The Inca were imperialists too, and the treatment of such peasant children may have served to instil fear and facilitate social control over remote mountain areas.… Read the rest
Fashionable nonsense has been with us since the time that prehistoric man first transcribed Of Grammatology on to the walls of the Lascaux caves. Here we cast an eye back at some historical highlights.
On Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Right from the start of the Cairo Declaration, it is made clear the world is divided into Muslims and infidels.… Read the rest
Rape victims are guilty of zina; their rapists go free.
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Four male witnesses of good standing are required to prove rape. Charging rape is proof of zina – by the woman only.… Read the rest
AI asks bloggers to support free speech
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Human rights group also wants web log writers to highlight the plight of fellow bloggers jailed for what they wrote in their online journals.… Read the rest
Kenan Malik interprets the Dispatches Muslim Survey.
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The survey shows that Muslims do not form a single homogenous community.… Read the rest
Injustice in Malaysia
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Subjecting Hindu women to Sharia courts is not justice.… Read the rest
Akbar Ganji on the View from Tehran
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Political change in Iran is necessary, but it must not be achieved by foreign intervention.… Read the rest
Natalie Angier on the matriarchal myth.
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Despite evidence that contradicts the story of a prelapsarian gynecocracy, and a glaring lack of evidence to support it, many people continue to subscribe to it. … Read the rest
Universal Human Rights and
“Human Rights in Islam”
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam claims supremacy over the UDHR, based on divine revelation.… Read the rest
Maryam Namazie on the veil
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The veil is a tool for the suppression and oppression of women.… Read the rest
Goldenbridge orphanage
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
She was regularly beaten, left to sleep in her own urine, had her teeth knocked out, was hospitalised after a beating when she tried to break out of the orphanage.… Read the rest
Hearings into child abuse at Goldenbridge
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Chills the blood.… Read the rest
Muslim-born woman detained for ‘rehabilitation’ from Hinduism
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Islamic officials seized her 15-month-old daughter from her Hindu husband, Suresh Veerappan, last month and handed the child to Revathi’s Muslim mother.… Read the rest
Marieme Helie Lucas on the fundamentalist political agenda.
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Fundamentalists want to impose a religious identity on all citizens, by virtue of their birth place rather than by choice, thus denying freedom of thought, freedom of religion, freedom of consciousness.… Read the rest
Fauziya Kassindja fled Togo to escape FGM
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
She was to be mutilated at the behest of a man who wanted to make her his fourth wife.… Read the rest
Friendly Feudalism: the Tibet Myth
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Young Tibetan boys were regularly taken from their peasant families and brought into the monasteries to be trained as monks. Once there, they were bonded for life. … Read the rest
Swimming in Saudi Arabia
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Foreign woman demands to use pool in international hotel, succeeds.… Read the rest
Religious police prevented schoolgirls from escaping fire
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Saudi Arabia’s religious police stopped schoolgirls from leaving a blazing building because they were not wearing correct Islamic dress; fifteen died.… Read the rest
A Conversation with Akbar Ganji and Martha Nussbaum [audio]
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Iran’s most prominent political dissident talks to the philosopher.… Read the rest
Spanish women’s groups sue imam
Apr 10th, 2010 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
His book gives advice on wife-beating. Not too hard, not on the tender bits; do it right.… Read the rest