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The largest city named for Christopher Columbus has called off its observance of the divisive holiday that honors the explorer, making a savvy move to tie the switch to a politically safe demographic: veterans.

Ohio’s capital city, population 860,000, will be open for business Monday after observing Columbus Day probably “for as long as it had been in existence,” said Robin Davis, a spokeswoman for Democratic Mayor Andrew Ginther. City offices will close instead on Veterans Day, which falls on Nov. 12 this year.

Native Americans and allied groups have long used Columbus Day to elevate issues of concern to them. That includes a peaceful protest of prayers, speeches and traditional singing in 2016 at Columbus City Hall — underneath the statue of the explorer that sits out front — to protest the Dakota Access Pipeline and to urge Ohio to support more renewable energy.

The decision to stop observing the holiday was not triggered by the national movement to abolish Columbus Day in favor of Indigenous Peoples Day as a way of recognizing victims of colonialism, Davis said. Columbus Day marks the Italian explorer’s arrival in the Americas on Oct. 12, 1492.

“We have a number of veterans who work for the city, and there are so many here in Columbus,” Davis said. “We thought it was important to honor them with that day off.” And, she said, the city doesn’t have the budget to give its 8,500 employees both days off, she said.

Columbus made its announcement Thursday in a two-paragraph news release focused on the impact on trash pickup and parking enforcement schedules. In that way, it avoided much of the consternation that has taken place elsewhere around the holiday.

An attempt in Akron to rename the holiday grew ugly last year, dividing the all-Democratic city council along racial lines. Five black members voted to rename the holiday and eight white members voted not to, keeping the holiday in place.

A similar effort twice failed in Cincinnati before a vote Wednesday finally recognized Columbus Day as the renamed Indigenous Peoples Day. It became the second Ohio city to do so, after the liberal college town of Oberlin in 2017. Cleveland, which has a large Italian-American population, continues to host a major Columbus Day parade.

Organizers of the 39-year-old Columbus Italian Festival, traditionally held on Columbus Day weekend, were not given advance notice of the city’s decision, said board member Joseph Contino.

“It’s very in vogue politically right now to do that. It’s not PC for me to say anything against indigenous peoples,” he said. “You can kick Christians, you can kick Catholics. That’s the message that it sends to us and that’s what it feels like; we’re Europeans and we lop Indians’ heads off. Which is just not true.”

Contino said he viewed the decision on the holiday as a missed opportunity.

“If you’re mayor of a city and its name is Columbus, why wouldn’t you capitalize on that? Use it to unite everybody,” he said. “Use this day to celebrate the entire culture, celebrate Italians and indigenous both.”

Tyrone Smith, director of the Native American Indian Center of Central Ohio, said the city’s decision is another step in embracing its growing diversity.

“The past is the past. It may not be pretty at times, but we cannot hold what happened back then against today’s society, regardless their bloodline,” he said. “The fact that the city of Columbus is taking action is a victory for everyone.”

 
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Bill Cosby’s lawyers have asked a Pennsylvania court to overturn the actor’s conviction and three- to 10-year prison sentence because of what they call a string of errors in his sex assault case.

The defense motion argued that trial Judge Steven O’Neill erred in declaring Cosby a sexually violent predator who must be imprisoned to protect the community. Lawyers called the sentence more punitive than necessary, given the standard two- to three-year guideline range for the crime and the fact Cosby is 81 and blind.

They also said the trial evidence never proved the encounter with accuser Andrea Constand took place in 2004, and not 2003, or that Cosby was arrested within the 12-year time limit.

Cosby was arrested on Dec. 30, 2015, and was convicted at a second trial this April. He has been in a state prison near Philadelphia since the Sept. 25 sentencing, when the judge refused to let him stay out on $1 million bail pending appeal. Given his fame, wealth and use of drugs to molest the accuser, the judge said, Cosby could remain a threat to other women.

The defense motion said O’Neill improperly considered the trial testimony of five other accusers in sentencing Cosby, instead of limiting that “prior bad act” testimony to the question of his guilt or innocence. O’Neill, in explaining the sentence in court, told Cosby he considered “voices from the past, your past,” and that he “heard their voices loud and clear,” the defense said.

The lawyers also challenged the state’s sex offender laws, which have been revised several times amid challenges they are unconstitutionally vague. The law requires judges to find that a sexually violent predator has a “mental abnormality,” a term they said has no legal or psychological meaning, yet subjects defendants to lifetime counseling and police registration.

The defense motion, dated Friday, was posted to a public court docket in the case over the weekend. Kate Delano, a spokeswoman for the Montgomery County District Attorney’s Office, said the office will file a response.

The motion was filed by lawyer Peter Goldberger, a top appellate lawyer in the region, and Joseph P. Green Jr., who handled Cosby’s sentencing after more than a dozen other lawyers on the case had come and gone. A former appellate lawyer on the case is suing Cosby over what he called more than $50,000 in unpaid bills.

The defense also complained that an audio recording played to jurors of a 2005 conversation between Cosby and Gianna Constand, the mother of accuser Andrea Constand, was “not authentic.” They said they did not make the discovery until an expert review after the trial.

District Attorney Kevin Steele has dismissed that as a legitimate appeal issue, saying it’s been widely known that Gianna Constand started her recorder after the call began. She had called Cosby to get answers about what happened to her daughter after Andrea Constand disclosed the assault a year later. The family went to police, who suggested they try to record Cosby.

During the call, Cosby acknowledged engaging in “digital penetration” after giving her daughter pills he would not identify, and offered money for Andrea to attend graduate school, Gianna Constand testified.

“If that’s what they’ve got, it’s beyond a Hail Mary,” Steele said at the sentencing, as Cosby’s lawyers sought to keep Cosby free on bail over the tape recording. O’Neill instead had Cosby led out of the courtroom in handcuffs.

 
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It’s Fashion Week season, and major cities around the world are gearing up to show off the latest trends in high fashion clothing and accessories. It’s also a busy time for the world’s top super models, who will grace the catwalks and runways in New York, London, Milan and Paris. VOA reporter Laura Sepulveda took in one of the more exclusive runways in New York City, where one model with Down syndrome saw her dream come true.
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Mormons will start spending less time at church each Sunday — two hours instead of three — after a change announced Saturday aimed at making worship more manageable for members around the globe. 

The change, which takes effect in January, is a significant one for Mormons, who since 1980 have been expected to attend all three hours each Sunday to be considered active members of the faith.

The news triggered widespread applause from members, with some posting celebratory memes on social media. It came during the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ twice-yearly conference, where a leader also reaffirmed the faith’s opposition to gay marriage and its belief that one’s gender is God-given and for eternity.

“The senior leaders of the church have been aware for many years that for some of our precious members, a three-hour Sunday schedule at church can be difficult,” said Quentin L. Cook, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, church leaders who help run the faith. “This is particularly true for parents with small children, primary children, elderly members, new converts and others.”

The three-hour commitment is a hefty one compared with those of some other religions’ Sunday services. Many Catholic, Lutheran and Methodist churches, for instance, offer weekly worship that lasts about an hour or an hour and a half, along with voluntary classes and other gatherings throughout the week.

​Trying to be ‘proactive’

Church President Russell M. Nelson called the adjustment a new “home-centered church” strategy that comes as the faith expands throughout the world. More than half of its 16 million members live outside the U.S. and Canada.

“The long-standing objective of the church is to assist all members to increase their faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and in his atonement,” Nelson said. “In this complex world today, this is not easy. The adversary is increasing his attack on faith and on families at an exponential rate. To survive spiritually, we need counterstrategies and proactive plans.”

Paulina Porras, a mother of 1-year-old twins, was ecstatic with the news. Her daughters aren’t old enough to go to children’s programs alone, so she and her husband have to care for them during Sunday church time.

“Staying three hours is impossible,” said Porras, 29, of Logan. “Two hours, we can do.”

Instead of attending two meetings each Sunday beyond the one-hour worship — such as Sunday school, men’s and women’s groups — members will attend one each Sunday, with the meetings rotating throughout the month, Cook said. 

‘Crazy’ family schedules

Marc Fisher, an insurance company owner from Las Vegas, also lauded the change. Three hours each Sunday can be intimidating for potential converts and wayward members, and the change gives families the flexibility to weave in gospel activities at home.

Fisher, 38, has seven children ranging in age from 7 to 25 who are busy with piano, volleyball and homework, he said. He plans to have more one-on-one talks with them.

“Schedules are crazy for a lot of families,” Fisher said. “Sometimes you hear in the church we’re caught up with checklists, the pressure and the stress of just meeting everything.”

While U.S. members most likely will welcome the new schedule, it seems to mainly reflect the church shifting its focus away from being heavily Western American, where most members live near chapels and can handle the three-hour Sunday commitment, or worship block, said Mormon scholar Matthew Bowman, an associate professor of history at Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas.

“This change is geared toward making participation in the church more flexible and increasingly targeted toward smaller congregations: A shorter worship block means less volunteer demands upon the congregation, fewer jobs which need to be filled, and generally easier administration,” Bowman said in an email.

Church membership growth has decreased in recent years, with membership growth in 2017 being the slowest in 80 years, according to independent Mormon researcher Matt Martinich. The number of convert baptisms in 2017 reached the lowest level in 30 years, he said.

This is mainly due to slowed growth in the countries with the most members: the United States, Mexico, Brazil, the Philippines, Chile and Peru, Martinich said.

Accent on efficiency

He doesn’t think the Sunday change is aimed at increasing retention, but rather at using church resources and members’ time more efficiently. The switch could allow multiple congregations to use the same church building in places like Utah where there are large numbers of members. It also will let members do personal and family gospel activities on their own time, he said. 

The two-day Mormon conference kicked off a day after the faith announced it was renaming the famed Mormon Tabernacle Choir to drop the word “Mormon.” The singing group, now called the Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square, performed at the conference, as it always does. 

The decision to rename the choir the was the first major move since Nelson in August called for an end to the use of shorthand names for the religion that have been used for generations by church members and the public.

The comments about gay marriage and gender came from longtime Quorum of the Twelve member Dallin H. Oaks, who called on members to oppose “social and legal pressures to retreat from traditional marriage or to make changes that confuse or alter gender or homogenize the differences between men and women.”

Oaks said those relationships and identities are “essential to accomplish God’s great plan” and that Satan “seeks to confuse gender, to distort marriage and to discourage childbearing — especially by parents who will raise children in truth.”

The comments align with past positions by the faith, which has tried to take a more welcoming stance to LGBTQ people while sticking with fundamental opposition to same-sex marriage and transgender operations. 
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The #MeToo and #TimesUp movements address the sexual harassment and abuse of women by powerful men in Hollywood and elsewhere today. But systemic sexism in the film industry goes back decades, influencing how stories have been told on the silver screen.

Consider the cartoon Pepe Le Pew, about a persistent skunk in relentless pursuit of Penelope Pussycat. When the TV series first appeared, more than half a century ago, it was considered cute and romantic.

Today’s audiences find the skunk’s unwanted advances creepy, and reflect female characters as passive sexual objects, said George Mason University professor Lisa Koch.

Domestic abuse and patronizing behavior of husbands toward their wives were often glorified as passionate relationships, Koch added, such as in the narrative of the 1939 epic drama Gone with the Wind. The character of Rhett Butler, played by Clark Gable, is derisive and controlling toward his on-screen wife, Scarlett O Hara, played by Vivien Leigh. She is scripted as petulant, erratic and manipulative. 

Hollywood glamorized and validated the hypermasculine male character who had to rein in the manipulative and childlike female characters, Koch said.

On screen, behind the scenes

Sexism and abuse on screen also reflected the pervasive sexual abuse actresses often endured behind the scenes, said Giovanna Chesler, director of film and video studies at George Mason University. 

“You read about how Bertolucci and Marlon Brando had an arrangement for their actress in Last Tango in Paris. They knew that this would be a rape scene they would be filming but she (actress Maria Schneider) did not.” Chesler was referring to Italian director Bernardo Bertolucci as well as U.S. actor Brando.

In her 2016 autobiography, Tippi Hedren: A Memoir, the actress who was Alfred Hitchcock’s main muse and star of his films The Birds and Marnie, writes that when she turned down the filmmaker’s sexual advances, he threatened to destroy her career.

Chesler says this pervasive culture of sexism and blackmail produced men like Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. 

“He was the Oscar maker and he anointed all of these actresses into Oscar-producing roles.” Chesler said. “They thought that once they really broke through, they would get out of being sexualized on screen. How ironic that in order to do so, they had to deal with this predator.”

Dozens of women have accused the disgraced Hollywood studio boss of sexual misconduct that includes harassment and assault. Earlier this year, Weinstein was indicted on sex crimes charges but remains free on bail while he fights the accusations.

Beyond Hollywood

Since the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements began, many films have offered more nuanced and textured female characters and are telling more women’s stories. 

But activists say more needs to be done to increase women’s equitable treatment in Hollywood. Lisa Koch says there is definitely power in the number of women who are uniting against sexism and sexual abuse from all walks of life. 

“It started with 300 women in Hollywood,” she said. “It has expanded dramatically, so 700,000 farm laborers pledged their support and that is just one example across the spectrum. Within the first 60 days, the movement raised $21 million in financial backing.”

WATCH: Sexism, Assault in Workplace, Including Hollywood, Stopped by Balancing Power

Activist and filmmaker Shannon Lee says female producers and behind-the-scenes artists are offering women jobs, equal pay and creative expression, such as film producer Ava DuVernay, who has an artist collective that distributes films and mandates that all the directors be female.

Lee cautions, however, that sexism against women in the workplace is too pervasive to change overnight. 

“When there is an imbalance of power, there is an abuse of power. USA Today did a survey that came out in 2017 saying that 94 percent of women in the film industry have had some experience of sexual harassment or sexual assault,” Lee said.

Koch offers another statistic: “Ninety-five percent of Hollywood directors are men, 18 percent of those involved in film production as directors, producers, writers cinematographers, editors, are women.”

Both women say the goal in the industry is 50/50 by 2020. 

“Where there is 50 percent male and 50 percent female, you don’t have the opportunity to this gross misconduct,” Lee said.

Sunu Chandy is the legal director of the National Women’s Law Center in Washington. She represents thousands of women who have come forward to seek legal support against sexual harassment and discrimination. She says both the #MeToo movement, where women openly addressed the abuse they suffered at the hands of men, and the #TimesUp movement, where sexual predators like Bill Cosby have been prosecuted and convicted for their crimes, are significant legal steps in establishing gender equity in Hollywood and elsewhere. 

“Hiring women into roles that are traditionally male roles is absolutely something that we are pushing for,” Chandy said. “But if someone goes there and is sexually harassed and leaves, it’s continuing the problem. If the Time’s Up fund helps that case to come forward and be publicized and that company takes meaningful steps to create a better workplace, more women will be encouraged to apply there.”

Chandy says that although progress is being made in offering women the legal help and support they deserve, much still has to be done to bring about real change in the workplace, be it a factory, a farm or a Hollywood movie set.
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Since the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements began, many films have offered more nuanced and textured female characters and are telling more women’s stories. But activists say more needs to be done to increase women’s equitable treatment in Hollywood. In this installment, VOA’s Penelope Poulou talks with activists, filmmakers and actresses about the legal and behind the cameras groundwork that will empower women in the film industry.
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The discrimination and objectification of women in Hollywood is not a new phenomenon. For decades sexist behavior by powerful men in the industry has been part of the star system, and it has influenced how stories were told on the large screen. In the first part of a two-part series on Gender Inequality, VOA’s Penelope Poulou examines sexist stereotypes in iconic films that have permeated our popular culture.
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The Yazidi community in Iraq and around the world expressed joy and hope after the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded its 2018 Peace Prize to Nadia Murad, a Yazidi activist and survivor of sexual slavery by the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq.

Murad will be sharing the prize with  Dr. Denis Mukwege, a Congolese gynecologist who treated thousands of women victims of rape and sexual violence.

The Nobel Peace Committee praised Murad’s courage because she did not accept the social codes that require women to remain silent and shamed after abuse.

“She has shown uncommon courage in recounting her own sufferings and speaking up on behalf of other victims,” the Norway-based Nobel Peace Prize Committee said.

Members of the Yazidi community told VOA their voices are now being heard and their plea for justice after the Sinjar massacre is being acknowledged by the world. 

Nagham Hasan, an Iraqi Yazidi activist and a gynecologist who offered treatment and counseling for many Yazidi women in refugee camps in Iraq including Nadia Murad, told VOA that the recognition of Murad is not just the recognition of the plight of Yazidi women, but also everyone else in Iraq who suffered at hands of extremists.

“When Nadia escaped her captivity and arrived to the camp in Sinjar she was traumatized and afraid, but now she blossomed into this strong woman and became the voice of all men and women victims of sexual violence,” Hasan said.

Hasan’s work was recognized in 2016 when she was awarded the U.S. State Department’s International Women of Courage Award for “promoting gender equality, combating gender-based violence, and providing psychological support for survivors of violence.”

Women struggle

Mirza Dinay, a Yazidi physician who helped hundreds of Yazidi girls seek asylum in Germany, told VOA that he is thrilled that Murad got this prize, which is a symbol of women’s struggle against sexual violence worldwide. 

“This is a win for Iraqis, Kurds and the Yazidi community and I hope this will encourage the Iraqi government to provide more support to the girls and women survivors of sexual violence,” Dinay said. 

Dawood Saleh, a Yazidi man from Sinjar who has resettled in the U.S., told VOA that Murad’s persistence in making the world listen to Yazidis’ plight has paid off.

“As a Yazidi survivor from IS genocide I feel happy that Nadia received this award. It means to me that Yazidis have value in the world,” Saleh said.

Murad’s reaction

According to United Nations, at least 10,000 Yazidis were either killed or abducted during the IS attack on Sinjar in 2014. The attack sparked international outcry and condemnation.  

Murad was one of those kidnapped by IS in Sinjar mountain in northwestern Iraq. She was sold several times as a sex slave to different IS members before she managed to escape after 3 months in captivity.

In reaction to Friday’s announcement, Murad told Nobel Committee that she did not think that she had the strength to do the work she has been doing. 

She said she derived her strength from thinking about what happened to her community and from the loss of many of her family members including her mother. 

“This prize will make the voices of women who suffered from sexual violence in conflict heard, especially the women in minorities like my community the Yazidis. It tells us that our voices will be heard,” Murad told the Norwegian Nobel Committee.

Murad has been a strong advocate for justice for all Yazidis who were kidnapped and abused by IS and continues to raise her voice against sexual violence.

“Whatever has happened to Yazidis, from August 3rd (2014) till now, they should get their justice. An international tribunal should be formed as soon as possible and Yazidis and other minorities who cannot protect themselves should be protected,” Murad told VOA in 2016 during an exclusive interview. 

Yazidi rights groups estimate about 3,000 women and children remain missing, while thousands live under dire conditions in refugee camps in Iraq.
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Ben Affleck says battling addiction is “a lifelong and difficult struggle.”

The actor posted on Instagram Thursday that he has completed a 40-day stay at a treatment center for alcohol addiction and remains in outpatient care.

The 46-year-old says the support he’s received from family and friends has given him strength to speak about “his illness” with others. He says he is fighting for himself and his family.

Affleck says battling addiction is a full-time commitment and “one is never really in or out of treatment.”

He had previously sought treatment in 2001 and 2017.

Affleck has been separated from actress Jennifer Garner since 2015. They have three children.
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Monica Lewinsky is teaming up with celebrities for an anti-bullying campaign that targets name-calling.

Appearing Friday on ABC’s Good Morning America, Lewinsky says the #DefyTheName campaign calls on people to change their social media names to include the names they were bullied by. Lewinsky says she’ll now be known as ”Monica Chunky Slut Stalker That Woman Lewinsky.”

Lewinsky says she had a long list of names from childhood on. She says name-calling is the most common form of bullying and it’s important not to let those names define you.

Lewinsky says organizers want to recreate a community of empathy online.

Lewinsky was a White House intern when she had an affair with President Bill Clinton. Clinton initially denied the affair before admitting to it in 1998.
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With the digital era in full swing, sketchbooks are likely to be gathering dust in desk drawers around the world. But for the founder of the Brooklyn Art Library, sketchbooks are precious, the nondigital predecessors of Instagram. As part of a special project, the library has created a business by collecting thousands of sketchbooks from people who pay to submit theirs to the collection. Elena Wolf has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.
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