quote:The Faith Temple Church of Apostolic Faith has been involved in controversy before. In 1998 a girl alleged she had been beaten during a service at the church, but no charges were filed. If this warning had been heeded, this exorcism and Cottrell’s senseless death could have been prevented.
quote:There are American states in which Jehovah's Witnesses and Christian Scientists who kill their children by denying them lifesaving blood transfusions or other medical procedures can escape the consequences of their crime by pleading "freedom of religion."
(although the above group does make a sacreligious reference to foetuses as "prehuman tadpoles")
posted
I'm with Slash on the mandatory reporting thing. Too many people don't truly know what abuse is, and a false accusation can be pretty destructive. I am required by law to report abuse, but I have also had training to know the law and correctly identify abuse.
As far as avoiding further abuse, you don't need a law here: you have a moral if not a legal imperative to report what you believe is abuse. I don't think creating a law would actually accomplish anything positive, and it could be damaging.
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posted
Imagine that...Jack Chick and a humanist site agreeing about something.
Perhaps someone could tell me what the JW stance on blood transfusions _is_. Though I usually think Chick is loony, I had thought the bit about blood transfusions was accurate, if prejudicial.
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quote: I wonder if perhaps laws should be implemented making a failure to report child abuse punishable somehow.
Calm down people. My statement wasn't meant to open any sort of floodgate. I was just curious as to whether or not some laws should exist. I never said under what criteria or how strict they should be.
By all means, I think that if any sort of system should be implemented, it should be based on anonymity of the reporter, with nothing done by any sort of DHS system until the alleged abuse has been investigated thoroughly. This would include having a report of the childs' physical condition done by a doctor, and the home inspected by some third party, perhaps the police. Perhaps something along those lines would keep anything happening such as harrasment down.
And if it should be punishable, perhaps it should be made common public knowledge what the judicial system considers abuse, so that there is no mistaking what is actually abuse. Now how it should be punishable, I'm not really sure how harshly they should be punished. I wouldn't go so far as to say jail time, but maybe they should have to take some sort of class about how child abuse impacts people later in their life. Kinda like how people who get numerous speeding tickets get their licenses' revoked and have to take a class. Maybe then they would know what they were seeing next time.
I don't know. Just some thoughts to toss around. No horrible offense meant by any of it.
Just a note: After reading my post to my fiancee to make sure that nothing sounded too far out there, and to see if he thought it would offend anyone, he disagreed with me.
He thinks that the people who see child abuse and/or have any connection with the actual abuse taking place should be abused themselves.
Don't my ideas sound tame now?
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posted
Banna, where did you find these self-diagnostic tests? All I've been able to find were tests for adults to use on their children.
Reading about Asperger's is confusing for me because the summary descriptions sound like me but the details do not.
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quote:By all means, I think that if any sort of system should be implemented, it should be based on anonymity of the reporter, with nothing done by any sort of DHS system until the alleged abuse has been investigated thoroughly. This would include having a report of the childs' physical condition done by a doctor, and the home inspected by some third party, perhaps the police. Perhaps something along those lines would keep anything happening such as harrasment down.
But don't you see? Something along those lines would be a perfect recipe for harrassment. Someone makes an accusation (anonymously) and you have to prove your innocence by going to the doctor and allowing an inspection of your home. Hate your boss? Send the cops to his house--won't he have to squirm in front of the neighbors! Ticked off at your ex? Make her take the day off from work to take the tykes to the doctor!
And of course, all of that's possible right now, but I just don't see the creation of any such a law being worthwhile.
I agree with your boyfriend's sentiment. People who know of real abuse who do not report it are behaving immorally. But they already know they should report it and choose not to. Creating a law won't change that.
As far as parenting classes, that's pretty much how DCF handles first incidents, at least down here. Having been through a MAPP class (as a requirement for adopting, not as a punishment!) I can tell you that they are not terribly valuable. And despite my cinicism, I would say I was one of the people who paid the most attention in my class! The thing is that not all people are capable of learning well in a classroom environment, and there were plenty of people who attended most of the classes but never paid any attention and never participated in our discussions.
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posted
Well, the presiding minister, Ray Hemphill, has been charged after all. The charge is "physical abuse of a child causing great bodily harm." It's punishable by up to 10 years in prison. No one else who participated was charged. This is in spite of the report of a woman who leaned into the child's abdomen. Seems to me that the combination of chest pressure and pressure on the diaphragm could be a combination leading to death.
Of course, this could all get plea-bargained down to probation.
It is different in each state, but there is a law that a mandated reporter(teacher, social worker, doctor, health care worker, therapist, etc) must report abuse. The assumption is that a mandated reporter knows that they ARE a mandated reporter, and that they have been trained in how to detect abuse.
Do all mandated reporters know they are mandated reporters? No. Should all mandated reporters know this? Yes. Are they all trained? No. Should they be trained? Yes.
There are a lot of messed up, abusive people out there, folks, and I would like to see hard stats which prove that reports of abuse are made out of revenge, or for fun, or that people who are wrongly accused are railroaded in the system, because I don't buy it. What I have seen in my profession are children who have been severely damaged, both physically and emotionally, and who may never recover from this abuse, ever.
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posted
Elizabeth, you are not talking about the same thing. You are talking about specific people who have that legal responsibility. If you read through all of the posts, you will see that Storm and I acknowledged that there are people already required to be on the lookout for abuse. As I mentioned earlier, I am one of these. And I have received training on both the law and the correct legal identification of child abuse.
But I have seen people who have not had similar training have wildly divergent opinions on what constitutes child abuse and what does not. And I think that if we make people afraid that they will face legal consequences if they fail to report abuse, then they will tend to err on the side of safety for them. And on the surface that might sound like a good thing, because that would seem to err on the side of safety for the child. But I think that in reality, that would only lead to further overburdening our child-welfare institutions with unfounded claims. I also think that claims made without any real evidence to back them up, whether out of maliciousness or out of an excess of zeal, have the capacity to do serious harm to families and to children. I am familiar with several cases where abuse was suspected where it was not happening. For example, a child who got a black eye in a school basketball game in front of witnesses, but somebody immediately leapt to the conclusion that black eye = child abuse, or a child that bruised easily due to low platelete (sp?) counts, leading a counselor to assume abuse. A little investigation could clear up both of these instances, but if we make reporting things the knee-jerk reaction that everyone has, then a lot of real abuse will slip through the cracks, because protective services will not be able to catch all of the legitimate cases.
In general, I don't believe that it's good legal practice to pass laws requiring average citizens to take active measures like this. I can't think of anywhere else that the law mandates that citizens turn into informants. Reporting abuse and so putting a stop to it is the right thing to do. Heck, so is reporting other criminals. But it immediately feels wrong to me to coerce the citizenship into spying for the government. If we start with child abuse, how long before we demand that people turn their neighbors in for other crimes as well? Say, haven't some hatrackers admitted to illegally downloading music . . . .
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posted
Orchid, are you feeling attacked? If so, that was not my intention. I just happen to disagree with that particular idea. Help me figure out in what vein your post is intended.
Believe me, I'm as opposed to child abuse as you are, and as intolerant of abusers.
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I don't put much stock in the sincerity of the concern of humanist organizations for the plight of children with disabilities. To them, it's mainly an opportunity to launch an attack against a religious group - one that certainly seems like it may deserve to be attacked.
The reason I say this is that killings of kids with disabilities occur in all kinds of settings. Far more kids with disabilities die at the hands of paid staff and family members than die at the hands of church groups - which is not to minimize the seriousness of what happened here. I think everyone involved deserves to be charged.
If you check out the Secular Humanism site, you'll find they have a magazine titled Free Inquiry. One of the magazine's regular columnists is Peter Singer, a champion of animal rights and an advocate of denying some humans basic rights. Singer, a bioethicist, advocates public policy that would allow parents of a newborn with disabilities to have the infant killed within the first 30 days of life. He also advocates public policy that would allow the killing of humans who don't fit his criteria for "personhood" at any age - many people with retardation, autism and alzheimers. I'm sure Singer would disapprove of the brutal circumstances of Terrance's death, but am less certain he would disapprove of the outcome.
Singer's a popular figure in humanist circles. Singer is no friend to people with severe disabilities. Neither are those who support his views.
posted
I know many compassionate humanists and atheists, and I know many non-compassionate religious people. Let's not make broad generalizations.
I do disagree with most of Singer's work. However, it is important to understand that Singer is a philosopher. Philosophers construct idealized worlds and play with them mentally. Singer has tried to move his philosophy into the realm of practice. It is still interesting as philosophy, but the implementation of it, to put it mildly, leaves something to be desired.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Fugu, please read my quote carefully - I specifically addressed organizations rather than individuals. And I stand by the characterization - you'll be hard pressed to find any criticism of Singer or of the viewpoints he holds in Humanist publications. The point remains, though, that abuse and killing of disabled kids is not something humanist organizations normally care about. It's just that the alleged perpetrators in this case are people they really like to attack.
Singer prefers to be defined as a philosopher since it gives him the best protection against criticism. But he writes and was hired by Princeton as a bioethicist, which is about changing public policy. That changes a lot of things. Among the rules that get changed are those relating to factual accuracy. In philosophical thought exercises, it really doesn't matter if you misrepresent factual matters. In bioethics, it does. Singer misrepresents research about disability and sometimes makes assertions he doesn't bother to support at all to build a case for public policy changes.
Interesting? I guess it would be if this was a thought exercise and not public policy advocacy.
Another note of interest - some of Singer's work about the nonpersonhood of some humans is built on that of an earlier writer - Joseph Fletcher, an Episcopalian bishop.
I agree with your assessment of people - there are good and bad to be found in all faiths and lack thereof.
posted
Well, maybe that's the reason I never joined up with any of these groups.
They're all too elitist, and--quite frankly--I'm better than that!
And I apologize, but I had not really looked into the background of these groups before I started pulling quotes from them.
But back to the original question:
Are there some religious groups in this country that see greater leniency when it comes to killing their own through the refusal of accepted medical practices? Or, in this case, the out-and-out physical abuse of their members (or their members' minor children)?
Would such practices be more or less acceptable coming from mainstream Christians or Jews? Mormons? Jehovah's Witnesses? Muslims? Fringe believers (like the "Faith Temple Church of Apostolic Faith")?
Here I go, making reference to one of those Secular Humanists again:
quote:The First Amendment states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Under that amendment, any law, court ruling, or jury verdict that denies adherents of a minority religion or belief system the rights granted to practitioners of all other belief systems would be unconstitutional. Christians are permitted to swear oaths on the sacred book of their choice; therefore Jews and Muslims must be permitted to swear oaths on the sacred books of their choice, and nontheists permitted to "affirm" rather than "swear" under the same penalty of perjury.
But just as the First Amendment prohibits denying to adherents of designated religions rights granted to all others, so does it prohibit granting to designated religions rights not enjoyed by all others. Laws criminalizing homicide by neglect are applicable to the whole population. They are not laws respecting an establishment of religion. Since killing children by substituting prayer for necessary medical procedures is a criminal offense for Catholics, that makes it a criminal offense for Christian Scientists and Jehovah's Witnesses as well. Any law giving those religions the right to withhold lifesaving procedures from children is therefore unconstitutional. Neither Congress nor a court can make such a law.
I agree with blacwolve (us DOGS have got to stick together, regardless of our place on the evolutionary scale): Prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law, and let their God defend them in court. Or in jail.
posted
The thing is, DOG, (not speaking for Christian Scientists) JW's DON'T arbitrarily kill their children by refusing medical treatment.
They do not accept blood transfusions. But there are so many medical alternatives that there is no NECESSITY in accepting blood transfusions to sustain life.
Have you looked into bloodless surgery? It's considered extremely dependable (often times SAFER) and the recovery time has proven to frequently be shorter when accepting bloodless alternatives.
It's become an entire branch of study. There are bloodless wings in hospitals now. It's an accepted practice, and many non-JW's are now making the same decisions because of the health benefits.
Everybody has a right to chose what medical procedures they want. That's different than REFUSING medicine. Do you understand the difference?
posted
Yah, go easy on the generalizations. As the husband of a closet humanist and devout athiest (whatever that means) she in no way supports the ideas of Peter Singer, at least what I have shared with her. I know plenty of folks with disabilities that protested when he visited as a speaker at a local university. It wasn't as if there were lines of athiests and humanists standing up in support of him. It was at a Jesuit University, too, not some secular institution, so nyah!
I hate when athiests are generalized as "out to get religious groups," that's all.
please read my reply to fugu - I think my post is being overinterpreted.
I track all too many killings of people with disabilities of all ages in all settings. They occur all too often.
The group I work with is a secular one and I have no religious affiliation at all.
I also track who writes about publicized cases involving killings of people with disabilities. I stand by my assertion that you will be hard pressed to find similar articles in Humanist publications expressing concerns about deaths and abuses occurring at the hands of parents and paid staff. Can anyone offer me evidence that the organizations involved are more interested in the problem of violence against children with discabilities than they are with opportunities to write against religious practices they find abhorrent? (for the record, I find the practices in this case abhorrent too.)
Just interested - when was the Singer appearance and the protest? I try to track them. I helped organize the initial protest of about 200 people on his first day of classes at Princeton.
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posted
Yes, this abuse conundrum is a puzzle. As a mandated reporter myself, I deal with it from that end, working with families and individuals who need assistance, etc. But, I have a cousin with Down Syndrome raised by the sweetest aunt and uncle in the world. My now 16 year old cousin made a flip comment about being angry with her dad because he teases her about something (I can't remember the wording, but my uncle does playfully taunt everyone) and said it in front of a teacher at school. This teacher took it as abuse and called it in. My family asked me to sit in on the visit with the DCFS worker interview (not in my capacity as a worker, just as a concerned relative). It went fine, we find that my cousin just was, as many teenagers are, upset with her parents one particular day, yadda yadda yadda. The end result? Well, of course there was no abuse or neglect, yet they have a "file" somewhere and they have a reputation at the school as someone who was visited by DCFS. Horrible and unfounded! So they took her out of school (I don't agree with that response, but she isn't my child) and now misses out on growing up with peers in a non-family setting (which she really needs). Was it worth it? The teacher made a bad call, but as noted, they are (rightfully) also interested in their careers and license and safe than sorry is always preferred.
What is a good balance of this? Better training would be a start (there were no injuries, no actual reported violence...just some vague "emotional abuse" claims by the teacher). I don't know what else. Because the more firewalls put up to prevent mistakes, the more legitimate abuse cases that will slip through the cracks. And the system is already overburndened with reports now. DCFS workers lose legitimate cases with alarming frequency, as I know first hand being on the "receiving" end of some of their families. It is a really precarious situation.
Even knowing that my aunt, uncle and cousin are no longer the same because of the mis-diagnosed abuse, I think (he says, looking at a picture of his child) it is still worth it. This is knowing that a bruise on my 4-year-old's leg could get reported any day, when you think about it. I think what helps is that I have a really REALLY close relationship with all the people that are in her life when I am not around. She is in Pre-Kindergarten and every day we speak with the teachers on how things are going, etc. We talk to the administration frequently, too. Not to "woo" them in any way, just because we want the best care and teaching for our child. In my cousin's situation, my aunt has a conflicted relationship with the school to begin with. She had higher expecations for her daughter's education than the program did and, in effect, was always calling to complain because even things they promised never happened according to the Individual Education Plan.
I am not saying the teacher was "getting revenge" but having a lack of trust means that when the chips fall, that trust comes into question. If my daughter's teachers saw a bruise, I have no doubt they would be quick to say "we saw this but we don't think this happened at school. Do you know what is up?" Because we do the same with them. If you have a teacher that doesn't want to talk to you because every time you do, it ends in an argument, of course they aren't going to call up out of the blue and ask how things are going.
I know, that isn't "best practice" but relationships count and even in trusting relationships abuse can happen, but I think things could be caught more if there is an effort to get to know the entire family, not just the child.
posted
sndrake: reread what you posted "to [humanist organizations] it's mainly an opportunity to launch an attack against a religious group". That certainly is a broad generalization.
Also, in your last paragraph you imply that those who like reading Singer's work are not friends to people with disabilities, when in fact many of them are. They find the philosophy interesting (as do I), but often disagree with the reasoning (as do I).
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posted
sndrake, I read what you said but still felt a bit defensive, sorry. Just because a group DOESN'T write about something, doesn't mean they support the killing of kids with disabilities! Yikes! While I don't track such abuse cases, I read a lot about it in TONS of journals and newspaper articles. I think it is bad practice to judge an entire group by what they don't write about. If that is the case, I could go off on any number of organizations or publications!
As for Singer's arrival, I looked to see if it was still on the web somewhere, but it is not to be found. If I remember, it was a couple of years ago here in Cleveland, Ohio. The person I support mentioned that she was involved with a group that was going to protest, but she didn't indicate if it was a 'formal' group. She loves to protest and has been very involved with disability self-advocacy movement all over the state but also just general protests. She got her and her wheelchair hauled away from a Nazi/KKK demonstration (one of those white supremecist thingies, they all look the same to me) that had nothing to do with disabilities but more to do with her personal politics. Also chained herself to a bus when they refused to upgrade to more accessible busses! In short, she rules. I will look to see if I can find more about it, though. I might have a brochure about the visit. Either way, it was at John Carrol University. I really wanted to go, just to hear him speak (and see if folks really did show up) but I wasn't able to do so. It was during work hours. Was a guest lecturer, I think.
Hope this helps. Who do you do tracking for? Part of national agency? University? Very curious.
posted
fugu, as far as organizations go, I stand by that unless you can find evidence to the contrary. To me, that would be some article expressing concern over abuse of kids with disabilities in nonreligious settings.
If you go back to my post, I didn't say anything about people who "like to read" Singer. I referred to those who support his views. And, yes, I stand by that - you can't support the killing of disabled newborns and the killing of people with severe cognitive disabilities and be any kind of friend to people with disabilities. How credible would you find it if someone claimed they were OK with beating up gay people but considered themselves a friend to gay people?
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posted
I said you implied it, and you did. First you said he was popular, which is true. Then you said that those who supported his views were no friends to disabled people.
Usually when someone is popular (particularly an academic) their views are supported. With Singer, this is notably not the case: there are many people who actively disagree with him who quite like to read his stuff. Without qualification as I have given, however, people will assume that popular = agreed with a lot. By not giving such a qualification you implied that many humanists were no friends to disabled people.
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as long as I "implied" many rather than all or even most, is it really that perjorative a statement? I could say the same for many Christians, Jews, Islamics, etc. and probably be accurate.
fil,
I am the only paid staffer of a national grassroots disability rights organization called Not Dead Yet . You can get to it by following a link on the page listed in my profile.
BTW, I actually had an exchange with Singer on a Pennsylvania Public Radio show. I think it's still up on the web. I wasn't at my best, since I hadn't had a lot of advance warning and I had a mild migraine, but I still got him defensive and fumbling for responses - something that seldom happens with Singer.
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posted
That's the thing, I don't believe it is many. I have met one humanist who supports the implementation of Singer's ideas, and I have met many humanists who read Singer (he's popular with the philosophy department here).
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posted
Latest news on the charges against Ray Hemphill. Turns out the news story last night was in error about the sentencing. Hemphill faces "up to five years in prison and five years of extended supervision if convicted."
Let's see, if he has no prior criminal offense, there are people willing to vouch for his character, and the public in general is apathetic or ambivalent about Terrence Cottrell's killing, Hemphill could get off very lightly as is often the case in homicides of children with disabilities.
posted
Interesting. I had 20 of the items on the first test. Scored only 27 on the second, though, and there weren't any hard and fast scoring rules. Still, that's way above the mean of 16.4. A few of the items on the first were ambiguous for reasons unique to me; for instance, my voice is more nearly monotonous than it used to be before I had an operation on my vocal chords.
Posts: 1041 | Registered: Feb 2002
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posted
The latest: Ray Hemphill, charged with child abuse in the death of Terrance Cottrell, is out on $5000 signature bail, which means he didn't have to put up any money. As a condition of bail, he is forbidden to perform any "exorcisms."
(Edit - I don't know what's wrong with this link. The URL for the article is correct, but it just takes you to the main page of the paper. For now, anyway, scroll down and you'll find the story. GRRR)
Excerpts:
quote:At the initial appearance, Ray Hemphill was given a $5,000 signature bail, meaning he did not have to post the actual money to get out of jail but would forfeit that amount if he violated bail conditions.
and...
quote:As a "strict condition" of bail, Court Commissioner John J. Valenti said Hemphill was not to "engage in or even attempt any sort of exorcism or spiritual healing."
Much as it pains me, this was probably handled appropriately. Under the presumption of innocence, it's customary to make bail obtainable for a defendant except under the most extraordinary circumstances. Hemphill is very poor, the prosecution says he has "substantial" ties to the community and is not a flight risk.
The prohibition on engaging in "exorcisms" was, I think, an absolutely necessary condition to attach to bail. Of course, I really have a hard time imagining people beating a path to his door wanting him to perform exorcisms on their loved ones in the near future.
posted
I would actually wager that in less than a year, nothing will be any different in the church.
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quote:I would actually wager that in less than a year, nothing will be any different in the church.
Storm, it's hard to tell. I don't really understand how these kinds of small groups work and how the guilt will be processed or rationalized within it.
What I do know is that what you have said is very true for the "supervised" settings in which these types of deaths usually occur.
Below is a link to an investigative report done by the Hartford-Courant in 1998. As I've stated before, many of the actions leading to the deaths of adults and children in these cases are similar to those of the members of the church group we're currently talking about. And not much has changed since 1998.
quote:In some cases, patients died in ways and for reasons that defy common sense: a towel wrapped around the mouth of a 16-year-old boy; a 15-year-old girl wrestled to the ground after she wouldn't give up a family photograph.
Many of the actions would land a parent in jail, yet staffers and facilities were rarely punished.
It's convenient to think that these kinds of things happen only with religious groups operating on the fringes. Unfortunately, that's not the case. These things usually happen under the guise of "treatment" and "supervision."
posted
sndrake, right on. Part of my responsibility is to assist with investigating abuse/neglect charges and do planning when appropriate. I am still amazed by what I see sometimes and cannot, even on the days my daughter is at her worst, conceive of ever hurting her to make a point. I hurt myself ( )...okay, not literally, but it feels that way...but never ever her. I can't imagine.
I wonder if the churches defense will include any of Temple Grandin's work, actually. She is a genius designer, but her ideas for dealing with cattle came from how she helped herself. For an autistic person, she said, there is no way to handle all the information coming into the brain. We filter out 99.9% of all information coming in (sounds, feeling, sight, smells, etc.) but for her, it was a gaggle of confusion. If I recall, she calmed down and could focus when she trapped herself between her couch and wall, the tighter the fit the better. Since then, she invented a machine that squeezes her, essentially. It is in her house and I think she lays on it and is squeezed between two soft but firm surfaces. This is how the cows are handled at the slaughter house. The are "squeezed" by the environment and are relaxed and not exposed to others of their kind dying. Sounds silly, but if you accept that animals can be harvested for food (as I do) then at least do it humanely.
So this is not an unusual technique for helping kids or adults with autism. Some schools have two giant beanbags that kids pinch themselves between (safely, of course). The full body pressure actually allows them to focus. It is amazing (and even Dr. Sachs did it when he visited Temple and loved it, too). So, when I read that they had him squeezed in a sheet, that is the first thing I thought about. If I were a juddge, I wouldn't buy it...but you never know.
fil
PS Checked out the Not Dead Yet Website...excellent stuff! I have seen a poster at one of the homes of a person I support. I love it. Keep up the good work!
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quote: sndrake, right on. Part of my responsibility is to assist with investigating abuse/neglect charges and do planning when appropriate. I am still amazed by what I see sometimes and cannot, even on the days my daughter is at her worst, conceive of ever hurting her to make a point. I hurt myself ( )...okay, not literally, but it feels that way...but never ever her. I can't imagine.
Fil, I'm sad to say that I am all too familiar with what you're talking about. I worked in the field of developmental disabilities for about 12-13 years in various settings. I wrote earlier about my experiences in my first job in which slapping kids (along with other "aversives") was part of my job. The extreme behaviorist approach used in the 1970s and early 1980s had a kind of secular version of "exorcism" built into its rationale.
After that initial job, overt physical abuse was not something I ever encountered again - at least not with people calling it "treatment." But in group homes and day treatment centers I worked in during the 1980s and early 1990s, psychological and emotional abuse were pretty everyday events in the places I worked.
quote:I wonder if the churches defense will include any of Temple Grandin's work, actually.
Somehow, I doubt that anyone in that church has ever read anything by Temple Grandin or likely to do so.
One of Grandin's main points would be lost on them, anyway. Her use of her "squeeze machine" was always under her own control. She got to initiate it, she controlled the pressure, and she decided when it would end.
quote: PS Checked out the Not Dead Yet Website...excellent stuff! I have seen a poster at one of the homes of a person I support. I love it. Keep up the good work!
Thanks.
I kinda figured you had checked out the site. I checked out the web stats this morning and found that an unfamiliar organization from Ohio had made some hits on our site.
Just to be clear - the only information I get is on the domains that visit the site, not individual users. So, for example, I know we got over 1600 hits this month from AOL, but that's all we know - not the aol users that came to visit.
Very glad to hear that there's some NDY stuff floating around in Cleveland. Mainly, the activists I know in Ohio are located in Toledo and Columbus.
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