Blasphemy laws have prohibited any denial or questioning of the dominant religious beliefs of the time.… Read the rest
Every Day is Blasphemy Day
Sep 30th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonEspecially today.… Read the rest
Different Rules for Hollywood Celebrities
Sep 30th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonDrug and anal-rape a girl of 13? Hey the guy is a genius director, so let it go.… Read the rest
Homeopathy Couple Jailed Over Baby’s Death
Sep 30th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonGloria’s parents finally took her to a hospital for an eye infection that had started to melt her corneas.… Read the rest
Paul Sims on Andrew Brown
Sep 30th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonBrown should have brushed up on his history before declaring atheism to be exclusively middle class.… Read the rest
Independent World Report
Sep 29th, 2009 5:47 pm | By Ophelia BensonLook: here is Independent World Report. It’s a new bimonthly reader-supported magazine covering the forgotten and untold stories of the world. It just launched. Subscribe to it if you can!
The editor is Tasneem Khalil. You know Tasneem – he used to report on corruption and police misconduct in Bangladesh, until one midnight he was arrested and his computer was seized and he was beaten up. He’s in Sweden now and he’s started this terrific magazine. I’m proud to say I have an article in the first issue. There’s one on the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara. There’s a lot.… Read the rest
Say anything
Sep 29th, 2009 3:22 pm | By Ophelia BensonOnce again I’m startled at the casual malice of Andrew Brown. No charge is too unsupported to make, it seems. No inhibition causes him to pause and ask himself, ‘Wait, do I really know any of this? Am I just blackguarding a whole category of people on the basis of nothing in particular? Should I perhaps rephrase things by adding a ‘some’ or a ‘may sometimes’ in places just to be fair?’ – no sense of shame prompts him to stop making things up about a group of people he dislikes. Why is that?
Oh well, the pope does it, Kevin Padian does it, so why should a journalist hesitate?
At any rate, he doesn’t.
… Read the restIt’s obvious
Launch of Independent World Report
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonReader subscriptions support our effort in highlighting the forgotten and untold stories of the world to an international audience. Subscribe!… Read the rest
All-hijab School Opens in Cambridgeshire
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIt is being paid for by ‘members of the Asian community.’… Read the rest
Ariane Sherine on Atheism as Snobbery
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAtheists just want to sneer at the working class, said Andrew Brown pleasantly. … Read the rest
Freedom of Expression on Trial Again at UN
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIHEU called for recognition that it is believers, not beliefs, that are entitled to protection against hatred. … Read the rest
God Save Us From the Pope
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIn May 2001 Ratzinger ordered Catholic bishops not to notify the police about child abuse allegations.… Read the rest
Vatican Says: Hey, Everybody Molests Children!
Sep 29th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThey all do it! Protestants do it even more! And it’s only faggots who do it in our church so shut up!… Read the rest
The Protestants do it more!
Sep 29th, 2009 10:45 am | By Ophelia BensonThe Catholic church is so brilliant at PR!
The Vatican has lashed out at criticism over its handling of its paedophilia crisis by saying the Catholic church was “busy cleaning its own house” and that the problems with clerical sex abuse in other churches were as big, if not bigger. In a defiant and provocative statement, issued following a meeting of the UN human rights council in Geneva, the Holy See said the majority of Catholic clergy who committed such acts were not paedophiles but homosexuals attracted to sex with adolescent males.
Great! Brilliant! We’re busy, don’t bother us. Everybody else does it even more than we do, don’t bother us. It’s mostly queers who do it, don’t bother … Read the rest
Women? What? What are they?
Sep 28th, 2009 5:06 pm | By Ophelia BensonI’ve been wondering about something, and thinking I was the only one who was wondering, and then just now I did a bit of googling and found that I was not the only one who was wondering. Our friend Parrhesia wondered about it last July and then our other friend Salty Current also wondered and went on wondering (scroll down if you’re interested). Wondering what?
Why there are so many men on the speakers’ list at the Atheist Alliance International and so few women.
Yes quite: why is that? Seventeen men and four women – why is that?
Because there are no atheist women, of course.
No, perhaps it’s not that. Because……uhhhhhhh…they forgot?
Who knows. But it’s irritating. And it’s … Read the rest
Who is the pope to lecture the rest of us?
Sep 28th, 2009 12:56 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe pope is humbly issuing everyone instructions again.
Pope Benedict XVI said yesterday that all of Europe – and not only this former communist country – must acknowledge its Christian heritage as it copes with rising immigration from other cultures and religions.
Must it? Why? That way communalism lies – my religion is bigger than your religion so ha! A secular public square is a much better way to ‘cope with’ immigration from other cultures and religions. (What else would immigration be from? Identical cultures and religions?)
“History has demonstrated the absurdities to which man descends when he excludes God from the horizon of his choices and actions,’’ Benedict said.
Well, history has also demonstrated the savage cruelty to … Read the rest
Pope Orders Europe to ‘Acknowledge’ Xian Heritage
Sep 28th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘History has demonstrated the absurdities to which man descends when he excludes God,’ cleric said.… Read the rest
Berlusconi Insults Both Obamas at G20
Sep 28th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThey’re both tanned, hahaha, look at that dress vavavoom, the president can read autocues hahaha.… Read the rest
Oliver Kamm Rebukes Yale Over the Motoons
Sep 28th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia Benson‘Yale sententiously describes itself as “an institution deeply committed to free expression”. That is nonsense.’… Read the rest
Nick Cohen on the Return of Deference
Sep 28th, 2009 | Filed by Ophelia BensonClass warriors use the law of libel and a privacy law they have virtually invented to protect the wealthy from scrutiny.… Read the rest