said many had hoped Suu Kyi, the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, would tackle the human rights crisis when she took power a year ago.

But it had become clear that although she was happy to be lauded as a pro-democracy icon, she was not prepared stand up for an unpopular and persecuted Muslim minority, and it would be wrong to spare her from scrutiny.

"Even accepting that Suu Kyi does not sufficiently control the military, she has utterly failed to utilise her considerable bully pulpit which would undoubtedly be impactful," he wrote.

http://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/obama-era-human-rights-envoy-says-aung-san-suu-kyi-utterly-failed-to-address-rohingyas

Structure of the Lead：
WHO-a former US human rights envoy
WHEN-Feb 27
WHAT- The UN Human Rights Council must set up a commission of inquiry into Myanmar's human rights record
WHY-As it has done for North Korea and Eritrea, and not spare its leader because of her iconic status
WHERE-not given
HOW-not given

Keywords：
1. plight:誓約

2. advocate:提倡

3. crusader:改革者

4. horrendous:可怕的

5. testimony:證言

6. persecuted:迫害的

7. utilise:使用