Do you know who is contacting your child over the internet? Is a chat room safe? Could a paedophile lure your child into a meeting?

Paedophilia wasn’t invented in the age of internet, but it certainly makes it easier for a paedophile to contact and lure children through chat rooms.

The first step to protect your children is to make sure they understand that sometimes the people they are chatting with aren’t who they claim to be.

Parents used to think that blocking access to unsupervised chat could safeguard their children, but paedophiles pretend to be children and finally make friends even in a supervised chat.

After the first contact, a paedophile normally builds a relationship and gains the kids’ confidence. The chat is then transferred in personal conversations in the chat room – known as ‘whispering’ – and eventually goes on with texting or telephoning – known as ‘grooming’.

The second crucial step is to explain how dangerous it is to give out information, such as their real name, their telephone number or their address.

Your children should know that if they share more personal information than a username, people will be able to contact them when they are offline and they won’t have the control of their contacts anymore.

If you are still worried that your child will actually establish contact with one of the paedophiles crawling in chat rooms and fall in the trap of meeting him – and it is more likely to be a ‘he’ – you shouldn’t panic.

More and more parents are now using spying software, which enables them to secretly record and monitor all the activities of their children’s computers.

“I work full time and I can’t stand behind my children’s screen at all times,” says a mother of two girls, Sophia Alexandru. “Every day I have forwarded on my computer their e-mails and chats. I felt guilty in the first place, but I realised that it has nothing to do with loss of confidence. I’m happy that I can protect my children.”

However, the spying software itself can’t help you and might be proved useless if you don’t try to understand a little about internet.

It would be a good idea to sign up in the chat rooms your child use, learn how they work and be familiar with the different ways children can chat.

As soon as you are in a chat room, you will quickly fall upon words and symbols you have no idea what they mean. It is the “chat lingo” – the language used in chat rooms – and you should at least have some understanding of it.

For example, a message that reads “BRBPAW” means “I will be right back because my parents are watching”.

A message that reads “Btw UR VGL” means “By the way, you are very good looking” and it implies that your child has sent or has been sent an image.

Also, the message “PM ASL” could mean “Private message. What’s your age, sex and location”.

If you suspect that a paedophile is grooming your children, you shouldn’t be hard on them. It isn’t their fault and you shouldn’t scary them.

The best thing is to stay calm and explain the dangers they have put themselves in. Referring to certain relevant examples which have been broadcasted could help you make your point clear.

Moreover, you have to understand that you have neither the means nor the skills to deal with the person who appears to be a paedophile and you should immediately contact the local police and report it.

You can find more information on how you can protect your child online through the site www.thinkuknow.co.uk

Financial scandals are stifling the British public opinion whilst the Tories are prompting the government to set the date for the elections.

It suddenly came as a parallel word to me that every country has to battle corruption scandals before they go for elections.

It’s the same movie playing again and again in different languages.

The leaks probably find the right time and in Britain, as happens in Greece, in France or in Italy,  bringing to the public attention that the MPs are taking advandage of their position is the action to bring forward the reaction; elections as the best way to fight corruption.

However, it is actually a matter of mixing the same old, marked cards and give them new names instead of denying to use them again.

Elections is the option we have to choose the best possible government, it’s the way for the public to say who they think is the most capable of leading the country.

It was a politician’s role to give a practical and reasonable solution, but it came out of Richard Bradson’s words.

Asked for the MP’s expenses claims he came up with the simplest solution. As he said, comparing to America, the country has way too many elected politicians.

If the number of the politicians in the House of Lords and the Parliament were cut in half, the rest of them could be payed better and therefore the financial scandals could be wiped out.

It sounds very simple, but of course none of the MPs could ever support it as a possible solution.

Whether the number of the MPs has to be cut in half or not, it’s about time for the politicians to realise that the solution for the corruption isn’t a pathetic adaptation to the conditions, but an energetic reaction and a real “clean-up” coming from inside.

The artwork is being presented in Shunt art gallery, London Bridge, this week and stimulate us to explore another perspective of a genuine news story through the lens of contemporary art.

At the international symposium of manufacturers of biotechnology on October the conclusion was to set 2020 as the deadline to have 100% crops by genetically modified seeds.

Accodring to the Greek magazine NEMECIS, thus far the 95% of the seeds has been modified and comparing to 2006, about 70 million more ectars have been plowed with modified seeds.

The goal is clear: two or three companies are about to replace the small companies providing seeds. Thus far, within 3 years, 42% of small farms have been reduced.

What’s even more clear, however not seriously taken into account, is that the nature’s violation will lead to an endless modification of the food chain and therefore the destabilization of the whole ecosystem.

Sooner or later, all these changes will affect the human body via the food chain and they will cause major and irreversible changes to human health or even new diseases.

Danger pre-gates

Dr. Arpad Pustzai from the Rowett Institute of Schotland discovered that the modified potatos caused serious implications at the immune system of guinea pigs, which would also affect humen if they consume these products.

Strangely enough, the announcement of his discovery caused to his dismissal from the Institute, but led to no further caution.

Dr Samuel Epstein brought in public attention that the genetically modified hormone “Bovine Growth Hormone” , known as rBGH, can cause malignant tumor at the breast, bowel and prostate.

However, the hormone has been used in an injective form to cows for more than 15 years and it was proved that just the 19% of the hormone could be destroyed during the pasteurization process.

There are many more examples on how unbearably mistaken is the perspective of creating a monocratory of biotechnology by modifying the food chain.

No questions that science has offered massive means to overcome immense obstacles in the past and is always working on our own favour, but it becomes extremely dangerous when we use this kind of power defying the apparent risks.

In this case, we put in danger thousands of species which will eventually end up in our lunch, invade our stomach, devastate our immune system, and still this isn’t considered as a crime against humanity.

For Muslims eating pig is a sin because it’s not clean and if we do accept that all this religious traditions depict a certain level of truth they actually might have had a point.

Even though the Wold’s Health Organisation can’t count on Quran’s predictions, after mad cows and the bird’s flu, we should have learned something.

Is it actually that we can’t predict a wave of deaths or is it that it is convenient enough for drug companies to see their sales climbing sharply?

Before we go crazy with nasty conspiracy theories it’s easy to find our way back to reasonable arguments with the realism figures can offer us.

Dealing with numbers

Two years ago the Reuter‘s article “Roche sees lower 2007 pandemic Tamiflu sales” made it clear that “Roche Holding AG expects sales of its Tamiflu drug to governments and other organizations building stockpiles in the event of a pandemic to be lower this year than last”.

There are two issues raised here, it is either that governments decided that the danger of a pandemic after 2003′s Saars flew away from us or that with a low pandemic alert it was out of the drug companies’ interest to supply pandemic drugs.

Moreover, the sales were falling and according to Reuters, ” The Swiss drugmaker predicted pandemic sales of 0.8 billion to 1.2 billion Swiss francs ($640-960 million) for the influenza medicine, down from 1.8 billion in 2006, according to an investor presentation on the company’s web site.”

It seems that it was about time for the pandemic sales to rise again as they “accounted for 70 percent of all Tamiflu revenues in 2006″ and the company announced that  Tamiflu sales in 2008 declined by 68% compared to the previous year.

So, it happened at the right time before the sales fell again.

Nobody can actually link the fall of the sales with the outbreast of the flu, but so far almost 1500 people died or have been confirmed as carriers of the virus with the drug companies seeing again the revenue topping.

E-mail: v.dermitzi@gmail.com

Nationality: Greek

Education

Sep 2008 – Sep 2009 MA International Journalism University of Westminster,                                                                                                                                                                                                                    London

• Online final project: Create a personal media website to a professional standard. Independently design, produce and provide content, images, digital photography. This site was designed to be accessible by dyslexics. URL: www.dyslexiaonweb.co.uk
• Magazine journalism: Produce a magazine. Originate a number of articles and design periodicals layout. Develop skills in teamwork and work in deadlines.
• Online journalism: Website design and building on the skills of online writing. Group project: www.theimpressionist.co.uk My personal profile page: www.dyslexiaonweb.co.uk/vdermitzi.html
• Investigative journalism: Theory and practice of investigative journalism. Techniques and methods used by investigative journalists. Investigation project.
• Freedom of speech, ethics and democracy: Focus on British and European legislation. Assignments on defamation and hate speech.
• Newspaper journalism: Research and originate a range of news and feature stories in short deadlines. Design a newspaper front page and a newsletter.

Sep 2001 – Sep 2005  BA (Hons) Greek Philology Aristotle University, Greece

• Ancient Greek and Latin poetry and prose: Aeschylus, Aristotle, Thucydides, Homer, Herodotus, Lysias, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Plato, Vergil, Cicero, Sallust.
• Modern Greek poetry and prose: Beginning until contemporary literature.
• Linguistics: The history of language. The Indo-European theory.
• Critical Literature – Literature theory: Critical analysis, European suicidal literature. Analysis of the literature movements.
• History of Art – History: European art, 18^th – 20^th century. Byzantine Empire.
• Theatrology: Ancient theatre in modern versions.

Languages

• Greek: Fluent, native speaker.
• English: Excellent, Certificate of Proficiency in English, Teaching licence,     IELTS (grade: 7, 5).
• French: Very Good, DELF B2.

IT skills

Mac and PC skills, Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Visio, Project), Adobe (InDesign, Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Flash), Typography, SEO/Marketing, Photography: www.flickr.com/photos/vasilikidermitzi/

Working Experience

Oct 2009: Sub-editor for the English edition of the London’s Greek newspaper ‘Eleftheria’.

• Responsible for the copy taste, the writing, the design and the final design of the English edition.
• Communicational skills, contact the subscribers and the advertisers. Responsible for the mail of the issue on time.

Sept 2009: Teacher of Greek, Independent Greek School of Manor Hill, London.

• Teaching strictly in Greek with the main target to strengthen the Greek education in the London’s Greek community. Adapt to a different educational system and be very careful with the special situation of teaching bilingual students.

April 2009: Internship in London Greek Radio.

• Research, write and upload online articles. Be self-motivated and pitch ideas for web site improvement according to web 2.0 rules.
• I had the opportunity to be initiative, produce and present genuine, local news stories for the radio.
• Interacting with different people who come from different backgrounds helped me to establish good communication skills and built trustful relationships.

Sep 2006 – June 2008: Full-Time Teacher of English, Eurognosi Private School, Greece.

• I had to draw guidelines, prioritise and organise the material needed to be taught day-after-day and instantly change my plans when conditions required a different approach.  This significantly helped me to enhance my organisation skills.
• I had to be very careful and responsible when providing new information and giving feedback. The job had to be carried out by giving attention to details.

Sep 2006 – June 2008: Private lessons in Greek, English, French and Latin.

• Working one-on-one with students with learning disabilities was a chance to be initiative and always remain self-motivated despite the difficulties.

The project was run by journalists who had different skills and managed to collaborate and use their background to reach a professional result.

The website’s description was ‘news through the lens of arts’ and was built to provide to its readers an artistic angle at current news stories.

I worked as writer and sub-editor, but also I gained experience in SEO.

The links for my articles are provided below:

• Recession didn’t kill theatre…yet
• Big Brother reshuffles Orwell’s dilemma
• Hollywood appreciates good shots
• Papyrus, camera and education 2.0
• Beauty and the beast of image prejudice

Spending hours and hours at the uni trying to be competitive and actually simulate my knowledge with real market was just the first step.

The step forward was to have working experience as soon as possible and practice the skills I obtained from the courses I attended.

I applied for a three-week-placement in London Greek Radio while my course was still running and even though I knew that coping with both a job and a course is an exhausting thing to do, my belief that it’s the only way to turn into a professional proved itself.

Although it’s a small company, the fact that it isn’t divided in huge departments offered me the great opportunity to be initiative and come face-to-face with all the aspects of radio production.

I was given the chance to work as a newsreader, produce advertisements and reportage, translate and write updates for the web and even work as a DJ.

The most challenging part was when the general manager – a former BBC employee – asked me to make a web critique on the spot and make recommendations based on my knowledge on the web.

I have to admit I was lucky enough to be offered a placement in LGR, because the friendly working environment and the chance to be supervised by professionals was the best way to begin with.

I am now collaborating with LGR and I will lead the web site’s reconstruction.

There are also plans to produce a weekly two-hour-show.

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Raising children with disabilities is a harsh aspect of parenting, but as parents share, it’s a condition they eventually adapt to for their children’s sake.

Nine months in the warm haven have passed and the glorious moment has come: your baby is born and opens his beautiful, little eyes to take a glimpse at the world meant to host it for the rest of its life.

However, the doctor has something to talk you about and you feel the earth shaking under your feet when the word ‘disabilities’ enters your life as a terrifying, unbearable situation.

The grief and the shock is a process you will go through, but it has soon to give its place to the strong will to look after your baby and face the 24-hour-full time care.

“After the pain and the sorrow, I had to stand tall on my feet and find my own way to cope with my child’s needs,” says Anna Marcovich, a mother of a severely disabled 7-year-old girl, who suffered lack of oxygen during labour.

“People can’t understand that we love our children as much as they do, and we think of their disability less of a burden and more of a special condition we eventually adapt to.”

Disabilities are defined as a severe physical or mental illness that restricts or prevents a person from certain activities. Disabled people can develop many skills, but they always have the need to be assisted in some ways. It is actually what Anna colourfully describes as “their need to have a stuntman for their difficult scenes.”

Parenting a disabled child is an eternal battle with massive problems; sudden health deterioration, sleepless nights and unaffordable expenses.

It is also an extraordinary mixture of feelings: “One day can be a delightful journey to heaven and the other, a desperate attempt to put myself together before collapsing,” says Anna.

“When my baby was four years old, I had already admitted the fact that she would never speak. One night, she suddenly opened her green eyes and called me ‘mummy’. I literally felt that I was in heaven. I have the feeling that every time I want to give up, she gives me a little something, just not to lose my faith.”

However, the daily routine is so harsh that leaves no time for social life and it sometimes becomes very difficult to understand the friend’s wary reaction.

“It’s a lifetime commitment and people gradually isolated me or maybe I became isolated,” says Anna. “They might have thought that I was very miserable and their sympathy irritated me. I think it was my mistake. My experience has now taught me that it was very hard for them to understand that after my baby was born, I just had a different way to measure happiness.”

Anna’s experience also taught her that a disabled child can either be the reason for the parents to develop a special bond, which would intensify their relationship, or can eventually lead to divorce.

“I wasn’t lucky enough to be married with a strong man. Our relationship was collapsing day-after-day, because he kept accusing me for our child’s condition. Two years later we decided to end our marriage.”

However, Anna is lucky enough to have her mother by her side and after all these years she spent crying and feeling guilty, she has now the strength to encourage mothers with disabled children to overcome the burdens and experience motherhood.

“I can’t imagine my life without my little baby. When I look back in my life, I realise that it was empty before giving birth. It’s a gift to be a mother and I will never regret having her.”

Apart from the disabilities referring to pathogenic symptoms, parents may have to face learning disabilities or difficulties (LD). They are disorders that affect a wide range of academic and functional skills and aren’t always obvious by naked eye.

But even when parents notice that their child has trouble to speak, to read, to spell, to listen or to effectively organise information, they comfort themselves with the thought that their child is ‘a little bit lazy’ or they are afraid that nature wasn’t ‘generous enough’.

Parents should turn their back on the misconception that learning disabilities are identified with mental retardation and be aware that it has absolutely nothing to do with low intelligence.

Konstantina Manta admits that even though her daughter, Mary, faced difficulties in reading and spelling from a very early age, she only asked for a doctor’s advice when the girl was ten years old.

“For ten years I was struggling to come to terms with the fact that my child wasn’t as smart as her friends. It hurts to think that your child has low intelligence. I was ashamed to talk about it and I thought that I was a bad mother. When I faced the same symptoms with my second child, Peter, I finally found the courage to talk to our paediatrician, who introduced me to a psychologist,” says Konstantina.

After a series of comprehensive assessment tests, both Mary and Peter were diagnosed dyslectic.

Dyslexia is one of the most common learning disorders and it mainly affects the reading skills, as well as the memorising ability. Consequently, the writing and spelling skills are also affected and therefore, the dyslectic students are examined orally.

“We then worked very hard with specialised teachers one-on-one to help my children find their own way to study and organise their thoughts,” says Konstantina. “The most important thing was that I finally understood that nothing was wrong with my children’s intelligence and I managed to help them build their self-esteem.”

The two children have now learned that dyslexia is just another way their brain opts to function. Their disability doesn’t prevent them from having friends and being good students.

“Mary is one of the best students in her class and last summer, she succeeded on the final foreign language exams. Peter is very good at maths and he wants to become an architect,” says the proud mother.

Konstantina and Anna are vivid examples that parenting disabled children isn’t a walk under the sunny sky, but it is certainly a very strong, lifetime experience. It demands devotion and patience, but mostly, real love.

For more information on disabilities click at www.direct.gov.uk/en/DisabledPeople/index.htm

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Smashed windows, traffic chaos and about 22 arrests embraced the protests in Central London ahead of the G-20 summit.

Police confronted the demonstrators when they tried to reach an RBS branch, but after consistent attempts they managed to break out two police blocks.

Protesters were chanting “These streets are our streets, these banks are our banks” and no more than seven masked activists smashed several windows.

Smoke bombs thrown from inside of the bank didn’t prevent them from storming the branch.

Police clashed with the demonstrators to push them back and finally managed to retain control.

The demonstrators coming from four different directions, gathered at about 11 o’clock at the Bank of England square followed by strong police forces.

Yellow and red paint was thrown against the Metropolitan police and caused tension during the march.

Music and slogans accompanied the anti-capitalist and climate change activists’ protest, turning the protest into a street party for more than three hours.

Police watch over proceedings

Police vehicles, helicopters and hundreds of police officers covered the area hours before the protesters gathered in the City.

The banks and the shops were evacuated to ensure the workers’ and the customers’ safety.

Officers climbed at the main entrance of the Bank of England and used cameras to watch over on the activists.

Smoke bombs were thrown to stop the demonstrators from breaking the police cordons in front of RBS and from inside of the bank.

They were reported to have orders to take immediate control of the area and stop the protesters from moving towards Trafalgar square.

The tube station near the Bank of England was closed and the infuriated crowd was divided from several police blocks for hours due to “the breach of peace”, an officer said.

The rally and the march attracted huge media coverage and hundreds of journalists reported from the City after caution was urged for violence incidents.

The protesters

Banners were hold up against the climate change and the bankers, who were targeted to be responsible for the economic downturn.

People who attended the march were chanting “Abolish money”, “All straights” and “Shame on you”.

Hundreds of the protesters were environmental groups fighting against carbon trading policy, which they claim isn’t effective to reduce greenhouse emissions.

They aim to camp at the Bishopsgate site for 24 hours with peaceful workshops, music and board games.

The anarchist group alerted from the Whitechapel Anarchists Group blog for a massive strike against the centre of capitalism.

They were organised in small groups and used bins to store CD players and banners.

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