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Darcie Conway

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One of the biggest impacts on an adult's life is how they spend 10 minutes a day as a child.

Think when adults aren't successful it's due to the choices they've made in their lives? Not always. It often has to do with how they started out. Doing one thing for 10 minutes every day could change someone's whole future.

Nearly 1 billion people worldwide can't read this sentence.

And it has nothing to do with the language it's written in.

See, in America, some estimates say around 12% of children grow up without basic reading skills.

Meanwhile, Save the Children, over in the UK, estimates over 1.5 million British children will suffer the same fate by 2025.

And things are even worse in many developing countries.

Which is a big problem.

And while it's dangerous to to draw a cause and effect relationship, there is a strong correlation between reading ability by third grade, graduation rates, and ultimately, incarceration rates.

Literacy is an issue right here at home. Here's President Obama working with kids during a literacy project. Photo by Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images

But even when kids who are failed by the reading curriculum don't wind up dropping out of school, or worse, in jail, they're still likely to face enormous challenges throughout their lives.

According to the Literacy Foundation, the problems with illiteracy are vast.

On a personal level, people who can't read have trouble getting and holding down high quality jobs. They're also prone to low self-esteem, or self-efficacy, and more likely to battle depression.

Other issues are more abstract. Those who suffer from illiteracy struggle to understand and keep up with big cultural issues like global warming and equal rights. They're less likely, as a result, to become positively involved in their communities.

But it's not hopeless. There's a lot you can do to help raise the literacy rate.

Getting kids excited about reading in a group is super important. Photo from ThinkStock

For starters, read to your kids often and encourage them to spend time with great books. Even if it's only 10 minutes a day.

If you can, start a book club for your child and her friends, or even for you and yours! Creating a structured environment for reading and discussion can have a big impact.

You can also donate books, whether to your favorite charity or through a local book drive. Just do what you can to help more kids have access to reading materials.

Finally, you can contribute to organizations already fighting illiteracy around the world, like PlanetRead and Books for Africa, and help them get the resources they need to keep going.

Whatever you do, don't overlook the importance of reading proficiency among children.

The stakes are way too high.

And if you're still not convinced, watch this powerful video from Save the Children about the roots and consequences of our worldwide literacy problem.

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About 2 dozen countries have banned declawing, but the U.S. ain't 1 of them.

Don't feel bad if you've already done it. Just feel good about knowing better now.

Many loving pet owners had their cats declawed because they just didn't have the whole story.

Here's what you (and your friends) need to know.

All GIFs and images via Jason Galaxy/YouTube.

It's been estimated that up to 25% of all pet cats in the U.S. are declawed. It's also legal to declaw cats in Canada.

Part of declawing is "de-knuckling." (I'm squirming too, but there's nothing graphic here, so don't worry.)

Bones get amputated as part of the process.

Why do people do it? One reason is they don't want their stuff or themselves to get scratched up.

Cats have an instinct to maintain and exercise their claws (who doesn't like a good workout?). They also often communicate by patting their paws at you, and when they really want you to understand them, they'll draw out those point-making claws.

But if they don't have claws, cats may decide to communicate with you by biting instead.

I'd take a swipe or two instead of a bite, thank you very much.

Also, kitty litter hurts their post-surgery feet, so they start finding other less painful places to pee ... in the house.

I don't know about you, but I'd rather have a cat with claws than turn my house into a toilet.

Without claws, cats have trouble defending themselves from predators.

They have a hard time climbing trees to escape and can't protect themselves with their claws if they get caught.

These kinds of post-declawing behaviors often land declawed cats at the shelter (because maybe you don't like what they're doing, but you can't just let them go in the wild now that you've taken away their defenses). And I think we all know what can happen when there are too many animals at the shelter...

So, does laser declawing make a difference?

It apparently is less messy and can mean a speedier recovery, but that's about it. There's some research out there, but nothing seems conclusive that laser declawing is superior.


People are fighting to ban declawing in the U.S. city by city, but it's time to have it banned across the whole country. In Canada too.



If you've already declawed your cat and you didn't know any better, don't feel bad.

Let's get the word out to everyone else.

You can check out the Cat Daddy himself in the video below.

Jackson Galaxy is one cool cat.

FACT CHECK TIME! The video says at least 22 countries have banned declawing. Our fact-checkers found a range from 22 to 28 countries with official bans by the end of 2014, and — as Jackson says — more are sure to come.

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Bieber's Junk Was Splashed Over The Net. Here's Why His Junk Was The Least Offensive Part.

Men go through it too, but in a different kind of way.

"I clicked on Justin Bieber's Calvin Klein ad immediately."

"It was a standard fashion shoot. But it wasn't his package that created the controversy. It was the fallout."

A website "quickly released what they claimed were the pre-Photoshopped versions."

"His muscles were smaller, his package was less prominent, and he had less hair on his happy trail."

"I think it's telling about masculinity and male body image. Whether or not the photos were actually 'shopped is irrelevant to how people responded."

"When the supposed originals came out, blogs and comment boards had a heyday mocking Bieber for looking like a little kid."

"We mock women for all kinds of things, but being too small usually isn't one of them."

"I think the infantilizing remarks come down to emasculating Bieber."

"To be a real man is to be masculine. And to be masculine is to be powerful, dominant, and large in musculature, height, and, yes, package size." (That's the stereotype.)

"These expectations reinforce the notion that men are the dominant gender. And when guys don't measure up or appear weak or womanly, we shame them."

"Of course this just results in guys being stupidly competitive or using violence to solve problems."

"Another issue the debacle brings up is the sneaky Photoshopping of guys."

"The average action figure today has more muscle than the world's largest body builders."

"Researchers have actually found that boys with higher exposure to this imagery have lower rates of self-esteem and are more likely to have an unhealthy relationship with exercise [or] drugs, or to use steroids."

"The bottom line in both issues is gender roles being taken to an extreme."

"The expectation that we live up to some bizarro extreme and mocking each other when we don't is damaging on all fronts."

In reality, very few people fit into these molds we're trying to cram them into. We all have feminine and masculine traits.

Check out the whole story in Laci Green's video below.

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How An Old-School Way Of Having Sex Is Kinda Making A Comeback For Birth Control

Everyone should decide what's best for them.

There's a new kind — scratch that, a VERY old kind — of birth control in town.

Listen up, everybody with a uterus (and everybody in a relationship with someone who has a uterus)! It's time we learned about a traditional method of birth control that's been making a comeback in recent years. What is it?

No, it is not "beat the baby-carrying stork with your umbrella."

It's called the Fertility Awareness Method.

Pretty much what this means is that you pay super-close attention to your body to estimate when you're ovulating, and during those times you either abstain from sex or use another form of birth control (like condoms).

How does it work?

Well, the reason Fertility Awareness Methods (FAM) have been regaining popularity in recent years is that they're made quite a bit easier with technology. Lots of apps and websites are available to help you track your cycle. There are a few steps to follow (which vary depending on which specific method you choose), but you pretty much have to know your body really, really well. Like, you and your body have to become the bestest of friends.


You + your uterus = best friends forever.

  • STEP 1: Track your cycle and the symptoms of each part of your cycle.
  • STEP 2: Figure out when you're likely to be ovulating.
  • STEP 3: Don't have (unprotected) sex during that time.

Right, but how reliable is it?

Ah, yes. Reliability. So, WOMP WOMP, Fertility Awareness Methods are quite a bit less reliable than other common forms of birth control. Let's do a little comparison:


Here's the (obvious) kicker: You gotta use what's right for you!

Some folks like Fertility Awareness Methods because they don't involve putting chemicals in your body. Other folks love the pill, or an IUD. At the end of the day, you've gotta decide what's right for you, and you might want to talk to your doctor (and your partner) to help make that decision.

Check out a video about Fertility Awareness Methods below.

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