Religion Dispatches
…of sub-Saharan Africa, it is problematic in most cases. Ultimately we are promoting the practice of a marriage of equality. It’s not going to be easy, but it’s a goal. For sure that goal cannot be reached when it is permissible for a man to have more than one wife. Some use the logic of the Qur’an to further argue for monogamy as the norm because the preconditions for polygyny are especially impossible to fulfill these days. But again as I said,…
Read More…point. That is, unless we planned ahead by at least an hour. They said the Saudi government had allowed five million this year. I don’t know where the information comes from and besides, can one individual actually tell the difference between the three million norm and a five million tops? All of the next few days were meant to be completed in concert with millions of people at this juncture. Yet, somehow, it is also supposed to remain intensely p…
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…massive Wikileaks trove of diplomatic cables to track down a massive Saudi Arabian investment in Arizona land, where Saudi-employed “farmers” now grow prodigious amounts of hay, sucking up precious water from a rapidly dwindling aquifer. Wall Street is next up for treatment. The team comes across an obscure investor-backed trust company that purchases vast tracts of US farmland, which is then leased to foreign interests. When confronted, the smoot…
Read MoreThe Saudi clerical establishment is once more making noise that Islam is only for them; not for women, and eventually not for any other men. Their latest proposal is that women should be barred from taking part in one of the commandments of the faith, to make pilgrimage to Mecca. Although women can still go to the city, they are to be kept separate from the Ka’ba, the actual point of the pilgrimage. The argument is that women and men should not m…
Read More…cerns [the march] would provoke clashes between gays and their opponents”. India: Census Documents Nearly 500,000 Hijra We reported in May that India’s Supreme Court had ruled in favor of allowing transgender people to identify themselves as a “third gender” on official documents. Less than 30,000 people used that designation in registering for the recent general election, but data released from last year’s national census – which included a third…
Read More…, noting the difficulties in getting implementing acts through Parliament. India: Human Rights Watch Urges Repeal of Sodomy Law Human Rights Watch this week said there is an “urgent need” to repeal India’s “archaic” law that criminalizes same-sex relations. Fiji: Prime Minister Dismisses Marriage Equality As Rubbish, Says Couple Should Move to Iceland Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said in response to a suggestion that the country should conside…
Read More…ent Hinduism or Buddhism, but certainly influence the issue of violence in Indian society. Indeed, if the demand is to quote a prominent public figure who can credibly speak for Buddhists on the topic of violence in India today, then only the Dalai Lama would suffice. (For the curious, his comments are here.) Another commenter noted “the Kakacupama Sutta was not a teaching given to young laywomen.” This is true. Buddhism’s historical emphasis on m…
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…ncy, a May poll found that 52 percent of Czechs support same-sex marriage. India: Profile of author whose stories in local language speak to isolated LGBT people Reuters profiles author Vasudhendra, who wrote stories about the life of his gay protagornist Mohandaswarmy for years before the author publicly came out himself. He tells Reuters that his stories, published in the regional language of the state of Karnataka, were initially written under…
Read More…djan headquarters of the country’s most prominent gay rights organization. India: Court rejects celebrity petition on challenge to criminal sodomy law On Wednesday the Supreme Court refused to reconsider the constitutionality of a colonial-era law criminalizing homosexuality; a petition had been filed by a number of prominent gay individuals. The Court, which had effectively recriminalized homosexuality in 2013 when it overturned a 2009 lower cour…
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…ect Pride marches, and are perfectly capable of doing the same in Nikšić.” India: Court investigating parents’ attempt to force trans man to marry The Delhi High Court heard allegations that the parents of Shivy, an 18-year-old transgender man living in the United States tricked him into visiting India on a holiday, took his passport and green card, and tried to forcibly marry him to a man. He says he fears for the safety of transgender activists…
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