Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • Learning to live with nature is a balancing act

    In India, animals like crocodiles, snakes, and bison are increasingly entering towns and villages due to the destruction of their habitat caused by climate change. The Wildlife Protection and Research Society use a number of methods to help conserve and protect wild animals. They train other volunteers on how to safely capture and release animals back into the wild, post photos to increase interest in animals, and work together with the communities to empower them.

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  • What happens when crime victims and offenders meet? Outagamie County is finding out.

    The Outagamie County Youth and Family Services agency makes restorative justice dialogue available to the victims of crimes committed by juveniles. After preparation with a trained mediator, the two parties meet to discuss the harm suffered by a victim and why a young person committed the offense. Both can be helped through a face-to-face conversation. The county is now considering expanding the program to adults.

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  • These Philadelphians Created an App to Prevent Gun Violence

    Philly Truce is a mobile app that lets people in crisis ask for help from volunteer conflict mediators without involving the police. The app connects people to social services and to volunteers who can help ensure that a personal conflict does not turn violent. Two Philadelphia men with a modest investment launched the app in May 2021. Hundreds already have used it to de-escalate disputes or to volunteer to join the effort to reduce violence. The founders hope to expand the project to other cities.

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  • Thousands of Alaskans are considering suicide. You can learn to help them choose life.

    To address Alaska’s high suicide rates, especially among youth, programs like the Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training teaches people how to safely and confidently talk about suicide. The two-day training provides steps people can use to talk with others about suicide, dispel any shame around the topic, and develop a safety plan with them. The main idea is not to solve all of their problems, but to keep the person safe now. The training combines conversations, videos, PowerPoints and roleplaying to teach the steps, based on a global model developed by LivingWorks 35 years ago in Canada.

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  • Taking Mental Health Crises Out of Police Hands

    Until Oakland joins the list of cities sending counselors and social workers on emergency calls concerning mental health crises, a grassroots program called Mental Health First is diverting a small number of emergencies from police involvement to a community-based response. Hundreds of volunteers, many with their own experiences with mental illness and crises, answer dozens of calls per month in which they de-escalate, counsel, and direct people to needed services – all without the threat that a misunderstood person could be harmed by police untrained in correctly handling such crises.

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  • Germany's Promising Plan to Bring Conspiracy Theorists Back From the Brink

    The German government opened an office, known as Zebra (“not everything is black and white”) to help people dispel misinformation and conspiracy theories. Most clients are seeking help with loved ones who believe in conspiracy theories, misinformation, or are becoming radicalized. Clients receive in-person phone or video appointments with a neutral staff person, who helps them defuse conflicts, find commonalities, and address mental health issues. After the COVID-19 pandemic began much of the program’s work has been aimed at dispelling misinformation about the government’s response and the vaccine.

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  • Hello? This Is Colombia's Antimachismo Hotline.

    Bogotá’s city government started the Calm Line to give men a way to connect by telephone with psychologists trained in therapeutic responses to the machismo that leads to gender-based violence. Despite doubts that Colombian men would use the service, the line fields about a dozen calls a day. "Fear, shame and confusion pervade many of the conversations," but also can lead to breakthroughs in understanding the attitudes that oppress women. That understanding is the first step toward cultural change, the Calm Line's supporters believe.

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  • He befriended his brother's murderer. In each other, they found healing

    Since the 1990s, California prisons' victim-aid office has arranged for crime victims to meet with the incarcerated people who harmed them or their family members. These victim-offender dialogues, a restorative-justice method offering alternative forms of accountability, have helped survivors heal by providing information they could not glean from the traditional justice process. Some have also experienced reconciliation and forgiveness. Only victims can initiate the process, and most incarcerated people are deemed ineligible after screening and preparation for the face-to-face dialogues.

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  • ‘I Don't Want to Hit My Children. I Don't Want to Hit Anybody.'

    The Respect Phoneline started in the UK in 2004 to give anonymous callers, usually men, a way to seek help for their violent impulses. Rather than putting the burden for resolving domestic violence on survivors and on the punitive tools of the criminal justice system, the hotline approach recognizes that people prone to abusing others are frustrated and unhappy and want to change but need help to figure out how. While the aftermath of anonymous phone counseling can't be tracked, the author observed the process helping many men change their thinking. Similar hotlines have started in multiple places.

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  • Where Juvenile Detention Looks More Like Teens Hanging Out

    Apache County, Arizona, once had a costly, under-used juvenile detention center and a traditional philosophy that stern punishment would steer young people away from misbehavior. Now the abandoned detention center is The Loft Legacy Teen Center, an after-school hangout with mentors, connections to social services, and a place where youth can go to socialize – a rare commodity in this rural community. It's run and staffed by the court system and its probation department. But its methods are love and support, not threats of arrest and incarceration. Juvenile arrests are now way down.

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