They disagreed with her. Surely that’s illegal?… Read the rest
Violent Abduction: How Romantic 
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘If a woman can tell her children that their father kidnapped her, it’s a great love story.’ Right.… Read the rest
So We Should Prefer a Dim Bulb?
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is Obama called an elitist because he is comfortable with and in command of nuanced ideas? … Read the rest
Myths About Vaccines and Autism
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Proponents maintain their belief largely through the generous application of conspiracy thinking.… Read the rest
There is no Shortage of Godbothering Books
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
They far outnumber the putative flood of atheist books. Carlin Romano reads a few.… Read the rest
Review of Mary Lefkowitz’s ‘History Lesson’
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Teachers owe it to themselves and their students to get as close as possible to the truth.… Read the rest
Does science make belief in God obsolete?
Apr 30th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Templeton foundation asks; Pinker, Hoodbhoy, Midgley, Hitchens, others answer.… Read the rest
When in doubt, kill the nearest woman
Apr 29th, 2008 2:39 pm | By Ophelia BensonFunny how ‘religion’ often seems to manifest largely as an unappeasable loathing of women. How the very first item on the agenda seems to be punishing women for being women, and terrorizing women for the crime of existing, and telling women what to do and killing them if they don’t do it.
The 19-year-old Iraqi was, according to her father, murdered by her own in-laws, who took her to a picnic area in Dokan and shot her seven times. Her crime was to have an unknown number on her mobile phone. Her “honour killing” is just one in a grotesque series emerging from Iraq, where activists speak of a “genocide” against women in the name of religion…
She has … Read the rest
Wording
Apr 29th, 2008 12:20 pm | By Ophelia BensonSometimes people try to do the right thing and their very effort to do the right thing causes them to do just the wrong thing they meant to avoid. Sometimes that’s sad, other times it’s funny. Sometimes it’s part funny part irritating.
A Bradford man attacked and threatened after his family converted from Islam to Christianity was told by police to “stop being a crusader”…The No Place To Call Home report, by Ziya Meral, states apostates are “subject to gross and wide-ranging human rights abuses.”…The report, launched today, describes how the Pakistani community in Bradford reacted to the family’s conversion by shouting abuse and death threats, vandalising their house and car, attacking Mr Hussein and following his wife.
Really?! … Read the rest
Bristol City Council Wracked with Confusion
Apr 29th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
There’s cohesion, then there’s homophobic bullying, then there’s community, then there’s inclusive…… Read the rest
Iraqi Women Subjugated Via Murder
Apr 29th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Honour killings are not actually a crime in the eyes of the government,’ said Houzan Mahmoud.… Read the rest
Bradford ‘Apostates’ Get Death Threats
Apr 29th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Sher Azam, of Bradford Council for Mosques, said ‘Islam teaches us respect, tolerance and understanding.’… Read the rest
UCL Statement on Nicholas Kollerstrom
Apr 29th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
He’s a Fellow in Science and Technology Studies.… Read the rest
UCL Withdraws Fellowship from Holocaust Denier
Apr 29th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Let us hope the schoolchildren visitors are properly taught about the elegant swimming-pool at Auschwitz…’… Read the rest
Pamela Bone 1940-2008
Apr 28th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
She was fearless on matters of politics, human rights, justice and religion… Read the rest
Pamela Bone
Apr 28th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Bone wrote recently on what she saw as the betrayal by Western feminists of their Muslim sisters. … Read the rest
Simon Blackburn on Eight Myths
Apr 28th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
What is usually known as culture is a set of symbols enabling people on the inside to recognise and dislike those on the outside.… Read the rest
Hell for Women in Iraq
Apr 28th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Women are harassed if they appear in the streets, educational institutions, or work places.… Read the rest
The Folly of GM-phobia
Apr 28th, 2008 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
With the Earth’s population soaring, it will be the poor who go hungry, not the eco-warriors destroying modified crops.… Read the rest
The Democratiya Interviews
Apr 28th, 2008 | By Max DunbarThe online magazine Democratiya was set up by writers and academics in 2005 as a reaction to the status-quo left consensus that dominated liberal thought from the provincial dinner party to the pages of the British Guardian. From its founding statement:
… Read the restWhen over eight million Iraqis voted in democratic elections in January 2005, at polling stations guarded by American and other foreign troops, emerging to dance for joy, their purple fingers aloft, only for Britain’s leading liberal newspaper to sneer that the election was ‘at best irrelevant’ it was clear that something had gone terribly awry. When Iraq’s heroic free trade unionists were called ‘collaborators’ and ‘quislings’, while their torturers and murderers were hailed as a ‘liberation movement’ one
