Once in awhile Twitter’s recommendations come in very handy – I didn’t know Sherry Rehman was on Twitter. I didn’t even know she was Pakistan’s ambassador to the US – last I knew she was one of two surviving politicians in Pakistan who favored reforming the blasphemy law, and thus in very serious danger. I’m profoundly glad that she’s now an ambassador and thus less likely to be murdered by one of her own employees the way Salman Tazeer was.

So in reading her Twitter feed I find Foreign Policy’s list of important women on Twitter. I wish it weren’t an afterthought to a list of just important people on Twitter that was nearly 90% men, and I wish … Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

In a comment at Pharyngula responding to people saying things like

I find it sad that, for want of a better analogy, the terrorists seem to be winning… let’s not kid ourselves, this is a fight for our movement, and we have to be prepared to get your hands dirty if we don’t want this kind of dick head behavior to be associated with it.  Yet all I see is declarations of “oh, I’m not going, because poo-poo heads”… it should be more like “They what!?  Let’s take it to ‘em, troops”

Maureen said:

How dare you come here with so poor a grasp of what has been happening, such a complete blank in your brains?  How dare you suggest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I got email threats about TAM today, so I’m not going.

One less thing to worry about.… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

The popular Pakistani singer Ghazala Javed was shot to death in Peshawar yesterday along with her father.

Police official Imtiaz Khan said the ex-husband was suspected of involvement in the murders.

The singer had fled to Peshawar in 2009 to escape the then Taliban-dominated northwestern district of Swat as the army launched a sweeping offensive.

Ghazala Javed sung in her native Pashto language and released more than two dozen albums that were popular among Pashto speakers in the northwest.

She married businessman Jahangir Khan in 2010, but demanded a divorce after finding out he had another wife and because he tried to ban her from singing, the family said.

Not the Taliban, just a murderous possessive ex-husband.

Same thing.… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

The pope’s consigliere says it’s the devil who’s making things hot for them.

In a rare interview with the Italian Catholic magazine Famiglia Cristiana, Bertone, the Vatican’s secretary of state, accused the media of “intentionally ignoring” the good things the Church does while dwelling on scandals.

Yeah the good things! Like telling people condoms cause Aids! Like trying to stop people using any kind of birth control ever! Like trying to make hospitals promise never to save a woman’s life if it requires an abortion – never ever ever. Like excommunicating anyone who tries to ordain a woman. Like saying no no no no no no women can never be priests because they are women. Good things!

Bertone branded

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

A few hours after we did the hangout video yesterday, Russell Blackford did a tweet.

I see that DJ Grothe is still Witch of the Week. #bullies

Followed by another.

Freethought Blogs – the haven of bullies, bully-enablers, and witch hunters. I’m sick to death of this. #bullies

Some hours after that, Jeremy Stangroom did one.

…the bullies at FreeThought Blogs run the risk of precipitating a tragedy. Bullying ruins – and sometimes ends – lives. #bullies

So now you know. We (we of Freethought blogs, we who did that video, we whom DJ Grothe accused of turning women away from TAM by discussing harassment issues, we who have been rejecting that accusation, we who have been … Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

A pony, a pony, a pony!

The whole set is at Jason’s – Greta, Natalie, Sikivu, Rebecca, Taslima, Jen, Stephanie – The Horsewomen of the Feminist Apocalypse. Yesssss!

The artist is embertine.

… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I mentioned yesterday that a Karachi police station was being attacked by a mob who wanted to kill a guy who’d been arrested for blasphemy. It was eyewitness news on Twitter, not published news. Now there is published news.

A police station in central part of the city was attacked by an angry mob on Sunday that tried to break into the lockups to kill a blasphemy accused.

The Taimuria Police Station in North Nazimabad became a warzone when it arrested and booked a man under section 295(b) on accusation of desecrating a copy of Holy Quran.

…

“Then slowly people started gathering outside and it turned into a crowd. The screaming mob was demanding of us to hand

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Greg has an interesting followup comment on his claim about how intentional it all is.

I am not suggesting that people sat down in a board meeting and made a plan and DJ Grothe is carrying it out.

I am suggesting that a male dominated society within a society (JREF/TAM within Western Culture) is blind to certain things, and has certain self-serving expectations, and smooth sailing is defined when those expectation are not interfered with by, well, by “Feminist Bitches.”  Are there no conversations happening amongst (there’s that word again) JREF financiers, board members, DJ, others? Are there no emails distributed among any of the various mainly male defenders of DJ Grothe in social networking circles that say anything about

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

I heard a bit of news on the radio late Friday evening that froze me to the spot with surprise -

A British Columbia Supreme Court judge has declared Canada’s laws against physician-assisted suicide unconstitutional because they discriminate against the physically disabled.

I thought immediately of Eric. I very nearly got back online to email him (but went to sleep instead).

In a 395-page ruling released Friday, Justice Lynn Smith addressed the situation faced by Gloria Taylor, a B.C. woman who was one of five plaintiffs in the case seeking the legal right to doctor-assisted suicide.

Taylor has ALS, a fatal neurodegenerative disease, and she sought the ruling to allow her doctor to help her end her life before

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

Here’s what I was doing for the last couple of hours.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi_OsT7frPg

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

It’s Sunday, Boko Haram bombs in Nigeria day, so there have been bombs going off in Nigeria today (because it’s Sunday). Boko Haram keeps its appointments.

Multiple blasts have hit at least three churches in the northern Nigerian state of Kaduna.

A local Red Cross worker told the Associated Press that at least 12 people had been killed and 80 injured in the attacks.

A decent haul. They could do better, but 12 + 80 is respectable.

Meanwhile, Urooj Zia reports via Twitter that there’s a mob attacking a police station right now in Karachi, trying to kill a man accused of “blasphemy” who is being held there. Taimuria police station.

A couple of days ago another mob in Quetta, … Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)