Time not only to save the six, but also to defend a common vision of science and law in establishing the truth.… Read the rest
Omer Ismail on Darfur
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSudanese government denies its role in the genocide, restricting reporters in order to hide the truth. … Read the rest
Columbia Teachers College and ‘Loyalty Oaths’
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonDoes stated ‘respect for diversity and commitment to social justice’ amount to an ideological loyalty oath?… Read the rest
Bérubé’s ‘What’s Liberal’ Reviewed
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘An unrepentant liberal, fond of postmodern culture, but not of Noam Chomsky or Michael Moore.’… Read the rest
Pope Warns Scientists Against Doing an Icarus
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonBy doing research that the Vatican disapproves of. Don’t touch that apple.… Read the rest
Free Speech at Columbia
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIn the last month Columbia has been embroiled in four separate free-speech controversies.… Read the rest
Deborah Solomon Interviews Harry Frankfurt
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘People in this country are starved for the truth.’… Read the rest
Sam Harris on Bad Reasons to be Good
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe link between religion and morality in our public life is almost never questioned.… Read the rest
Might Secularism be a Good Idea?
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIs it time for Britain, as a state, to turn secular? … Read the rest
Shazia Mirza Off to India to Joke About Veils
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe British Council is sending her for bridge-building purposes.… Read the rest
Trevor Phillips: Veil Debate Could Start Riots
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘This is not what anyone intended and it is the last thing Britain needs.’… Read the rest
Anti-gay Catholic Group Harassing a Priest
Oct 23rd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonCatholic Truth, a right-wing newsletter, trying to out an Edinburgh priest.… Read the rest
Looney American Foundation threatens to sue the Nobel Committee
Oct 23rd, 2006 | By Ra RavishankarBackground Information: Since last September, Hindutva (Hindu
supremacist) groups have attempted in vain to doctor sixth grade
social science textbooks in California [1]. With the solid backing of
their Indian allies, and aided by a battery of expensive lawyers and
the PR firm Ruder Finn, these groups sought to elide discussion of
caste and sex-based discrimination (in India) in the textbooks [2].
Their efforts were first opposed by a European-American scholar (Michael Witzel,
Professor of Sanskrit at Harvard University), and the California State
Board of Education is predominantly European-American, so the Hindutva groups and
their supporters cynically assumed the mantle of an aggrieved minority
[3]. What follows is an (as yet) imaginary account of the developments
following the announcement of … Read the rest
To a hammer, everything looks like a nail
Oct 23rd, 2006 12:51 am | By Ophelia BensonA couple more thoughts on Dabashi, because they tie into other things, into larger subjects. (Which, come to think of it, is part of what he is claiming about Nafisi and RLT. It’s a reasonable enough thing to claim, it’s just that he does such a terrible job of it. It could for instance be the case that RLT, whether intentionally or by accident, did something to increase US hostility toward the Iranian regime; but that’s a rather different thing from claiming that, for instance, ‘there is no difference between Lynndie England and Azar Nafisi.’ You’ll notice I haven’t been claiming there is no difference between Hamid Dabashi and Iran’s religious police. That would be because I think there’s a … Read the rest
Respect
Oct 22nd, 2006 7:49 pm | By Ophelia BensonSpeaking of respect for religion…There’s Adele Stan in The American Prospect:
… Read the restIn positions it takes on other issues, Feminists for Life is indeed “pro-woman,” whether in regard to its stance on the Violence Against Women Act or support for mothers on welfare. But it’s hard not to wonder if those positions aren’t just a beard, along with the term, “feminist,” for the hard-core, misogynist agenda of the Vatican. The organization’s no-exceptions anti-abortion position follows Catholic doctrine to the letter, a doctrine that has always demanded of women that they bear whatever burden men place upon them, and that they not soil the altar with the very bodiliness they represent by virtue of the means by which children are born.
Mary Warnock on Music and Education
Oct 22nd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘Nobody can deny how central a part music plays in the life of most children and adolescents.’… Read the rest
Nick Cohen on Bono and Being ‘Tax-efficient’
Oct 22nd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAnd humbug.… Read the rest
Untruth in Advertising
Oct 22nd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘Feminists for Life’ might as well be an office of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.… Read the rest
Religious Believers Will Just Have to Live With It
Oct 22nd, 2006 | Filed by Ophelia BensonPissed-off atheists are finding their voice in a debate set up and manipulated by religious forces.… Read the rest
The Shorter History of God
Oct 22nd, 2006 | By R. Joseph HoffmannFirst some history. The Hebrew tribes were a violent lot, not just because their literary enemies, like the 3rd century BCE historian Manetho, says they were, but violent even by their own reckoning. From Abraham’s fatwah on the cities of the plain, described gleefully by the author of Genesis (Genesis 19:12-29) as the first victory of Yahweh against his enemies, right down to the final humiliation of the God-forsaken people (their description) and the fall of the southern kingdom of Judaea (586 BCE), the love of war and the smell of blood dominates the Hebrew Bible.
Take for example this little story in the Book of Judges: A certain Levite takes a concubine, who deserts him. Outraged, the Levite drags … Read the rest