In the U.S. all healthcare professionals are “mandated reporters.” That means, if they find out about any form of child abuse while they’re on the job, they’re legally required to report it. Failing to do so can result in the loss of their professional license. Doing so is always considered an exception to confidentiality rights.

I suspect the hospital in question has a strict policy about reporting any pregnant mother who tests positive for drugs to CPS as a means of avoiding lawsuits. The problem is really with CPS systems in the U.S. They’re supposed to investigate reported instances of abuse and if it turns out there’s no cause for concern, close the case in short order; but CPS workers aren’t all of equal quality, and in my experience (I work in mental health), there’s a real problem with people who were abused as children becoming CPS workers and having a bias towards being overly suspicious of all parents. So, cases sometimes get dragged out, which ironically results in psychological harm to the children the CPS workers are supposed to be protecting.

Ah, another baiter. You should get some therapy too. When another country’s politics piss you off this much, and you resort to venting your rage online, that’s a pretty good sign you have some unaddressed issues going on in your life. It’s not uncommon for people to avoid dealing with their real problems by becoming willfully preoccupied with more trivial issues that don’t really affect them, like politics.

Did you even read the article? She wasn’t tested without her consent. She just didn’t think the test would come back positive for opiates. The U.S. is no different from other countries: we don’t drug test people without their consent.

Jesus Christ, the caliber of commenter on this platform is seriously questionable.

It would be if the above post was about something related to bad actions by the U.S., but it’s not. People talking shit about America here are just using this post as a way to vent their anger about other issues, which is childish.

And before anyone accuses me of anything, I’m no Trump supporter and I understand why people are angry at America right now. Still, that’s no reason to disparage the entire country as a “shithole.”

Oh, I remember you. You like baiting people into arguments and shit-talking America. LOL. Get some therapy, man. Rage-baiting online is a pathetic way to deal with your feelings.

Because if a pregnant woman is on something chemically addictive, the baby is too, and that’s important to know when delivering a baby.

And so it begins….

No, please don’t give him that much credit. If you saw him run a casino, you’d swear he was doing it on purpose, but he isn’t. He really just is that dumb.

I’m not saying he’s not also in Putin’s pocket, but don’t try to convince me that he has the brains necessary to make sabotage look like incompetence. He’s nowhere near that clever.

It seems to me that the problem stems from you thinking communism necessitates authoritarianism.

It doesn’t technically necessitate it, it just makes it very likely to happen, due to its insistence on there being only one political party. Communism isn’t just an economic system, it’s predicated on a government-run economy in a way that most other economic systems aren’t.

Someone saying they are a communist would be the same situation as you saying you are a socialist

If they mean socialist, they should say ‘socialist.’ Most people understand this to mean that you’re for things like free education, medical care, etc. When you say you’re a communist, at least in the West, you’re signifying to others that you either like or support governments like the USSR and CCP. I understand what you’re saying about there being some overlap in the terms, but the main distinction to me is that communists believe in a single political party system of government, whereas socialists don’t.

Because the US and other countries make such a point of preventing communism from succeeding, it can be frustrating when a lack of successful large scale communism is used as proof that communism can’t work.

While the U.S. has certainly put a lot into preventing communism from spreading, it hasn’t always succeeded. I would argue that the communist states that do exist demonstrate its main problem quite clearly: a single political party system puts a government on the fast track to authoritarianism. Multiple political parties mean there is always an opposition to a government that becomes authoritarian; it’s not a fool-proof defense against it, but way better than with only one party.

I have tried my very best to not make any assumptions about you, other than the political ideology you stated you had, but if I accidentally did, please tell me. I do not wish to offend you, and rather just want to provide my input on what you have said.

No, you didn’t make assumptions, and I appreciate your cordiality.

You made a lot of assumptions about me in your comment. I’m not going to bother with them, because that’s honestly your job to handle.

I don’t equate communism with (democratic) socialism. I consider myself a democratic socialist, and that’s part of the reason I consider myself progressive. The main difference is that democratic socialism makes room for multiple political parties, while communism accommodates only one. This is the essence of tyranny. No progressive should advocate for communism, because communism is another form of authoritarianism: subjugation to state rule.

I have my problems with “woke” culture, just as I do with conservative culture. But most of my problems with woke culture have to do with their rhetoric and means of achieving their goals, rather than the goals themselves. A racially mixed workplace is something I highly value; achieving it by means of affirmative action is not something I support, because I think 50+ years of it have shown that it doesn’t really work. Yes, it has been shown to improve interracial relations in the workplace, but it has also been shown to cause workers to question the competency of coworkers that benefit from it, and make those who don’t feel discriminated against. This is not what it was intended for. It was supposed to counter inherent racist biases in corporate hiring systems. Instead, it’s become a system that is the very least viewed as a loophole for non-white employees. Obviously, not every case is an example of a non-white employee gaining an unfair advantage over a white employee, probably only a small fraction qualify as such, but as a system it has created the perception that Whites are being discriminated against. And its proponents have done virtually nothing to address that. That needs to change. I’m not saying the spirit of affirmative action needs to end, but its implementation need to change.

If and when you respond, I would encourage you to not make assumptions about my stance. I don’t fit into the political boxes neatly.

Social conservatives are a hateful people. Bitter and hateful. They’re the bad guys of the world.

I’ve seen people advocate for communism here and asked them to name an example of a communist government of a major country that hasn’t devolved quickly into a dictatorship, and let me tell you, the hysteria and rage could power a small city. I’m fairly progressive, I like to think, but it seems like a lot of lemmings have gone so far down the anti-capitalist rabbit hole they’ve literally come out the other side in China and are wearing Mao stickers.

History will remember this administration as one of the worst. These fuckers are all writing their own chapters in history books as full fuck-tard level. They will be looked back on with shame and embarrassment. Let this be their legacy. They are not the problem. The problem is the 55% of the voting populace that voted for them. America needs to improve our educational system so these our population isn’t as fucking stupid as we are.

The irony is that the MAGA slogan “America First” actually puts America behind other nations consistently. The irony behind the MAGA belief that Trump puts American workers first is that all his policies prioritize the interests of the very people they hate and want him to dismantle: the uber-rich “Elite.” MAGA voters are some of the dumbest, most gullible Americans in the country, and I personally think they simply vote for the politicians they do because said politicians fly the same bigotry flags they support: anti-gay, anti-trans, anti-racial-equality, etc. In other words, MAGA is basically just America’s bigots rallying under an “America First” banner, which is code for”straight, white Americans first.” So sad I know people who support this crap and don’t realize they’re falling in with the worst America has to offer.

<Snickers in North Korean.>

Hopefully, Texas police realize they’re being given an unlawful order and arrest the dickweed who issued it.

LOL. Texas police don’t have brains.

For the same reason liberals bash on Texas all the time: it’s a flagship state for the political brand that’s an easy target due to its size and problems (due to its size).

On Friday, the mayor said the County Attorney advised him to sign the agreement to avoid being removed from office.

Sounds like his legal counsel felt they did have legal grounds to remove him from office.

When my WiFi has a 5-10 minute hiccup because my ISP is upgrading its network.

<sigh> How will I ever last?

I strongly suspect this is being done at the behest of some Evangelical Christian groups that think sex for any reason other than reproduction is a sin, and who feel justified enforcing their ways of life on others (but they’re also the most persecuted group in history, don’t forget).