wonderlandkat@hotmail.com Re: Extreame Shock Jenny jennyg@compuserve.com Wed Jul 7 15:59:20 1999 Hi Kat,*p*No, I hadn't seen the web-page -- thanks for pointing it out!*p*Unfortunately, the historical sections aren't reliable. They come from a piece written by John Bethancourt, which has been re-copied on dozens of different web-pages that I've seen. Mr. Bethancourt used old, erroneous information for his statistics (guesses based on witch-hunting propaganda, numbers that came from *before* we'd examined trial records). Basically the figures contain numerous forged trials; they contradict each other; and most of the numbers in the "unnamed" section are completely inaccurate.*p*However they're quite right that there are witch crazes -- major ones -- going on right now, in Africa and Indonesia. The Indonesian craze alone has killed 150. (The link below goes to a brief Newsweek article on the killings.) A more detailed one, from Fox, is at:*p*http://www.foxnews.com/js_index.sml?content=/news/wires2/1016/n_ap_1016_95.sml*p**br*As for what to do... spells? Prayers? More mundane solutions escape me. These aren't simple cases of religious prejudice, where people hate Witches and kill them. In Indonesia, many of the victims are Muslim clergy. No one knows if this is actual vigilanteism, covert warfare between rival factions, or a government-backed terror campaign designed to intimidate dissidents.*p*It's tough stopping discrimination in our own countries. Trying to help others is so much more complex. I don't mean to say that it's impossible -- I just don't know what to suggest.*p*Anyone else have any ideas?*p*Jenny Extreame Shock Kat Mac 188 Tue Jul 6 00:14:57 1999 http://newsweek.com/nw-srv/issue/19_99a/printed/int/asia/ov3019_1.htm