Religion Dispatches
…give our people a future of prosperity and security the United States and India stand united.” He went on to praise the people of Mumbai, evoking Gandhi and particularly noting that the strength of India—like the strength of the USA—lies in diversity, which was on full display during those attacks when we saw “Hindus, Sikhs, Christians, Jews, and Muslims, protecting each other, saving each other, living the common truth of all the world’s great r…
Read More
…executive director of Students for a Free Tibet, who regularly travels to India for nonviolence trainings. In India, “their action is a little bit more spontaneous.” A New Revolution The March 10 National Uprising Day protest in Delhi was bigger than ever this year. Tempa Tsering, the official representative of the Dalai Lama, says more than 1,000 gathered in front of the United Nations’ office to mark the anniversary of the 1959 rebellion in Tib…
Read More…scrimination and harassment, they also have an important symbolic place in India.” The Times of India reports, The Rajya Sabha on Friday unanimously passed a private member’s bill seeking equal rights with dignity for transgenders, who are widely scorned, ostracised and ghettoised in the country. It was historic not only because it was the first private member’s bill to be passed in the Upper House in 36 years, but also since it might turn out to…
Read More
…There were fliers portraying President of the current opposition party in India, the Indian National Congress party, Sonia Gandhi and Hillary Clinton as horned demons on a “witch hunt” to “get Modi” and his party for alleged involvement in the 2002 riots in Gujarat. Modi governed the state during the violence that took the lives of more than 1,000 people, most of them Muslims. In stark contrast, there were large posters displaying Trump in what a…
Read More…exual activity,” which could be the lead in to overturn Section 377 of the Indian Penal code that still criminalizes consensual same-sex conduct, a remnant from an 1860 British Colonial Era law that exists in many constitutions across the Commonwealth countries even today. Malta: Civil Union & Adoption Law, Trans Protections in Constitution This week the parliament of Malta passed, and President Marie Louise Coleiro Preca signed into law, a civil…
Read More
…se FedSoc publicly casts itself as a non-partisan debate club, though, the code effectively protects Neil Gorsuch’s sacred right to don a bow tie next time FedSoc conclave rolls around. This ethics code exists largely as a marketing tool for reporters willing to buy what the FedSoc Six are selling, but also as cover for the justices’ clear preferences. Its language, which allows justices to participate in “a nonprofit civic, charitable, educationa…
Read More
…nt, and a pledge at the end. A final admonition declares that breaking the Code will result in immediate execution. The Code is illustrated with images pulled from a website promoting the 2007 Swedish film Arn: The Knights Templar. This past spring, copies of the Code were mysteriously distributed across Michoacan. Like La Familia, members of the Knights Templar must refrain from drugs and must commit to routine drug testing, but unlike La Famila…
Read More…lesbian and transgender people. A 2006 revision to the country’s criminal code expands the penalty for sodomy to include acts that “would be regarded by a reasonable person as an indecent act.” This could include two men holding hands, hugging or kissing and could carry an extended prison term. And Zimbabwe is not alone. Homosexuality is outlawed in 35 African countries and punishable by death in two countries, Mauritania and Sudan, as well as in…
Read More
…d by further grassroots action. The Ifrah Foundation, which combats FGC in Somalia, says a national action plan is forthcoming from government and civil society, though the role of Somalia’s government in Somaliland’s application of this fatwa remains to be seen. The fatwa has received more pointed criticism from the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA), who argue that since it only bans the more severe type 2 and type 3 for…
Read More…College, has shown that the connections between U.S.-government efforts in Somalia and Minnesota dissolve the domestic/foreign divide. The global war on terror emerged simultaneously in both places. The rise of the Islamic Courts Union in Mogadishu prompted the invasion of Somalia by Ethiopian fighters, with the backing of the US, and the Somali community in Minnesota was subsequently targeted both as a potential security threat and a source of po…
Read More