First – Learn the Facts

You are most likely to succeed with your property tax appeal if you find factual errors in your property tax record, also known as an “appraisal card”. Mistakes in real estate appraisals, such as errors about the age of improvements or incorrect square footage measurements are not uncommon.

After you file a Notice of Protest, the appraisal district will schedule an informal conference with one of their staff appraisers. Bring any proof for your case to the appointment in the form of photos or other documentation supporting your claims. The appraisal district will need to keep your evidence for their file, so remember to bring extra copies.

Understand How Your Home Has Been Appraised

Harris County Appraisal District [HCAD] has over a million single-family residential properties to appraise. Montgomery Central Appraisal District [MCAD] has responsibility for valuing about 250,000 homes. The daunting reality is that there are not enough well-trained staff appraisers to go around.

In the real world, appraisal district employees sometimes are not able to inspect much beyond new construction or additions. Even when properties are inspected, the examination may be hardly more than a drive-by. It is more common now for appraisal districts to rely on aerial pictometry for various aspects of property inspection. The level of technological resources now available to most appraisal districts is impressive.

Given the overwhelming number of properties that must be re-valued, these appraisal districts are dependent on computer mass appraisal models. The mass appraisal models that counties use are inevitably imperfect, although some are better than others. Your quest will be to determine the ways and the degree to which your property and your neighborhood have not altogether fit the model.

You may ask a real estate agent to help you find some comparable homes and their actual sales prices. Most good agents don’t mind helping you, because you may work with them later. Remember you want to be able to prove that your house is in a lesser condition than the comparable sales. Try to compare your home to the best ones in your neighborhood. If you can find information on better homes that sold below your assessed value during the prior year, you may have the grounds for a reduction.

Research the Value of Your Neighbors’ Homes

The easiest way for most homeowners to develop an appeal is to use the sales comparison approach to market value in their appeal, however the sales do not always favor your case. Another angle you can try is to determine if your home has been appraised in a “uniform & equal” manner to other similar properties in the same neighborhood.

Check if the appraisal district’s value of your house is at, or below, the median of the tax appraisal value of other homes in your neighborhood. Texas appraisal districts will have this information available online through their websites.

Obtain the Appraisal District’s Evidence

Along with your “Notice of Protest”, submit a request in writing for all the evidence the appraisal district used to value your home and intends to present at an Appraisal Review Board [ARB] hearing. It is also referred to as the House Bill 201 [HB 201] packet. Review this information to ascertain how the appraisal district determined the value of your home. You may find that this uncovers shortcomings the appraisal district’s case.

Don’t Lose Hope – You Have a Few Chances to Get It Right

If you are unable to settle your case one-on-one with a staff appraiser in an informal conference, the next level of administrative appeal is a formal Appraisal Review Board [ARB] hearing. Montgomery Central Appraisal District [MCAD] will have your formal hearing the same day. They immediately escort you down the hall and show you to the waiting area to present your case. Harris County Appraisal District [HCAD] will reschedule you to return to their office on another day to have a formal hearing. You will almost always wait two weeks.

The ARB hearing will be like a minor courtroom setting in which you make the presentation of your case. An experienced senior appraiser will represent the case on behalf of the appraisal district. A panel of at least three, supposedly impartial, appraisal review board members will hear the case and render a final decision. Important Warning: The ARB has the authority to actually RAISE your property value, so consider this risk. Also, do not forget to bring extra copies of all your evidence ( five altogether ) for the appraisal district and the ARB panel.

If your formal ARB hearing does not have a satisfactory outcome, you may still have two additional options available. For residential properties valued below $1-million, you can file an application for binding arbitration through the office of the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. There are fees of $250 or $500, depending on the level of involvement of your case. The other option is to file a law suit in district court against the appraisal district. As both of these procedures are time consuming and costly, you will need to decide if they are practical in your case.

Get Started – 10 Action Steps

1. Get a copy of your property tax record, or “appraisal card”. Texas appraisal districts will have this information online through their websites. If you cannot find it, call the appraisal district office for assistance.

2. Review the appraisal record for errors in your favor.

3. Find out if you are eligible for any special exemptions and apply for them. Examples are the Texas general homestead, over 65, disabled, or veterans exemptions.

4. File a “Notice of Protest” before the statutory deadline. This is usually May 31st or within 30 days of sending your “Notice of Appraised Value”.

5. Study the appraisal district’s evidence, the HB 201 packet.

6. Try to get help from a real estate agent to identify the details about good comparable sales (… and remember who helped you whenever you have a real estate transaction that pays ).

7. Take photos of your home and the other properties you are using for comparison. If you do not have a good camera, borrow one; or ask a friend to help you.

8. Make detailed written notes about precisely what you think should be the right value and the reasons for the reduction. Prepare your presentation and be able to show the proof to support your claim. This needs to consist of factual evidence such as dated photos, documentation of recent sales, and neighbors’ appraisal values.

9. Be kind and respectful to the other appraisal district staff and ARB members. Never forget they are also human and have feelings, like you. Remember the time tested expression, “You can catch more with honey than with vinegar.”

10. If you think it stands in your best interest, appeal your case to a formal ARB hearing. This may be a roll of the dice though. Depending on the make-up of the panel and their state of mind on the particular day of your hearing, your ordeal could be more favorable or it could become even worse.

If all this seems like a good deal of effort, there is yet another way to help ensure you get the best possible outcome. You can have a property tax consultant prepare and present your case, providing professional representation for you at appraisal district hearings. You can get the benefits of this service on a contingency basis, so it will cost you nothing unless you actually save money — that you would have paid in taxes.

1968 Was A Horrific Year

Horses are big business in Kentucky, and even schoolboys were aware of the controversy in Louisville 50 years ago. It began with the horse race on the first Saturday in May, so far as we knew.

With Kentucky Gov. Louie Nunn and presidential candidate Richard Nixon watching from the stands, Dancer’s Image came from dead last, 14 lengths back, to pass 13 horses and cross the wire a length and a half ahead of Forward Pass. Nunn chuckled as Nixon dramatically tore his losing ticket in half.

But Nixon may have been a little hasty, depending on which horse he picked. Three days after the race, Churchill Downs stewards ordered Boston car dealer Peter Fuller to return the trophy and winning purse, and named Forward Pass the 1968 Kentucky Derby winner. Post race testing revealed that Dancer’s Image had phenylbutazone in his blood sample.

It’s an anti-inflammatory painkiller, used routinely nowadays when horses suffer swelling in their joints. But in 1968 it was illegal at Kentucky racetracks. Fuller’s veterinarian prescribed it during training, but allowed six days for it to clear from the horse’s bloodstream before the race. Fuller, his veterinarian and the horse’s trainer were at a loss to explain why Dancer’s Image still had phenylbutazone in his system on race day.

I was an odd 8th-grader who read Racing Form past performance charts fluently and had committed a lot of racing trivia to memory. But we were also a politically conscious family. My dad ran for the House of Representatives on “Clean Gene” McCarthy’s antiwar slate in Kentucky’s 1st Congressional District. Bobby Kennedy was campaigning for the presidential nomination across the river in Indiana.

Martin Luther King was shot down exactly one month before the 1968 Derby, but he was in Louisville one year earlier to help local Blacks, led by his brother, A.D. King, protest housing discrimination.

Locals had disrupted a race at Churchill Downs the previous year, and wanted to disrupt the 1967 Derby, but King persuaded them to hold the protests downtown instead, due to the potential for mayhem at the track.

In April 1968, Fuller entered Dancer’s Image in a tune-up for the Derby, the Wood Memorial Stakes at Aqueduct Racetrack in New York City.

When his horse won, Fuller donated the purse to the recently widowed Coretta Scott King. I’ve seen two different numbers – $62,000 and $77,415. Either way, it was a lot of money in 1968 dollars. He didn’t publicize it, but it was common knowledge at the track, and a race announcer mentioned it on television.

The gift made friends and enemies for Fuller. There was hate mail. There were anonymous death threats. There was a mysterious fire at one of his stables. So he asked Churchill Downs management to put on extra security. They refused.

Fuller was a pretty demanding guy. He was an ex-Marine and the son of a Republican ex-governor. His father was one of the wealthiest men in America, and Fuller was no slouch, himself.

After growing up in a household with 11 domestic servants, Fuller was accustomed to having his way. It was customary to provide Derby horse owners with four tickets. He demanded 50.

The brash, hard-charging Yankee may have alienated courtly Southerners he should have tried to charm. Instead, he made condescending remarks about “rednecks.”

The bottom line is that he didn’t get the extra security from Churchill Downs, and he didn’t hire his own. Security at his race barn, he recalled, was “an old fella in a chair and asleep.”

Fuller said later he believed he was “set up,” that some unknown intruder entered his horse’s stall to inject the disqualifying phenylbutazone. Either that or the blood sample was adulterated.

Fuller appealed the track stewards’ decision to the Kentucky Racing Commission, and lost. He took his case to court and won in 1970. Dancer’s Image was once again the 1968 Kentucky Derby winner.

But then the State of Kentucky took that decision up to a federal appeals court, and won its case against Fuller and Dancer’s Image. That was final. Fuller said he spent $250,000 on his futile lawsuits.

A billboard at his horse farm in New Hampshire boasts stubbornly that it is the home of Dancer’s Image, 1968 Kentucky Derby winner. But that sign is false.

Forward Pass is the 1968 Kentucky Derby winner. The colt was no fluke, either – he went on to win the Preakness, and barely missed a Triple Crown sweep June 1 after leading the Belmont til final sixteenth pole.

Three days later, as 13-year-olds were starting summer vacation, there was another tragedy in the real world, the second in two months. that made horse racing seem awfully frivolous.

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore,” wrote poet Emma Lazarus, addressing the Old World. “Send these, the tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”

And so Palestinian immigrant Bishara Sirhan brought his family to America. The poet also bade the Old World “keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp.” But when Bishara brought his 12-year-old son Sirhan Sirhan to California, he imported a monstrous ego and many centuries of ancient hatreds to his American sanctuary.

The younger Sirhan appeared Westernized in his teens, with a pompadour hair style, and even in old age today he looks like a kind gentleman. But he testified in court that he assassinated Bobby Kennedy “with 20 years of malice aforethought.” His diary confirmed that he was seething with resentment against Jews, and against the New York Senator who favored selling fighter jets to Israel.

He cased the Los Angeles hotel where Kennedy would watch primary election results with supporters. Kennedy won the California and South Dakota presidential primaries June 4. Incumbent President Lyndon Johnson had long since bowed out of the race. There was great hopefulness among Americans who had supported the late president John F. Kennedy eight years earlier.

As Bobby Kennedy left the celebration through a hotel kitchen, Sirhan intercepted him and put three bullets in him, one in the head and two in the back. Like phenylbutazone, Sirhan nullified the victory. And in my mind’s eye, I see Richard Nixon piecing the shreds of his Derby ticket back together.

Of course, it’s anybody’s guess how the world might have been different if Bobby Kennedy were elected president that November instead of Richard Nixon. Like his older brother, he had a penchant for adultery. But he was a practicing Catholic, under the influence of Cardinal Spellman. Unlike his younger brother Teddy, he didn’t try to harmonize public policy with his personal immorality.

If older brother John’s lone nomination to the Supreme Court is any indication. a Court populated by three Bobby Kennedy nominations might have decided Roe v. Wade differently.

Byron White, JFK’s appointment to the Court, not only dissented from Roe, but from all subsequent decisions that applied it as binding precedent. Nixon, by contrast to JFK, nominated pro-abortion Justices Lewis Powell and Harry Blackmun, and pro-abortion Chief Justice Warren Burger to the Court.

If Bobby Kennedy instead of Richard Nixon had filled those Supreme Court vacancies with the same kind of Justices as Byron White was, they might have combined with William Rehnquist and White to form a 5-4 majority for the protection of unborn children. Tens of millions of American children might have been spared the abortion holocaust that ensued after Roe v. Wade, and continues today. Thanks to Sirhan Sirhan and the people who welcomed him to our country, we’ll never know for sure.

“1968,” Fuller said, “was a horrific year.”

by Bart Stinson

Human and civil rights violations often occur in many parts of the United States as illustrated by recent voting and marriage laws passed in State Legislatures, miscarriages of justice occurring through verdicts rendered in our judicial system, bias and discrimination taking place at the corporate level and bullying in our schools. When they take place, these violations have a serious negative impact upon community race relationships, can cause civil disobedience and strife and sometimes even threaten our ability to keep law and order. What avenues are open to us to prevent their future occurrence?

An Assessment of our Current Race Relationships Based Upon Sixty Years of Observation

I am not an expert in race relations but grew up with the civil rights movement in full swing and saw what happened over the past sixty years both in Florida and the nation at large. The best way I know to resolve civil rights problems such as those described is to prevent them from happening in the first place by eliminating the underlying causes, but that is not always possible and when it is possible it does not happen overnight.

The American civil rights movement has brought us much progress in race relationships through the efforts of Dr Martin Luther King, the American Civil Liberties Union, the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 by the United States Congress signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson and the well documented efforts of countless others.

But even though our country has elected its first black President, in point of fact our various racial groups if given a choice still seem to prefer to mingle with members of their own race most of the time. This self-imposed distancing of the races from one another when and where it occurs undermines mutual understanding and respect, provides the opportunity for misunderstandings to arise and sometimes becomes the match that ignites civil disobedience when perceived violations of human rights occur. Protests and demonstrations taking place as a result of voter suppression laws, marriage inequality and alleged miscarriages of justice arising from unpopular jury verdicts illustrate my point.

My focus will be primarily on the voter suppression laws in operation during the 2012 Presidential election.

Human and civil rights violations illustrated by voting laws passed in State Legislatures

When laws such as those listed below become law with the deliberate but sub-rosa intent to lower the percentage of minority voters going to the polls and casting ballots because the party passing such legislation receives much less support from those voters than the opposition party receives, it is a deliberate impairment of racial harmony and an obvious attempt on the part of the political party in office to keep power at all costs even by violating human and civil rights. The laws and practices mentioned are reminiscent of laws enacted by so-called “banana republics”. When those laws don’t have the intended result and the election is lost by the party passing them what’s next? A military junta? It is outrageous for a political party in the United States to stoop to that level. If a political party cannot get a majority vote in a lawful and ethical way then it has no right to win election. Consider these tactics for a moment all of which have been recently used in trying to win elections.

• Make registering to vote more difficult.
• Impose restrictive and burdensome identification requirements as a pre-requisite to registering to vote and casting your ballot.
• Prohibit same day registration on the date of the general election.
• Reduce the number of early voting days to a minimum.
• Eliminate early voting on Sunday – a day on which many voters of color prefer to cast their ballots.
• Make voting as inconvenient as possible for those who do not normally vote for you.
• Deliberately distribute fliers in Spanish misstating the date of the election and showing it held on a date later than the date for which it had been scheduled.
• Put many more voting machines in favored precincts than you place in precincts dominated by the opposing party to assure long lines and delays in voting in precincts dominated by the opposing party and make sure only short lines exist in the precincts dominated by the party in power.
• Shorten the hours the polls stay open.

Where these discriminatory attempts to suppress minority rights exist the next time a situation develops that those minorities consider discriminatory – such as a miscarriage of justice in a court trial – it will ignite and mobilize civil rights advocates, initiate litigation, cause public protests and bring about petitions to the government officials for the redress of grievances. Is creating the need for such action to keep and exercise rights to which we are all clearly entitled in the best interests of racial harmony? Is it in the national interest to allow such practices to continue? Let the reader be the judge of the appropriateness of such action.

It is extremely disappointing, that even after decades of effort – legal, judicial, public and private, personal and corporate to give equal opportunities and set up a level playing field for all we are still trying to dig ourselves out from under the quagmire created by the attitude of people who are frozen in time and unwilling to see the need to change their attitude.

Conclusion

We must continue to educate our children to understand the underpinnings and great importance of the American civil rights movement, its causes and the sacrificed lives that brought it about. And we must instill in them the need to firmly commit to legal equality for all: black – white (or any other race or color), lesbian – gay – bisexual – transgender, or straight, male – female, young – old, and the disabled without regard to religious doctrine or political ideology.

Respect for our racial and cultural differences in all age groups seems key to overcoming the lingering remnants of bigotry and hate that sometimes still disrupts racial harmony and social integration. Old habits die-hard. In this case let’s hope they die sooner than later.

© 2013 Douglas M. Midgley, J.D. All Rights Reserved Worldwide

How can you tell if you are really showing leadership? It depends on how you define it. Unless you get feedback from people you are managing, it is hard to know how you are doing in a managerial role. But this is only one way of looking at leadership.

You can also define leadership as promoting new or better ways of doing things and being able to convince your target audience to buy your idea. This is the sort of leadership that Martin Luther King showed to the US government when his protests against segregation on buses led the US Supreme Court to outlaw such segregation. This form of leadership had nothing to do with King managing any part of the US government. Leadership really means showing the way, helping people see a better way of doing things, either by setting an example or by actively promoting it.

So, how can you keep score on your own leadership efforts? And, why should you bother? The main reason to do it is that your confidence could get a great boost and it might encourage you to show even more leadership. You probably show leadership in at least a dozen small ways every day without being aware of it. We can easily overlook the seemingly little things we do every day and not realize that we have had an impact on people around us. Things that seem obvious or easy for us, we discount. We don’t see such things as a big deal, but they might be new and difficult for others. So, if you don’t keep score, you may be showing more leadership than you realize, but think you aren’t really showing any at all. If this is you, maybe you’re selling yourself short.

To set up your leadership scorecard, categorize your leadership attempts from small to large scale as follows:

1. Convincing a subordinate to do something different.

2. Influencing a peer to think or act differently.

3. Selling a new idea to your boss.

4. Getting your department to change a small but significant process.

5. Convincing your department to adopt a larger scale change.

6. Influencing your whole organization to shift direction.

7. Convincing your organization to take a major change in direction.

You may be able to think of some other categories. Keep track of how many times each week you show leadership at each of these levels. The benefit of this list is that it encourages you to start small. If at the end of the week you have shown leadership successfully a few dozen times at the first two or three levels, you just might be confident enough to raise your game to a higher level.

If you’re not sure if your leadership attempts were successful, check back in a few days and ask the people you tried to influence if they made the change and what they see as the benefits of the switch. Getting the other person to articulate the benefits as they see them is itself a great leadership tactic. If they weren’t quite sold before, getting them to state the benefits might tip them over the edge. If you find keeping score a great motivator for you, try asking them how helpful your suggestion was on a scale of 1 to 10.

There is solid evidence that personal change occurs most readily if we measure our success. So, you may think it’s a bit contrived or self-indulgent to keep track of your successes in this way, but it just might be a great way to help you lift your game to achieve a broader leadership impact, one that moves a larger part of your organization toward more significant changes over time. As you gradually raise the stakes, you should find yourself getting more attention and respect.

The more you stick your neck out, however, the greater the risk, so be sure to get key stakeholders on side before you try to promote anything really large scale or radical. You don’t need to go for broke. Try your ideas out on receptive audiences first. Ask them who else might benefit from your idea. Enlist their support by asking them to spread the word. Ask yourself who has most at stake to preserve the status quo. Sound these people out quietly before you go public on a major change initiative.

The old saying: What gets measured, gets done applies to leadership. If you don’t measure, you probably won’t achieve your full leadership potential.

This is an introduction for anyone who would like to participate in a surf fishing tournament. Surf fishing tournaments are a great way to enjoy this exciting sport.

Surf fishing tournaments can run for a day, several days or even weeks. Most tournaments are used as a fund raiser for a nonprofit organization. There are all kinds of tournaments you can enter. In one respect they will have a lot of similarities. All the tournaments will have designated boundaries and requirements to compete in their event.

Surf Fishing Tournament Registration and Kick Off Orientation

Surf fishing tournaments are conducted in a few different ways but all of them are very similar. Registration fees vary from a few dollars to a three digit fee to get in. Some will have registrations prior to the tournament and others have their registrations on the day of the event. Either way at some point after registrations you can expect to attend a kick off orientation. The purpose of the meeting is to make sure everyone is familiar with all the rules and requirements of the tournament. The first (unwritten) rule is always "know the rules". Don't miss the orientation meeting. Even if your familiar with the rules there is always something important you need to know that may get you disqualified.

Team Entries

Some tournaments will have team entries of up to six members. The teams have a captain appointed who has additional responsibilities for team management. Teams usually have a designated station to fish and special rules as well. It's another interesting way to participate in a surf fishing tournament.

Tournaments Within a Tournament

Often there are special tournaments you can enter within the main tournament event. Usually this requires additional cost and separate awards are handed out. These are like side tournaments for special situations or results that can be achieved while participating in the main tournament. It's not just another category. It's an event within an event.

Multiple Categories of Surf Fish

The tournaments will usually have several different categories of surf fish species to compete in. That makes it nice because you can qualify for several different kinds of fish caught and have more opportunities to win something. If you should happen to get into a school or pod of fish there's a good chance to chalk up a winning entry. Winning entries can be based on size, weight, quantity or a point system depending on tournament rules.

Point Systems For Scoring

Tournaments that run for several days are usually based on a point system. Points can be based on several things. You can get points for things like fish length, weight, practicing catch & release and type of fish. Sometimes there are categories to get bonus points too. Photos are often used as proof of catch with supporting evidence.

Handling, Tagging & Releasing Fish

Lots of surf fishing tournaments promote good conservation measures with catch and release practices. They publish instructions for handling fish and releasing them with the least impact to the fish. Sometimes provisions are made with instructions for tagging the fish for future data collection. One tournament I know of has had an "adopt a fish" tagging program. In order to collect data for a study that was being done, you could tag your fish and then get follow up information regarding future fish activity.

Prizes and Awards

Winning participants are rewarded in several ways. Trophies, money and championship titles are some of the ways the winners are recognized. Cash awards can run into the four or five figure range. There are lot of chances to win between the many categories and divisions setup.

Cheaters

Unfortunately there are always cheaters when it comes to winning money. Tournament officials put a lot of effort into preventing it. By submitting an entry form you will often simultaneous agree to submit to a polygraph test if a challenge arises. It's sad to think that a fun event would be tarnished by such an act.

Protests

This is handled in an interesting way. Most tournaments require a fee to be accompanied with a formal written protest. You submit a protest, pay the fee and if the protest turns out to be valid and held up by the officials, you get your money returned. This prevents a lot of bogus protests and accusations. I've know of tournaments that require a $ 200 fee to be accompanied with your protest. If you're going to protest you better know what you're complaining about.

Surf fishing is such an exciting sport. Entering a surf fishing tournament is just one of the many ways to enjoy it. If this is something that you think you'd like to try don't be put off if you're just a beginner. It wouldn't be the first time beginners luck took a first place.

I’ve read quite a few books on leadership and various related subjects but I’ve never come across one quite like “The Dog Poop Initiative” by Kirk Weisler. All of us in the business of trying to help others develop their skills are constantly searching the world around us for events that can be turned into great stories. Weisler has set the bar high with this book.

The premise of the book is that there are few people who will take the initiative to solve a problem. The majority are much more likely to avoid it. As the author points out, in the case of parents, that tendency for avoidance will most likely result in a new generation of avoiders, choosing to avoid, rather than solve, problems.

This is a terrific leadership lesson. What example are you, as a leader, setting for your people? Leaders must be ever mindful that they are always being watched. What they do, or don’t do, can have immediate results, but can also have far reaching consequences. Leaders who avoid problems or sweep issues under the rug will find their subordinates will begin to do the same. When the leader then protests that type of behavior, a conflict will develop that will be impossible to resolve without a change in the leader’s behavior.

I found another interesting application to this story. One of a leader’s most important jobs is developing new leaders. “The Dog Poop Initiative” provides a perfect example of one character trait to look for in potential new leaders: initiative. A person who is not willing to take the initiative when the situation calls for it will probably not be a good leader.

This is certainly one of the shortest book reviews I’ve ever written. But then “The Dog Poop Initiative” is one of the shortest books I’ve read. That’s why I haven’t spent much time on the story line either. To do so would be to give it away. The story is only 23 pages; each page containing a rhyming sentence and some illustrating art work. It isn’t just a children’s book though. It’s one of those clever little books you’ll put in your office for others to read, hoping they get the point.

Animal fur is one of the high-priced raw material used in the production of high-end fashion products. The material has been used since time immemorial in human clothing. In recent times, inhuman practices in the fashion industry have come to the forefront including the perceived cruelty to animals and the unethical rearing of animals for the production of fur.

Animal fur in fashion and the growing consciousness

According to many animal rights’ associations, nearly one billion rabbits, 4 million foxes and 50 million minks are bred and killed for the sole purpose of producing fur from these animals. Both the breeding, rearing and killing practices have been labelled as inhuman and barbaric by most activists around the world. China has been the largest exporter of animal fur in the world and widely criticized for its alleged unethical killing of animals including cats and dogs.

Animal fur has remained in popular culture and fashion; especially, in its usage as a luxury textile. It is considered as a symbol of social and economic status because of its cost and rarity.

However, with the turn of the century, a lot of impetus is being laid on the production of ethical and conscious clothing sans the cruelty to animals on moral and ethical grounds for the sake of fashion.

After years of protests against the rampant use of animal fur in fashion, many animal rights activists have finally found some relief as many high-end fashion brands have gone fur-free. The move has been welcomed by authorities, activists, fashion industries and the general masses alike. Some of the leading names in fashion retail that have gone fur-free include Hugo Boss, Calvin Klein, Ralph Lauren, Tommy Hilfiger and Gucci.

Recent trends in the fur-free fashion revolution

Michael Kors, along with Jimmy Choo, is the most recent fashion brand to adopt a no-fur policy. Net-a-Porter is a popular luxury online shopping portal that has announced a no-fur policy across all of its e-commerce platforms.

A considerable work in this regard has been done by various animal welfare groups across the world. These include Born Free USA, part of the Fur Free Alliance, PETA and others.

One of the best examples of fur-free fashion is the popular London Fashion Week that welcomed fur-less fashion on its catwalk ramps. The event boasted of 86 percent of its shows to have featured completely fur-free fashion.

British designer-activist Stella McCartney’s introduced her fur-alternative label ‘Fur Free Fur’ featuring long-haired coats at the prestigious Paris Fashion Week.

The Road Ahead…

In spite of the efforts by animal welfare groups around the globe and fashion brands and retailers joining hands to fight the menace, a lot of work remains to be done in this regard. There are still many fashion retail brands who identify themselves with the prolific use of real fur in their products. The likes of Fendi, Dior, Saint Laurent, Louis Vuitton, Canada Goose and Karl Lagerfeld further need to reevaluate their stance on the matter.

Human fabrics have been evolving and fashion takes the baton forward in bringing new trends and innovations in the industry. The use of alternative fur is one of the champion alternatives, pioneered by Stella McCartney. Therefore, fur-free designs are here to stay and it’s high time that luxury fashion brands embrace ethical fashion for good!

A good book may go with you until your bedtime but a best book will be with you for a lifetime. For instance, there are some timeless treasures of American Literature beginning with 'THE COLOR PURPLE' by Alice Walker. Why am I citing this specific example? It is because I am going to base this article on its theme, storyline, plot, and characters.

The color purple explores the fall and rise of a young African-American woman called Celie Johnson. There is a hue of fear, exploitation, horrid teenage years, and abuse by one's stepfather. Alice has carefully kept out the vivid images of life through celie's perspective and why not as whole of the book is celie's journey from hell to heaven and from downfall to rise.

When this novel came out, it received mixed reactions from the black Americans as the abuse came from the community itself. Walker's work on the other hand was a pioneer in the sense of history. This book actually created a lot many controversies in the American fiction. It represents the idea of ​​slavery in the Negro community that destroys the basic unit and infrastructure of the society that is family. Money on the other hand was another major horror that this people faced. Young children and especially teenage girls were sold or married to oldies to have money and farming animals. It was as if making slaves and the masters that resided in the families sold them off without having a second thought. We always take an example and recite all the time that our families are there to protect us but here family led the young girls to slavery, exploitation, bullying and mental abuse. If there were no families, there would be no slavery, no community, no unity, and no society. This sounds like hell but this is true. No effective protests were seen, and as we read the book, we actually can picture the girl who is forced to become a woman and how she finds love in the same-sex relationship. (Celie and Shug Avery). The writer does not follow the usual track of black and white mechanism of slavery but black on black exploitation effect. Here, the lower class is not only affected by the whites but also by their own people.

Alice is African-American woman writing about and for the African-American people. The evil comes from the same community. Walker by this brave attempt explores the gray areas pervading in her own community. This was not an easy task. She got death-threats and killer letters from people because all of them were hoping to see this as a 'white-perspective' novel. It is easier to throw off the blame on other's shoulders because we cannot acknowledge our own faults. (Is it not?). In this context, the roles are literally changed. Immense contradiction is reflected and terrible backlash is seen.

I do not judge the author, the book, or the community because when a writer writes she promises to portray real-life accuracy. It is a dismayed representation of a young black life and the villain is not the archetypal white but the black people themselves.

History has many lessons to teach us but who wants to know? When visions of WWII and the holocaust are shown my thoughts turn to how placidly people boarded the trains to their death. To be that willing to obey a handful of soldiers with guns many thousands preferred to live that extra bit longer than to die for their cause. Now it is about climate change and the worst holocaust of all, mass extinction of life on earth.

People are standing against it and experts in the field are shouting it from the highest platform they can climb but conservative politicians are like a brick wall of resistance. The latter seem to be only concerned with staying in power and pleasing the heavy polluters who fund them.

Those who aimed their guns at the masses and forced them into situations from which there was no escape didn’t appear to have a conscience. How much are they like the politicians who only serve their jobs and protect their income that is mostly from big business.

In Australia the new move by the Federal Government is to issue prison sentences and to take away welfare payments to anyone who protests. That is so like Germany prior to the Second World War that it isn’t funny, nor should it be tolerated. People are scared and rightly so.

Protesters against climate change are facing the wrath of governments who are arresting and dealing with them in courts. Many are locked up and heavy fines and other penalties are also issued. So where is the justice? How can judges ignore the willingness of those who stand against the death sentence we are being served? After all they will die as well.

One argument after another is presented to avoid the issue that we are on a slippery slope to the last days. While food shortages coupled with massive fires; floods; droughts; winds; and diseases; are on the increase the decline in insects means it will only worsen. When there is less food and water.

Desalination and depletion of life in the oceans has to also be a part of an unsustainable future. With alternatives readily available the question is why the majority are sitting back and waiting for their lives to end in such circumstances? While writing about it is one way of protesting it’s also important that those less well-educated be informed. The majority has to speak up in a louder manner and overturn conservative governments that are killing us.

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

March on Washington Speech, August, 1963

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), American clergyman and Nobel Prize winner, one of the principal leaders of the American civil rights movement and a prominent advocate of nonviolent protest was born on January 15, 1929, the second of three children. His father was a Baptist minister and served as pastor of a large Atlanta church, Ebenezer Baptist, which had been founded by Martin Luther King, Jr.'s, maternal grandfather. Martin was ordained as a Baptist minister at age 18.

He attended public elementary and high schools as well as the private Laboratory High School of Atlanta University. King entered Morehouse College at age 15 in September 1944 as a special student. He received a bachelor's degree in sociology in 1948. In the fall of that year, King enrolled at Crozier Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, and received his Bachelor of Divinity degree three years later. King's public-speaking abilities-which would become renowned as his stature grew in the civil rights movement-developed slowly during his collegiate years. He won a second-place prize in a speech contest while an undergraduate at Morehouse, but received Cs in two public-speaking courses in his first year at Crozer. By the end of his third year at Crozer, however, professors were praising King for the powerful impression he made in public speeches and discussions. King was awarded a doctorate by Boston University in 1955. Throughout his education, King was exposed to influences that related Christian theology to the struggles of oppressed peoples. At Morehouse, Crozer, and Boston University, he studied the teachings on nonviolent protest of Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi. King also read and heard the sermons of white Protestant ministers who preached against American racism. Benjamin E. Mays, president of Morehouse and a leader in the national community of racially liberal clergymen, was especially important in shaping King's theological development.

While in Boston, King met Coretta Scott, a music student and native of Alabama. They were married in June 18, 1953 and would have four children. In 1954 King accepted his first pastorate at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, a church with a well-educated congregation that had recently been led by a minister who had protested against segregation.

He had been a resident in Montgomery less than one year when Rosa Parks defied the ordinance regulating segregated seating on municipal transportation. King was soon chosen as president of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), the organization that directed the bus boycott. King's serious demeanor and consistent appeal to Christian brotherhood and American idealism made a positive impression on whites outside the South. Incidents of violence against black protesters, including the bombing of King's home, focused media attention on Montgomery. In February 1956 an attorney for the MIA filed a lawsuit in federal court seeking an injunction against Montgomery's segregated seating practices. The federal court ruled in favor of the MIA, ordering the city's buses to be desegregated, but the city government appealed the ruling to the United States Supreme Court. For 12 months, makeshift car pools substituted for public transportation. At first the bus company scoffed at the black protest, but as the economic effects of the boycott were felt, the company sought a settlement. Meanwhile, legal action ended the bus segregation policy. On June 5, 1956, a federal district court ruled that the bus segregation policy violated the Fourteenth Amendment, which forbids the states from denying equal rights to any citizen. The boycott ended, and it thrust into national prominence a person who clearly possessed charismatic leadership, Martin Luther King, Jr.

By the time the Supreme Court upheld the lower court decision in November 1956, King was a national figure. His memoir of the bus boycott, Stride Toward Freedom (1958), provided a thoughtful account of that experience and further extended King's national influence.

King, urged by prominent black Baptist ministers in the South to assume a larger role in the struggle for black civil rights following the successful boycott, accepted the presidency of the newly formed Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) -an organization of black churches and ministers that aimed to challenge racial segregation. As SCLC's president, King became the organization's dominant personality and its primary intellectual influence. He was responsible for much of the organization's fund-raising, which he frequently conducted in conjunction with preaching engagements in Northern churches.

In January 1960, he resigned his Montgomery pastorate and moved to Atlanta, Georgia, where the SCLC had its headquarters. SCLC sought to complement the NAACP's legal efforts to dismantle segregation through the courts, with King and other SCLC leaders encouraging the use of nonviolent direct action to protest discrimination. These activities included marches, demonstrations, and boycotts. The violent responses that direct action provoked from some whites eventually forced the federal government to confront the issues of injustice and racism in the South. King's challenges to segregation and racial discrimination in the 1950s and 1960s helped convince many white Americans to support the cause of civil rights in the United States.

In 1963 Wrote 'Letter from Birmingham Jail,' arguing that it was his moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws, in the every year he had Delivered his 'I Have a Dream' speech to civil rights marchers at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC In 1964, King became the first black American to be honored as Time magazine's Man of the Year and also won the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway; Accepting the award on behalf of the civil rights movement, Dr. King said, "Sooner or later, all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.". King's efforts were not limited to securing civil rights; he also spoke out against poverty and the Vietnam War; throughout 1966 and 1967 King increasingly turned the focus of his civil rights activism throughout the country to economic issues.

He began to argue for redistribution of the nation's economic wealth to overcome entrenched black poverty. In 1967 he began planning a Poor People's Campaign to pressure national lawmakers to address the issue of economic justice. After his assassination in April 4, 1968 at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee by a sniper then realized named James Earl Ray and sentenced for 99 years imprisonment. The FBI had believing that King had been associating with Communists and other radicals, but King became a symbol of protest in the struggle for racial justice; and at last President Ronald Reagan signs legislation designating Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday a national holiday in 1983 (the 3rd Monday of every new year).

King's nonviolent doctrine was strongly influenced by the teachings of Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi. Unlike the great majority of civil rights activists who have regarded nonviolence as a convenient tactic. King followed Gandhi's principles of pacifism. In King's view, civil rights demonstrators, who were beaten and jailed by hostile whites, educated and transformed their oppressors through the redemptive character of their unmerited suffering.

The SCLC helped the students organize the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), at a meeting held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina, to coordinate the protests. As a direct result of the sit-ins, lunch counters across the South began to serve blacks, and other public facilities were desegregated.

An important interplay of action and response developed between government and civil rights advocates. And it was this interplay that did so much to quicken the pace of social change.

The most critical direct action demonstration began in Birmingham, Alabama, on April 3, 1963, under the leadership of Dr. Ruth. King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The demonstrators demanded fair employment opportunities, desegregation of public facilities and the creation of a committee to plan desegregation. King was arrested and, while imprisoned, wrote his celebrated "Letter from a Birmingham jail" to fellow clergymen critical of his tactics of civil. King was arrested more than seven times during his many civil rights campaigns throughout the South.

On August 28, 1963, more than 250,000 Americans from many religious and ethnic backgrounds converged on Washington, staging the largest demonstration in the history of the nation's capital. The orderly procession moved from the Washington Monument to the Lincoln Memorial, where King electrified the demonstrators with an eloquent articulation of the American dream (I have a Dream) and his hope that it would be fully realized. In one of the most famous passages from the speech, King declared:

"When we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all God's children, black men and white men, Jews and gentiles , Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual 'Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last' "