It is no secret that some European countries have been passing xenophobic laws for the past few years; and, if anything, these laws have proven at least two things: a) Many European legislators (and the people who support them) have forgotten the key role European countries played in the devastation of the countries currently “pouring in [...]

Yesterday Human Rights Watch published the article UAE: Spousal Abuse Never a Right on their site criticizing a decision by the UAE Federal Supreme Court that upholds the “right” of a husband to “chastise” his wife and children with beatings and other forms of disciplinary measures such as punishments and coercion as long as no [...]

When thinking of the right to due process, we think of the right to a fair trial, with an impartial judge, in some countries we think of a jury of our peers, the right to legal representation, and other similar requirements. However, we rarely think of our lawyer actually having the right to speak on [...]

Growing up in California I can only think of one time when a “state of emergency” was declared: the Los Angeles Riots of 1992, and let me tell you, it was scary! Of course at the time I was only 13 years old and hearing words like “state of emergency” and “curfew” while watching my [...]

Yesterday, the US Supreme Court rejected a ban on videos of animal cruelty. The question at hand was whether or not to strike down a federal law that made it a crime to create or sell dogfight videos and other depictions of animal cruelty. The case related to the prosecution of Robert J. Stevens, a [...]

Censorship is a topic that just keeps coming up in this blog because too many governments are willing to pass laws that limit people’s freedom of speech. Sometimes, their only goal is to block a certain message out, to keep people in the dark about “inconvenient” views on key issues. At other times, these restrictions [...]

According to the ABC News, Pakistan is a 95% Muslim country, which might explain why there is currently a law there that was introduced by Pakistan’s former military ruler General Mohammad Zia-ul-Haq in the 1980s, which carries the death penalty for insulting Islam or its prophet. The current government is pushing to change the law, [...]

Last week, the BBC published an article saying: MPs have backed a government move to allow sex education to be taught in England in a way that “reflects” a school’s “religious character”. What they are talking about is an amendment to England’s current Children, Schools and Families Bill, passed by a majority of 345

Exactly one month ago today I published what I thought was an interesting little post about the legal and social consequences of a language conflict in the Middle East. The post was about the body of water that separates Iran from Saudi Arabia and all its names: The Gulf of Basra, the Arabian Gulf, the [...]

Time Magazine published an article today saying that: “A Kentucky man has been arrested and charged with posting a poem threatening President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama on a white supremacist Web site.”

Freedom of religion, the principle that supports the right of an individual or group to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance either in private or public, is, in my opinion, intimately related to freedom of speech.

The country we are looking at is China, and the charge is “inciting to subvert state power” which can carry a sentence of up to 15 years in prison. Despite Article 35 of the Chinese Constitution which guarantees freedom of expression, in the last few years at least 29 people in China have been convicted [...]

And that new meaning is one that allows the government to deprive some of its citizens of a fundamental human right: the right to political participation. As Ivory Coast prepares for its very first presidential election in a decade, international pressure to set a date for the elections rises. Apparently, the condition for voting in [...]

There are few things in this world that we can all agree on. Scratch that. There’s probably nothing in this world we can all agree on, but few things most of us can agree on. The importance of cultural diversity is one of them. So when ignorance, lack of understanding of certain cultures or traditions, [...]