“David Kato’s death is a tragic loss to the human rights community,” said HRW’s Maria Burnett.… Read the rest
All entries by this author
Uganda: gay rights activist killed
Jan 27th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonDavid Kato was the most outspoken gay rights advocate in Uganda. Yesterday he was beaten to death with a hammer.… Read the rest
Most of the video is too graphic to broadcast
Jan 27th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonBut you can see the grinning man clashing two stones together to celebrate after Siddiqa is killed.… Read the rest
Is a kirpan a religious freedom or a weapon?
Jan 27th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonIf a kirpan is allowed in schools, should it be allowed in the National Assembly?… Read the rest
Hundreds of rocks are thrown at her head
Jan 27th, 2011 | By Lauryn OatesAs the Afghan Government continues its wooing overtures to the Taliban, and Karzai whines about “foreign interference” in his latest meddling in Afghan parliamentary democracy, the Taliban execute a couple by stoning them to death in Kunduz province in front of a crowd of hundreds.
The crime? The couple fell in love and attempted to elope, beyond a community where relationships based on mutual love and attraction, and not on money and perversion, might have a chance of fulfillment.
The BBC has short clips of the horrific murders, noting that “most of the video is too graphic to be shown.” The event is described as follows:
… Read the restThe video begins with Siddqa, a 25-year-old woman, standing waist-deep in a hole in
A sewer
Jan 26th, 2011 5:43 pm | By Ophelia BensonEw.
Slightly afraid and slightly queasy in advance, I hunted up Glenn Beck’s website called “the Blaze” and looked for something on Frances Fox Piven.
Ew.
And people think violent rhetoric might be a problem…I can’t imagine why, can you?… Read the rest
Demonstrations, tenability, reasons
Jan 26th, 2011 1:06 pm | By Ophelia BensonSo now we’re disputing whether or not goddy claims can be untenable even if they’re not, technically, demonstrably false.
I think they can. It’s true that it’s not possible to demonstrate that goddy claims are false. (When Russell first met Wittgenstein, the latter drove the former crazy by refusing to agree that there couldn’t be [or that he couldn’t know that there wasn’t?] an invisible rhinoceros in the middle of Russell’s study, or some such thing.)
But that doesn’t make goddy claims tenable. It doesn’t make them plausible, either. There are myriad reasons that are short of demonstration but are still good reasons not to believe “God” exists.
To repeat the bit I quoted from Georges Rey:
… Read the restNow, it doesn’t
Steiner schools were founded by a racist mystic
Jan 26th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe powerful people running Waldorf-Steiner schools today claim that these views do not influence the education that happens there, but…… Read the rest
Glenn Beck targets Frances Fox Piven
Jan 26th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonAt one time it was all just talk for Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh and Dr. George Tiller’s assassin, Scott Roeder, too.… Read the rest
The lunatic Right v the Constitution
Jan 26th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThe Constitution was not written to weaken an overreaching Congress but to strengthen an enfeebled one.… Read the rest
Andrew Anthony talks to Pascal Bruckner
Jan 26th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonLike Voltaire and Diderot, Bruckner writes across a variety of forms and genres, as a philosopher, a polemicist, an essayist and a novelist.… Read the rest
Nabokov was right about the Polyommatus blues
Jan 26th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonGene-sequencing technology has confirmed his speculation that they originated in Asia, moved over the Bering Strait, and moved south to Chile.… Read the rest
Demonstrations
Jan 25th, 2011 4:47 pm | By Ophelia BensonA commenter at WEIT yesterday, strikingly named RPS, made a familiar point.
I eagerly await your demonstration that the claim “God exists” is false.
She later expanded.
As they say, you don’t know what you don’t know. I’d be perfectly happy with a clear demonstration of how “God” as commonly understood doesn’t exist.
The fact that it’s difficult to impossible to demonstrate conclusively that something doesn’t exist does not mean it’s reasonable to believe that that something does exist. It’s also not a good reason to believe that it does exist.
It’s possible to imagine an infinite number of things, none of which we can demonstrate conclusively not to exist. That doesn’t mean we should believe they all do … Read the rest
The debut of Sans
Jan 25th, 2011 3:36 pm | By Ophelia BensonOh look, Sans has made its debut. It’s the new magazine put out by the splendid people at Fri Tanke who published Hatar Gud kvinnor? The theme of this first issue is religious oppression of women, including an interview with me, and there’s an occupied burqa on the cover. Barely had it hit the stands when a Christian think tank accused it of…wait for it…Islamophobia. Sayeeda Warsi would be so proud.
Sara Larsson and Christer Sturmark, the editors of Sans, wrote an article saying why the magazine is not Islamophobic and why the whole idea is bad and stupid. It’s in Swedish, but then not a few of you read Swedish, and then there’s Google translate. I used it and … Read the rest
Glenn Beck’s ravings trigger death threats
Jan 25th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonBeck talks vicious nonsense about Frances Fox Piven, and his website fills with threats along with Piven’s address.… Read the rest
Is the first issue of Sans “Islamophobic”? [Swedish]
Jan 25th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonSara Larsson and Christer Sturmark respond to the accusation from a Christian think tank. The answer is No.… Read the rest
Journalism 101
Jan 25th, 2011 11:28 am | By Ophelia BensonLauryn Oates points out that the TES reported the Taliban had gone all sweet and cuddly on girls’ education, while absent-mindedly also reporting that it had that on hearsay.
The only person quoted in the story was Afghan Education Minister Farooq Wardak, who reported, “What I am hearing at the very upper policy level of the Taliban is that they are no more opposing education and also girls’ education.”
No confirmation from the Taliban itself was provided in the story, or since.
Oh. Which, in basic beginners’ journalism, or basic beginners’ epistemology, or courts of law, or historiography, is Not Good Enough. NPR re-learned this just recently after it reported that Gabrielle Giffords had been shot and killed, based on … Read the rest
Taliban still evil and opposed to educating girls
Jan 25th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonThat story last week reporting they’d gone pro-girls’-school was just something someone said. Can you say “crap journalism”?… Read the rest
HRW highlights Egypt human rights violations
Jan 25th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonHRW said security officers targeted bloggers and journalists who criticized government policies and exposed human rights violations.… Read the rest
Oh noes, Ricky Gervais dissed God!
Jan 25th, 2011 | Filed by Ophelia BensonCharlie Sheen can take it, but God goes all to pieces.… Read the rest