Social Issues

Times Online | A code of practice explaining the legal implications of the equality bill states that religions need not be mainstream or well known for their adherents to gain protection. “A belief need not include faith or worship of a god or gods, but must affect how a person lives their life ...

New York Times | They signed a contract for a billion years — in keeping with the church’s belief that Scientologists are immortal. They worked seven days a week, often on little sleep, for sporadic paychecks of $50 a week, at most.

Online Colleges | If you thought buying textbooks for your college classes cost too much, then take a look at the prices attached to these books, some of the most valuable in the world.

Letters of Note | On April 9th, 1948, a month before Israel declared independence, just over one hundred residents of Deir Yassin were massacred by members of two militant Zionist groups - Lehi and Irgun - as part of an effort to cleanse the area of its Arab population.

Progressive.org | The anarchist author Gabriel Kuhn was planning on visiting the United States in early March and staying until May. He had speaking engagements set up at several colleges, bookstores, and coffeehouses.

Associated Press | Visit any of the nation's more than 100 historically black colleges or universities and you'll see clusters of men and women engaged in the rhythmic clapping and foot stomping routines known in black Greek circles as "stepping."

Sydney Morning Herald | Javon Thompson was possessed by an evil spirit, Ramkissoon was told, because he didn't say "Amen" during a mealtime prayer. Javon didn't talk much, given his age, but he had said "Amen" before, Ramkissoon testified in a US court in Baltimore.

New York Post | "What happened in this case is one of the worst things that can possibly happen in our criminal-justice system," Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Charles Solomon said as he pronounced sentence.

CBC | This means, StatsCan said, that roughly 653,000 women and 546,000 men considered themselves the victims of violence at the hands of a current or previous spouse or common-law partner, an estimate that was unchanged from an earlier study.

Scientific American | We have all heard these phrases before. “Violent psychopath” (21,700). “Psychopathic serial killer” (14,700). “Psychopathic murderer” (12,500). “Deranged psychopath” (1,050). The number of Google hits following them in parentheses attests to their currency in popular cultur...

Spiegel | It's been seven years since Mayan "landed on planet Earth," as she puts it. But the 27-year-old doesn't feel completely at home here yet. She's a young, modern Israeli woman. Still, despite the dragon tattoo on her shoulder and the loose top offering occasional glimpses of her bra, the...

Letters of Note | I am deeply moved by the offer from our State of Israel, and at once saddened and ashamed that I cannot accept it. All my life I have dealt with objective matters, hence I lack both the natural aptitude and the experience to deal properly with people and to exercise official fu...

Salon.com | Would you rather be an American wrongfully accused of child trafficking even in the post-earthquake Haitian justice system (complete with lawyers, access to courts, and full due process), or a Muslim wrongly accused of Terrorism by the U.S. Government (and put in a black ho...

Daily Mail | For years this has been little more than conjecture; fuel for the lively and often hostile debate between Anti-Stratfordians - those who deny that an ill- educated grain merchant and actor such as William Shakespeare could possibly have produced such a stunning oeuvre - and outraged...

Free Press | The Fiqh Council of North America – a body of Islamic scholars that includes some from Michigan – issued a fatwa this week that says going through the airport scanners would violate Islamic rules on modesty.

Truth Alliance | This prophetic dream of the Babylonian King speaks of four empires that will rule the Earth, each in its turn. Starting with Babylon the Great and the golden head, each layer grows weaker and weaker representing each major empire in its turn.

Advocate | Gay military rights advocate Lt. Dan Choi has been called back into drill duty, he told The Advocate in a phone interview Tuesday. Photographer Jeff Sheng, who recently turned his lens on active gay and lesbian service members for a book about "don't ask, don't tell," originally repor...

Cyber Seer | When you think of your experience with the Education System you went through, do you believe you received education or indoctrination? What I experienced was definitely indoctrination. The examination and grade  system definitely did not leave any room for the student to questi...

CS Monitor | Soaring above the rugged British Columbia landscape, the young Austrian sensation Gregor Schlierenzauer will aim for gold. But conspicuously absent will be women jumpers, who lost a legal battle to end Olympic ski jumping's 86-year history as a men's-only sport.

Daily Vanguard | Professor John Hall, during his 2 p.m. “Economics 445/545: Comparative Economic Systems” class on Jan. 14th, verbally harangued student Zachary Bucharest for nearly half an hour, according to students in the class.

News Busters | Yet Moore, who ironically advises the state-run Office, told a forum in July 2008 that he was opposed to such subsidies (video of MCPP's findings on this matter embedded below the fold along with highlights from its January 28 press release):

Chicago Tribune | The idea behind sexting, or sending a nude picture via a cell phone text, is not so new. Children played doctor long before grade school students were armed with cell phones capable of snapping photos. They just didn't record an image of the offense.

Huffington Post | Several days after 21-year-old Heather Lynn used her Wachovia debit card to donate $10 to Yele Haiti's earthquake fund, she noticed on her online billing statement that the bank had deducted a 3% "international service fee" from the donated amount.

Guardian | A growing number of science students on British campuses and in sixth form colleges are challenging the theory of evolution and arguing that Darwin was wrong. Some are being failed in university exams because they quote sayings from the Bible or Qur'an as scientific fact and at one sixth ...

Boston Herald | Police were called to the 26-year-old’s home about 5 p.m. Cops called for backup and tried to kick down the door. As one officer walked outside, the suspect came crashing through a closed third-floor window, bounced off an awning, hit the ground and ran.

Crime Shots | In January 1999, Robert Culver and his fiancée, Lorraine Reed, lived together in a small brick home on McLean Street in Manassas, Virginia, with Reed's two daughters, Stacey Lynn Reed and Kristie Erin Reed.

Mother Jones | Rob Santana awoke terrified. He'd had that dream again, the one where silver wires ran under his shirt and into his pants, connecting to electrodes attached to his limbs and torso. Adults armed with surveillance cameras and remote-control activators watched his every move.

Eurek Alert | Since the beginning of time, philosophers, scientists and theologians have sought to find out whether human beings have free will or whether other forces are at work to control our actions, decisions and choices.

News.com | He was eventually acquitted, but the ordeal cost him his job, his home and about $450,000 in lost income and legal costs. The case is also based on similar accusations of sexual abuse of their children made by the ex-wife during a bitter Family Court battle.

JALOPNIK | Conan O'Brien introduced the Bugatti Veyron Mouse as a new Tonight Show character Thursday night, not because it was funny, but because it was "crazy expensive" for NBC. To be funny he'd have to crash it into a lake.

Houston Chronicle | The protesters scrawled the word “life” on red tape across their mouths to convey their opposition to what they called an “abortion super center” that Planned Parenthood will open in a six-story building on the Gulf Freeway in March.

Haaretz | Hassoun, the leader of Syria's majority Sunni Muslim community, also told the delegates that Islam was a religion of peace, adding: "If Mohammed had commanded us to kill people, I would have told him he was not a prophet."

Faith Freedom | An innocent little girl, Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow, aged only 13yrs was stoned to death in Somalia.  She pleaded for her life, a witness explained.  "Don't kill me, don't kill me," she cried, according to the man who wanted to remain anonymous.

Freethinker | THREE members of Aceh’s “morality” police in the Indonesian Muslim province of Aceh have been accused of  gang-raping and torturing a 20-year-old  female student just over a week ago.

Boing Boing | Brian Krebs's "Krebs on Security" features an ATM skimmer that is chillingly well-camouflaged. After seeing photos of early, crude skimmers -- devices that capture your card number and work in concert with a hidden camera that records you punching in your PIN -- I assumed that I could ...

The Guardian | David Nutt, the scientist sacked as a government adviser by the home secretary, today defiantly launched his own independent committee which he says will provide the definitive scientific verdict on the risks of drugs.

Liberty Revival | Everyone knows about the most popular board game Monopoly. What many people don’t know is that this board game was originally called The Landlord’s Game and created by Lizzie Magie in 1904, specifically as an educational tool to teach the principles of Henry George.

Science Blogs | For something intangible, a glance can be a powerful thing. It can carry the weight of culture and history, it can cause psychological harm, and it can act as a muzzle. Consider the relatively simple act of a man staring at a woman's body. This is such a common part of modern society...

HNN | Auschwitz is still largely intact, but it is crumbling. Knowledge of the Holocaust among the young is patchy and getting thinner by the year.

NBC Bay Area | Lawmakers on Tuesday approved Assembly Bill 390 -- legislation to tax and regulate marijuana. The Assembly's Public Safety Committee voted 4-3 on bill at a hearing in Sacramento. The bill will now be passed to the full Assembly on Friday for consideration.

English Russia | Here we have one more photo for the “story of one photo” post. As you might already recognized one lady here is the ex-first lady of America, the wife of the assassinated president Kennedy, Jacqueline Kennedy, later married to Greek shipping tycoon Onassis.

Boing Boing | This handsomely illustrated book has peeled back the covers on London for me, showing off this city's many oddments and wonders, curiosities that had been literally lurking right there on my daily walk to work, all unsuspected.

Euro Heritage | This article offers my personal observations and photos of the Vatican/Holy See/Papacy from my 2007 vacation. The Papacy has reigned supreme as the central authority of the Catholic world -- nominally more than 1 billion ...

New York Times | “The Simpsons” has been on the air longer than “Gunsmoke,” but that’s not a reason to watch the show’s 20th-anniversary special on Fox this Sunday night. Tributes to even the best shows can smother them in pomposity.

Listverse | The world is full of secret and exclusive places that we either don’t know about, or simply couldn’t visit if we wanted to. This list takes a look at ten of the most significant places around the world that are closed to the general public or are virtually impossible for the general publ...

Brussels Journal | American columnist Diana West recently released her book The Death of the Grown-up, where she traces the decline of Western civilization to the permanent youth rebellions of the past two generations.

Mirror News | A wealthy British Nazi ­sympathiser was behind the theft of the ­infamous sign above the Auschwitz death camp.

Listverse | There are always two sides to history. Unfortunately, history has generally been written by the victor. As a result, only one viewpoint is told and exaggerations are made, but occasionally the other angle gets out there. It is then up to the student to determine what is authentic and wha...

Cracked | How many of you used to love stories about buried treasure when you were kids? Well, those stories got started for a reason: There is lost treasure all over the place. Entire fortunes lost, the only people who knew their locations long dead.

Dispatch | Supporters of John Freshwater stood in a parking lot yesterday asking God to inspire the school board to make the right decision.