News
Welcome to our archive of news stories relevant to the project
of fighting fashionable nonsense. The stories are drawn from the
electronic pages of the world's media. On this page, you'll find
links to those stories that have been featured on Butterflies
and Wheels during the current year. At the bottom of the page,
you'll find links to separate archives of stories from previous
years.
We're always pleased to hear about news stories that you think
should be featured on Butterflies and Wheels. Just
send an email here, if you want to point one out to us.
A note about links
Inevitably links go out of date. We suggest, therefore, that
you make hard-copies of the stories that particularly interest
you.
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Latest News
Stop Honoricide Campaign
In memory of every mother, daughter, sister murdered to protect family honor.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Think-tank Launched in Pakistan
An independent think-tank to address issues faced by the people between the Oxus and Indus Rivers.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Zanu PF is Burning Maize as Zimbabwe Starves
Food was used as a tool for retribution and punishment by Zanu PF after the 2005 elections.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Very Deep Stuff
Links are a paradox uniting the full and empty space between nodes in the network.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Deep Stuff
Subjectivity is the lens and connector through which the spatio-temporal dislocation gets focused and bridged.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Nesrine Malik on Islam's Refusenik Women
They have 'unsavoury views about Islam,' they 'nail their colours to the west's mast of values.'
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Einstein Had 'Rid Himself of Belief in Atheism'
Because he admired Freud; 'if we are Freudians, we have a tragic view of life.' Uh...
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Normblog on a Revisionist Account of Atheism
To be an atheist, on this revisionist account of what atheism is, you have in fact to be a fool.
Date filed: 15-05-2008
Jesus and Mo Don't Believe in the Atheists' God
God cannot be empirically investigated, he is ineffable, beyond our capacity. Which is handy.
Date filed: 14-05-2008
Can U Read Kant?
To Mark Bauerlein, the present is a good time to be young only if you don't mind a tendency toward empty-headedness.
Date filed: 14-05-2008
Irish Bishops Say: Too Many Catholic Schools
92% of the country's primary schools are managed by the Catholic Church
Date filed: 14-05-2008
PBS and Public History
Pete Seeger tells the truth in his autobiography, but a new documentary is evasive.
Date filed: 14-05-2008
'Harun Yahya' Sentenced to Prison
The Foundation for Scientific Research adopted arguments from young-earth creationist organizations.
Date filed: 14-05-2008
Should Philosophy Talk to Non-philosophers?
Jonathan Barnes, Myles Fredric Burnyeat, Raymond Geuss, Barry Stroud discuss.
Date filed: 13-05-2008
Clinton Takes the Conservative Populist Tack
Clinton's 'hard-working Americans, white Americans' made explicit what conservative populists usually keep implicit.
Date filed: 13-05-2008
Review of Why Truth Matters
Reviewer much cleverer than authors.
Date filed: 13-05-2008
On Fitna, the Movie
Maryam Namazie, Fariborz Pooya and Bahram Soroush discuss.
Date filed: 13-05-2008
Archbish Compares Embryo Bill to Rape
Notes that persons must be treated as ends. Fails to note that cells are not persons.
Date filed: 13-05-2008
Real Humans Are Lazy, Busy, Impulsive, Biased
That's why they can be nudged in socially desirable directions.
Date filed: 12-05-2008
Steven Pinker on the Stupidity of Dignity
Leon Kass has a problem not just with longevity and health but with the modern conception of freedom.
Date filed: 12-05-2008
Alan Wolfe Discovers the Forgotten Philosopher
Mill. Mill is forgotten? Who knew?
Date filed: 12-05-2008
Not a Good Time for Literary Criticism
Instead of building a body of knowledge, the field wanders in circles, bending with fashions and pronouncements of gurus.
Date filed: 12-05-2008
Raymond Geuss Remembers Rorty at Princeton
Over the years, I did my best to set Dick right about Gadamer.
Date filed: 12-05-2008
Fatal Impediment in Catholicism
Watchdog accuses church of using dogma to oppose all forms of research on embryos.
Date filed: 11-05-2008
Father Says Daughter Deserved to Die
The police congratulated him on what he had done. 'They are men and know what honour is,' he said.
Date filed: 11-05-2008
Murphy-O'Connor on Marriage and Family
Marriage and family way important, he says. Celibate priests are authorities on this.
Date filed: 11-05-2008
Pope Reiterates Ban on Contraception
Ruthless bastard.
Date filed: 11-05-2008
UD Does a Spot of Discourse Analysis
A Sunday laugh.
Date filed: 11-05-2008
Extract from Neil Gross's Richard Rorty
Rorty concluded that there is no position outside historically situated language games from which to distinguish mind from world.
Date filed: 10-05-2008
Students Don't Know Much, Academic Says
He blames American news networks for creating shows about stupid people yelling at each other.
Date filed: 10-05-2008
Robert Irwin on Said's Shadowy Legacy
Tricky with argument, weak in languages, careless of facts, but thirty years on, Said still dominates debate.
Date filed: 10-05-2008
Is Schlafly Worthy of an Honorary Doctorate?
Lecturing is one thing, an honor is another.
Date filed: 10-05-2008
Scott McLemee on Neil Gross on Rorty
What tools does a sociologist bring to a book about Rorty that an intellectual historian wouldn’t?
Date filed: 10-05-2008
Katha Pollitt on Dr. Phyllis Schlafly
Washington University is giving Phyllis Schlafly an honorary doctorate. Yes really.
Date filed: 09-05-2008
Cardinal's Lecture [click 'Transcript']
'Have you ever met anyone who believes what Richard Dawkins doesn’t believe in?' Yes.
Date filed: 09-05-2008
God Mysterious, Cardinal Says
'If Christians really believed in the mystery of God, we would realise that proper talk about God is always tentative.'
Date filed: 09-05-2008
Terry Sanderson on Cormac Murphy-O'Connor
'You are a politician as much as a priest, but no one has elected you.'
Date filed: 09-05-2008
Resist the Medievalists
The pro-choice lobby has no pulpits to marshal its troops.
Date filed: 09-05-2008
Undercover Atheist Joins Hagee's Church
Christian Zionism aims to align America with Israel so as to 'hurry God up' with Armageddon
Date filed: 08-05-2008
Bush Cites God in Defending War Actions
His policies were predicated on the belief that 'every human being bears the image of our maker.'
Date filed: 08-05-2008
MF Husain's Work Ruled Not Obscene
Hindu nationalist groups accused him of 'hurting their religious sentiments.'
Date filed: 08-05-2008
Malaysian Woman Allowed to Leave Islam
That's against the law in Malaysia, but the judge decided she had never actually converted.
Date filed: 08-05-2008
Bogus Anti-elitism
Pseudo-populist suspicion of them there expurts is not the way to stay in the reality-based community.
Date filed: 08-05-2008
Sleeper on Wieseltier on Amis
Wieseltier's review is preening and melodramatic, an opera bouffe of a literary attack.
Date filed: 07-05-2008
The Mystical Fallacies of a Hero of the Right
Hayek is not as rational and irrefutable as the right would have it. He is a romantic, a serious deficit in a social theorist.
Date filed: 07-05-2008
Pragna Patel on the Problem with Multifaithism
At the heart of all fundamentalist movements is support for the patriarchal family.
Date filed: 07-05-2008
Multifaithism is Bad for Women
The multicultural approach harms women; it focuses on relations between groups, rather than within them.
Date filed: 07-05-2008
Girls' School Burnt Down in Swat District
Another girls school had petrol bombs thrown at it on Sunday.
Date filed: 07-05-2008
How Forced Marriage Works
She loved her parents, they didn't beat her, but she gave in to the incessant pleadings.
Date filed: 06-05-2008
Jesus and Mo Ponder the FLDS
Mo is shocked, shocked.
Date filed: 06-05-2008
Terry Sanderson on a Clash of Rights
Those of gay people and those of religious people who want to discriminate against them.
Date filed: 06-05-2008
Parvin Ardalan Gets 2 Years Suspended Sentence
For a demo demanding equal rights for women on divorce, inheritance and child custody.
Date filed: 06-05-2008
Women's Rights versus Religious Liberty
They are in tension.
Date filed: 06-05-2008
Oh the Horror: Obama is an Intellectual
Well we can't have that. Obviously the more ignorant a president is, the better.
Date filed: 05-05-2008
NCSE's 'Expelled Exposed'
Not a documentary; anti-science propaganda to create the appearance of controversy where there is none.
Date filed: 05-05-2008
Pretend Populists
Bogus 'anti-elitism' is a weapon against liberal Democrats. How does that work?
Date filed: 05-05-2008
Carl Zimmer on Gene Networks
The more scientists know about them, the more there is to find out.
Date filed: 05-05-2008
Nick Bostrom Looks for the Great Filter
Perhaps the Great Filter is a destructive tendency common to virtually all technological civilizations.
Date filed: 05-05-2008
Nussbaum on Philosophy and Shakespeare
Also psychoanalysis and Shakespeare. Hmm.
Date filed: 05-05-2008
Malaysia Plans to Treat Women Like Infants
Government plans to require women to obtain written consent from families or employers to travel alone.
Date filed: 04-05-2008
Charles Darwin Samples a Little Television
It is clear what science is for: it is to help the police elucidate which American has killed which other American.
Date filed: 04-05-2008
The Miracle of the Finger
'It looked to have been an ordinary fingertip injury with quite unremarkable healing. This is junk science.'
Date filed: 04-05-2008
Ben Goldacre on 'Pixie Dust' Nonsense
There is no missing finger, so pixie dust not needed.
Date filed: 04-05-2008
Ben Goldacre on Manufacturing Doubt
Note similarities between dissembling of food supplement industry and tobacco lobby’s war with epidemiology.
Date filed: 04-05-2008
Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Irshad Manji
One rejects Islam, the other wants to reform it.
Date filed: 04-05-2008
Attenborough Urges Better TV
Fewer celebrity chefs, more science.
Date filed: 03-05-2008
How Can We Stamp Out All This Kufr?
Lots and lots of 'community' pressure.
Date filed: 03-05-2008
Religious Questioning of Secular Public Space
Islamic conservatives try to dictate the content of curriculum at USW's Centre for Islamic Studies.
Date filed: 03-05-2008
'Muslims for Peace' Speak Up
'Muslims should fear Almighty Allah and break all connections with this diabolical Centre of Kufr.'
Date filed: 03-05-2008
Imams Angry About Literature Course
'Muslims for Peace' has demanded lecturer Samar Habib be dismissed and the course abolished.
Date filed: 03-05-2008
Vatican Happy About Snub to Pope
Time magazine left pope off '100 most influential' list; Vatican claims to be pleased.
Date filed: 03-05-2008
The Koran Predicted the Big Bang and DNA
So what's the next big thing? Be patient; the Koran will predict it after it's happened.
Date filed: 02-05-2008
Imran Ahmad Joined the BMSD
We believe government should be driven by reason and common values, not theology or cultural traditions.
Date filed: 02-05-2008
Brian Whitaker on BMSD Launch
Baroness Kishwer Falkner said Catholics and Muslims 'want a very special level of exceptionalism.'
Date filed: 02-05-2008
British Muslims for Secular Democracy
Alibhai-Brown asks 'How is it that the Sikhs and Hindus can live in democracy but not Muslims?'
Date filed: 02-05-2008
The Humanities Might Nurture Moral Seriousness
The aesthetic disposition is less quietist than dispositions which see everything as 'always already” inscribed'
Date filed: 02-05-2008
Against Taylorism in Education
If teachers are to be visible embodiments of intelligence, skill, and scholarship, they must first be visible.
Date filed: 02-05-2008
Katha Pollitt on Polygynists and the Pope
The pope wants women to be trapped in marriage with 15 children just as the FLDSers do.
Date filed: 01-05-2008
Priya Venkatesan Explains About Science
Literary theorist goes to work in a lab, finds that science is science. World tilts on axis.
Date filed: 01-05-2008
Dartmouth Review Talks to Priya Venkatesan
'It offended their sensibilities, because the whole course was about problematizing science and technology.'
Date filed: 01-05-2008
How to Teach Writing
'A lawsuit in which I am accusing some of you (whom shall go unmentioned in this email) of violating Title VII of anti-federal discrimination laws.'
Date filed: 01-05-2008
Lecturer Considers Suing Her Students
They disagreed with her. Surely that's illegal?
Date filed: 30-04-2008
Violent Abduction: How Romantic
'If a woman can tell her children that their father kidnapped her, it's a great love story.' Right.
Date filed: 30-04-2008
So We Should Prefer a Dim Bulb?
Is Obama called an elitist because he is comfortable with and in command of nuanced ideas?
Date filed: 30-04-2008
Myths About Vaccines and Autism
Proponents maintain their belief largely through the generous application of conspiracy thinking.
Date filed: 30-04-2008
There is no Shortage of Godbothering Books
They far outnumber the putative flood of atheist books. Carlin Romano reads a few.
Date filed: 30-04-2008
Review of Mary Lefkowitz's 'History Lesson'
Teachers owe it to themselves and their students to get as close as possible to the truth.
Date filed: 30-04-2008
Does science make belief in God obsolete?
Templeton foundation asks; Pinker, Hoodbhoy, Midgley, Hitchens, others answer.
Date filed: 30-04-2008
Bristol City Council Wracked with Confusion
There's cohesion, then there's homophobic bullying, then there's community, then there's inclusive...
Date filed: 29-04-2008
Iraqi Women Subjugated Via Murder
'Honour killings are not actually a crime in the eyes of the government,' said Houzan Mahmoud.
Date filed: 29-04-2008
Bradford 'Apostates' Get Death Threats
Sher Azam, of Bradford Council for Mosques, said 'Islam teaches us respect, tolerance and understanding.'
Date filed: 29-04-2008
UCL Statement on Nicholas Kollerstrom
He's a Fellow in Science and Technology Studies.
Date filed: 29-04-2008
UCL Withdraws Fellowship from Holocaust Denier
'Let us hope the schoolchildren visitors are properly taught about the elegant swimming-pool at Auschwitz...'
Date filed: 29-04-2008
Pamela Bone 1940-2008
She was fearless on matters of politics, human rights, justice and religion
Date filed: 28-04-2008
Pamela Bone
Bone wrote recently on what she saw as the betrayal by Western feminists of their Muslim sisters.
Date filed: 28-04-2008
Simon Blackburn on Eight Myths
What is usually known as culture is a set of symbols enabling people on the inside to recognise and dislike those on the outside.
Date filed: 28-04-2008
Hell for Women in Iraq
Women are harassed if they appear in the streets, educational institutions, or work places.
Date filed: 28-04-2008
The Folly of GM-phobia
With the Earth's population soaring, it will be the poor who go hungry, not the eco-warriors destroying modified crops.
Date filed: 28-04-2008
Saudi Blogger Released From Jail
Fouad al-Farhan had used his website to criticise alleged corruption and call for democratic reforms.
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Creeping Islamization in Turkey
'Most people are more religious these days. They don't want to eat pork, and they don't let others produce it either.'
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Obscene Desserts on Limits, and Religious Limits
Humans don't know everything, but does that mean religion can help? No.
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Jesus and Mo Have a Good Moment
Good night boys.
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Charles Darwin Starts a Blog
'Well there I was minding my own business in the Cafe of the Natural History Museum…'
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Army Major Threatens Atheist Soldier
'People like you are going against what the founding fathers, who were Christians, wanted for America!'
Date filed: 27-04-2008
Maajid Nawaz Replies to Ziauddin Sardar
Sardar's attack on the Quilliam Foundation was ill-informed in a number of ways.
Date filed: 26-04-2008
Sue Blackmore on Papal Social Calls
Sorry, we'll be out that day.
Date filed: 26-04-2008
Seumas Milne is Slightly Confused
He seems to think misogynist homophobic theocrats are right-on and their opponents are wicked.
Date filed: 26-04-2008
A Mild Critique of Leon Wieseltier
'Wieseltier has a meandering, conceptually confused, pointless essay in The New Republic...'
Date filed: 26-04-2008
Hitchens on Ratzinger
Reporters who can get off their knees might ask the pope if he is conducting his own foreign policy and, if so, in consultation with whom?
Date filed: 25-04-2008
Court Rules Doctors Can Transfuse Infants
The parents are Jehovah's Witnesses and refused to give their consent.
Date filed: 25-04-2008
British Muslims for Secular Democracy
Alibhai-Brown: 'this excessive culture of obedience is stunting the development of Islamic communities.'
Date filed: 25-04-2008
Egyptian Woman Calls for Strike via Facebook
It was a great success. Israa Abdel Fattah was arrested. New Facebook group 'Release Israa' has 3000 members.
Date filed: 25-04-2008
Zawahiri Accuses Iran of 9/11 Lie
Al-Qaeda did too so carry out the attacks! Iran's just jealous of Osama! It's so unfair!
Date filed: 25-04-2008
Why Ex-extremists Rather Than Never-extremists?
It's troubling that former extremists are seen as the only people who know how to deal with extremism.
Date filed: 24-04-2008
Mormon Fashion Statements
The dresses are meant to show modesty and conformity.
Date filed: 24-04-2008
Saudi: Male Guardianship Policies Harm Women
'The Saudi government sacrifices basic human rights to maintain male control over women.'
Date filed: 24-04-2008
Perpetual Minors
HRW draws on interviews with Saudi women to document the effects of these discriminatory policies.
Date filed: 24-04-2008
Saudi Women Appeal for Legal Freedoms
Women forced to live as children, denied basic rights and confined to a suffocating dependency on men.
Date filed: 24-04-2008
Trying to Herd Atheists
In the larger war against supernaturalism, it doesn’t help to fraternize with the enemy.
Date filed: 23-04-2008
Religion a Threat to Rationality and Science?
Imperviousness to reason is the property that we should most fear in religion.
Date filed: 23-04-2008
Mary Warnock on The Politics of Religion
It is essential to hold on to the fact that in this country we are not a theocracy, but a democracy.
Date filed: 23-04-2008
Science Shows Mecca is the Center of the Earth
The meeting in Qatar is part of a popular trend of seeking Koranic precedents for modern science.
Date filed: 23-04-2008
David Edgar Ponders 'Defectors' from 'the Left'
His version of it anyway, which of course is the only orthodox one.
Date filed: 23-04-2008
Andrew Anthony on David Edgar's Defective Logic
Edgar is arguing is that unless you sign up to his vision of the left, you have by definition joined the ranks of the right.
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Is Martha Nussbaum too Optimistic?
Conservative Xians 'should look more closely at the ethical reasoning of people who are agnostics and atheists.'
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Life at Haut de la Garenne
'It wasn't a children's home, it was a children's prison.'
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Free Speech and Clash of Cultures
'On the Media' talks to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ian Buruma, Flemming Rose, Ibrahim El-Houdaiby.
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Manipulation of Medical Research
Doctors often sign studies in medical journals that were actually written by pharmaceutical companies.
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Milk Teeth Found at Haut de la Garenne
Officers have been searching four cellars referred to as 'punishment rooms' by alleged victims.
Date filed: 22-04-2008
Reason Flunks 'Expelled'
The Wedge document makes it crystal clear what comes first for IDers, and it isn't evidence.
Date filed: 21-04-2008
Ben Stein's Way With the Truth
Expelled has some problems of its own with honest, open presentations of the facts about evolution.
Date filed: 21-04-2008
Rowntree Survey: Religion as Social Evil
Many said religion divided society, fuelled intolerance and spawned irrational policies.
Date filed: 21-04-2008
All Pope All the Time
More sycophantic coverage of Ratzinger. You'd think everyone in the world was a Catholic.
Date filed: 21-04-2008
Pope's Gone Back Home
He prayed, he celebrated, he visited. So what?
Date filed: 21-04-2008
Quilliam Foundation Launches April 22
Created by former activists of radical Islamist organizations.
Date filed: 20-04-2008
Jakarta: Protesters Demand Ban on Ahmadiyya
Ahmadiyya believe Ahmad was a prophet; most Muslims believe Mo was last prophet. Solution: a ban.
Date filed: 20-04-2008
Priests Brawl in Jerusalem Church
An Armenian priest forcibly ejected a Greek priest from an area near 'the tomb of Jesus.' Amen.
Date filed: 20-04-2008
Pope Claims Theist Monopoly on True and Good
Says Nazi regime 'banished God and thus became impervious to anything true and good.'
Date filed: 20-04-2008
EU Backs Down on Equality
Irish religious schools can continue to refuse to employ atheist teachers.
Date filed: 20-04-2008
Liberal Muslim Foundation Faces Hate Campaign
The Quilliam Foundation, backed by Muslim and non-Muslim scholars, will be launched on Tuesday.
Date filed: 20-04-2008
Michael Shermer on 'Expelled!'
Anyone who thinks scientists do not question Darwinism has never been to an evolutionary conference.
Date filed: 19-04-2008
Psychic Magic Woo People Are Too Funny to Ban
The greater threat are the morons who present themselves as superficially plausible and sciencey.
Date filed: 19-04-2008
Jesus and Mo Blurt Out the Truth
Maybe they'll be too drunk to remember.
Date filed: 19-04-2008
Mediums Protest New EU Directive
Shouldn't they have started protesting years ago? Since they knew it would happen?
Date filed: 19-04-2008
Ben Goldacre on How Policy Works
Perhaps there should be a special body for issuing warnings on the rare occasions when scares aren’t bogus.
Date filed: 19-04-2008
Rise of Conspiratorial Thinking About Science
In its extreme and ideological form, this contrarian approach to science can turn into a form of paranoia.
Date filed: 18-04-2008
Cairo: Police Seize Graphic Novel
On charges that it offends public morals.
Date filed: 18-04-2008
Bryson Brown and Chris Hedges on Atheism
Hedges describes an atheism unknown on land or sea.
Date filed: 18-04-2008
Eric Alterman on Samantha Power
Hacks sneer about 'university elitism' in the Obama campaign. Because ignorance is preferable?
Date filed: 18-04-2008
9/11 Conspiracy Theory and Anti-Semitism
Edmund Standing reports 'Scriptures for America' teaches anti-Semitism and advocates the execution of gays.
Date filed: 18-04-2008
Pope Rebukes US for Being Secular
Thinks religion has a monopoly on morality.
Date filed: 17-04-2008
Prince's Guide to Alternative Medicine Inaccurate
'The nation cannot be served by promoting ineffective and sometimes dangerous alternative treatments.'
Date filed: 17-04-2008
'Moderate' South Asian Imams to be Invited to UK
'To ensure imams are firmly rooted in the communities they serve.' Eh?
Date filed: 17-04-2008
The Funding of Islamic Studies
Much of the funding comes from the Saudis; is this a worry?
Date filed: 17-04-2008
Khadim Hussain on Special Laws in Tribal Areas
Colonial masters and indigenous elites, have convinced the tribal elite of their ‘distinctive culture’.
Date filed: 17-04-2008
Tehran's Anti-vice Chief Arrested
He was found with six naked women in a house of prostitution last month.
Date filed: 16-04-2008
Corruption in Catholic Church Starts at Top
Victims say pope is protecting some 19 bishops accused of raping children
Date filed: 16-04-2008
8-year-old Gets Her Divorce
But her family has to pay compensation to her former 'husband.'
Date filed: 16-04-2008
Manufactured Controversy
When significant disagreement doesn't exist among scientists, but is invented to achieve political ends.
Date filed: 16-04-2008
Virgins for Sale! Be the First to Nail Suli!
If a little girl is really pretty, she can sell for 40,000 rupees. That's enough for a nice party.
Date filed: 16-04-2008
The Pseudoscience of Brain Gym
Coochy-coo exercises may be fun, but they're definitely good at increasing the flow of bullshit into children's heads.
Date filed: 16-04-2008
Joseph Hoffmann on Good Without God
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John were the first spin doctors, transforming Yahweh into a compassionate conservative.
Date filed: 15-04-2008
Texas Sect Women 'Tell Their Side of the Story"
They're angry at the government. Sad, but what about all those pregnant young girls?
Date filed: 15-04-2008
Child Marriage is Where Religious Freedom Ends
This is where the imperative of protecting the vulnerable collides with freedom of religion.
Date filed: 15-04-2008
Costume is Control in Polygamy
'You don't want to stand out. You want to be invisible and do what your husband wants.'
Date filed: 15-04-2008
EP President Against Free Speech
'We are committed to the freedom of the press but I am against publishing cartoons that hurt the feelings of others.'
Date filed: 14-04-2008
Radio 4: Can People Stop Being Muslim?
Shiraz Maher campaigned for a state in which execution for leaving Islam would be written into the constitution.
Date filed: 14-04-2008
The Secular Army is Going to Destroy Art!
The Dawkins army wants to stop everyone painting! Stop them! Help!
Date filed: 14-04-2008
Islamists Protest Women's Rights Policy
Protesters against a new women's rights policy fought police in Dhaka after Friday prayers.
Date filed: 14-04-2008
Sentenced to Death for Swearing at God
Boğday's neighbor told the police he had sworn at God. Good enough for the Saudi authorities.
Date filed: 14-04-2008
'Expelled' Ripped Off 'Inner Life of the Cell' Animation
Which belongs to Harvard. That's a no-no.
Date filed: 13-04-2008
Police List Documents Seized From Polygamists
Sect had a bed in its temple where girls were required to consummate their marriages immediately.
Date filed: 13-04-2008
Let's Make the UN More Religious, Esp. Catholic
The 'Holy See' has great influence in UN debates on population and HIV/AIDS. Unfortunately.
Date filed: 13-04-2008
Atheist and Bishop Go Head to Head
Whenever we abandon reason and balk at the advance of knowledge, reaction and chaos ensue.
Date filed: 13-04-2008
Public Pool Reserved for ‘Muslim Male Swimming’
What next? Separate hours for Catholic men, Jewish women, Buddhist men, Sikh women?
Date filed: 13-04-2008
Yemen: 8-year-old Girl Seeks Divorce
'My father beat me and told me that I must marry this man, and if I did not, I would be raped and no law and no sheikh in this country would help me.'
Date filed: 12-04-2008
HRC Rapporteur Thinks Neocons Behind 9/11
Falk wrote foreword to The New Pearl Harbor, which claims 9/11 was likely an inside job.
Date filed: 12-04-2008
Wear a Hijab to Support Battered Women!
Stony Brook Muslim Student Association says: volunteer to wear a hijab all day in solidarity with battered women.
Date filed: 12-04-2008
Anguish Over Hu Jia's Sentence
He was convicted for writing five articles and giving two interviews.
Date filed: 12-04-2008
Chinese Rights Activist Sentenced Last Week
Hu Jia campaigned for the environment, religious freedom and the rights of people with HIV and Aids.
Date filed: 12-04-2008
Jesus and Mo Fall Out
Mo called Jesus's conscience a bullshitter.
Date filed: 11-04-2008
Mo Raps
A prophet with attitude.
Date filed: 11-04-2008
Stanley Fish on French Theory in America
What was involved was less the rejection of the rationalist tradition than an interrogation of its key components.
Date filed: 11-04-2008
Andrew Anthony Interviews Salman Rushdie
There is no getting away from the current relevance of subjects like foreignness, belonging and group loyalty.
Date filed: 11-04-2008
Raymond Tallis on the Neuroscience Delusion
Academic literary critics now place the firing of neurons rather than signifiers at the heart of lit crit.
Date filed: 11-04-2008
Breaking Open the Temple
FLDS lawyers said members were praying in front of the temple as officers dragged them out of the way.
Date filed: 10-04-2008
Oh That Kind of Temple
The kind that provides a bed where men rape underage girls.
Date filed: 10-04-2008
What Kind of Extremism Does Blair Have in Mind?
Catholic church's attitudes to gender equality makes development goals almost impossible.
Date filed: 10-04-2008
Underage Girls in Texas Sect Forced Into Sex
Several of the teenage girls have children. Many could not spell their last names or state their birth date.
Date filed: 10-04-2008
Rabbi Flees to Canada, Israel Seeks Extradition
Has been described as the 'spiritual mentor' of a group involved in the systematic abuse of children.
Date filed: 10-04-2008
On Samantha Power on Sergio Vieira de Mello
Moving from one hellhole to another, he experienced the conflicting claims of power and morality.
Date filed: 09-04-2008
Avishai Margalit on Sectarianism
The idea of the sacred describes what is indivisible and hence not subject to compromise.
Date filed: 09-04-2008
Persecution of Salah Choudhury for 'Blasphemy'
Journalist faces sedition, treason and blasphemy charges for confronting jihad and religious hatred.
Date filed: 09-04-2008
Blair Makes up for Lost Time on the God Front
'He has converted to Roman Catholicism. This requires much thought and reflection.' Hmm.
Date filed: 09-04-2008
Old Tibet Was no Shangri-la
One third of the boys in Tibet were forcibly taken by the monastery. That's human rights?
Date filed: 08-04-2008
Wafa Sultan Forced Into Hiding
Sultan joins a growing list of public critics of radical Islam facing death threats.
Date filed: 08-04-2008
Cross-dressing Children Shock-horror
Christian radio station rebukes costumes at school; cites 'traditional family values' and 'Biblical values.'
Date filed: 08-04-2008
Grayling and Monk Debate Education
The appetite for finding out, and thinking about what is learned, grows by feeding.
Date filed: 08-04-2008
Turkey Considers Tiny Change to Article 301
Proposed amendment would replace denigrating Turkishness with denigrating the Turkish nation.
Date filed: 08-04-2008
Illinois Legislator Tells Atheist 'Get Out'
'Get out of that seat. You have no right to be here! We believe in something. You believe in destroying!'
Date filed: 08-04-2008
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