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US Offers Help For Investigation of Bangladesh Killings

…ound after the Bishkek office of one advocacy group was firebombed. “I get phone calls and text messages saying things like: ‘we’re gonna cut out your tongue and shove it up your ass’ and ‘you are ruining this country,” said Nika. “The new law encouraged everyone to go after us, without fear of being punished.” The police are often accused of being at the forefront, with many LGBTQ individuals detailing instances of officers threatening to expose…

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The Environmental Politics of Vodou, New Orleans Style

…as Glassman’s voodoo shop. The Anba Dlo festival is also intended as a philanthropy project that calls attention to an often ignored problem. At midnight, following the conference, Glassman held a ceremony to invoke “La Siren,”—the Haitian name for the Yoruba sea goddess Yemaja. The ceremony was partly to apologize to the goddess for damage caused by the BP oil spill of 2010, and partly to seek her guidance in finding better forms of water manage…

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Safety Not Guaranteed

…ing up. The narrow stairway of our fifth story walk-up is pitch black. Our phones have no signal, which means no AP alerts, no Facebook, no Twitter—and no way to contact friends and family. Except for the radio, we’re cut off. And so is everyone else in the mass of humanity that lives and works below 39th Street. In the afternoon, after the worst of Sandy has departed for the north, I walk across Avenue B again into the Red zone. Some time during…

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Escape From Manhattan: Tech, Tragedy and Storytelling in Sandy’s Wake

…And nobody can deny the convenience of ready access to information, maps, phone numbers, calendars, and social satisfaction that our reliance on technology provides. Technology is a tool, right? It doesn’t change who we are, right? It doesn’t blind us—it reveals reality by connecting us and showing us the world via our screens… right? Look, I know that our new imaginative, mediated work is doing good. I know people can feel a real sense of empowe…

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Christian Atheism: The Only Response Worth its Salt to the Zimmerman Verdict

…e convenience store with Skittles and a soft-drink and talking on his cell phone with his friend. Instead, all that Zimmerman could see was a hooded threat. And so, he deputized himself to be the police, and in that capacity shot Trayvon Martin dead. But more than just deputizing himself to act with police power (and this is the crucial point of Dr. Butler’s reflections), he deputized himself to stand in the place of god, to act in god’s name and…

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Aliens Are Fattening Us Up For the Rapture

…ndsey (author of the grand-daddy of all Left Behind books, The Late Great Planet Earth), devoted his television show to this very question: “Are UFOs Real?” If you missed the show, here it is on Lindsey’s website. Lindsey’s short answer to CNN’s question is that yes, indeed, UFOs are real and fully understandable, almost predictable, in terms of Lindsay’s dispensationalist end-times scenarios. They are literal demons and are further evidence for a…

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Eid on 9/11 Anniversary?

…, Eid ul-Fitr may be on September 9th, 10th, or 11th. Strangers in Our Own Lands It was worrying enough to think about how some people might misinterpret such a convergence, and that was before the rise in Islamophobic rhetoric. Every other day, I’m greeted with someone arguing that Muslims are all evil, that we shouldn’t have any more mosques in America, that we are a dastardly fifth column. The assumption here is always that Muslims are foreigne…

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“Fast for Families” Immigration Reform Effort Enters 20th Day

…f compassionate immigration reform. How has that impacted your work? I get phone calls from LDS people who would identify themselves as politically conservative, but they say, “There’s this guy I know . . . Can you help him? He’s a really good guy.”  People need to remember that there are many “really good guys” out there waiting for immigration reform.  People coming to the US for work get villainized. “Illegal alien” is one of the most unbelieva…

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From The Virgin Mary to a Housewife in Queens: Inside The Seer of Bayside

…ll the story. In his work on Scientology, Hugh Urban describes trying to balance a “hermeneutics of suspicion” with a “hermeneutics of respect.” I faced a similar dilemma. Much of what has been written about the Baysiders has been either from the perspective of theologians representing the Catholic hierarchy or the anti-cult movement. No one has really tried to put a human face on this group. At the same time, I am not an apologist for the Bayside…

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The US Religious Right and the LGBT Crisis In Uganda

…orced him to strip naked and interrogated him. His wife received harassing phone calls. Kaggwa appears to be the target of intimidation. Kaggwa is also the executive director of the Support Initiative For People With Atypical Sex Development, a group that advocates for the rights of intersex people in Uganda. Kaggwa was born intersex, and raised as a girl. He “became very Christian, turned to God a lot to see if there would be a miracle of some so…

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