[T]he girls, ages 13 and 14, had been fleeing for two days along rutted roads and over mountain passes to escape their illegal, forced marriages to much older men, and now they had made it to relatively liberal Herat Province.

But a cop spotted them, and far from protecting them, he sent them back home. “There they were publicly and viciously flogged for daring to run away from their husbands.” Or rather their “husbands” who were more like rapist slaveowners than anything we in the less thuggish part of the world would consider “husbands.”

Forced into a so-called marriage exchange, where each girl was given to an elderly man in the other’s family, Khadija and Basgol later complained that

Of course. I posted a link to that interview with David Sloan Wilson and wondered if he gets Templeton money, so googled his name and Templeton. Well of course he does. Silly question. Barrels of it, apparently – Google turns up a whole raft of items.… Read the rest

And speaking of tensions between religious freedom and other rights – Helen Ukpabio is another who is attempting to use the law to make her “religious rights” trump other rights.

Since “Saving Africa’s Witch Children” was first shown in Britain, in 2008, Mr. Itauma’s home state has adopted a law against accusing children of witchcraft. But Ms. Ukpabio went on the offensive by suing the state government, Mr. Foxcroft, Mr. Itauma and Leo Igwe, a Nigerian antisuperstition activist.

In the lawsuit, Ms. Ukpabio alleges that the state law infringes on her freedom of religion. She seeks 2 billion naira (about $13 million) in damages, as well as “an order of perpetual injunction restraining the respondents” from interfering with or otherwise