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Worldwide Protests For Free Expression In Bangladesh
The Worldwide Protests for Free Expression in Bangladesh were a series of rallies outside Bangladeshi embassies and consulates to demand the release of four Bangladeshi bloggers who had been arrested on charges of blasphemy. The protests took place on 25 April – 2 May 2013 and were organised by the Center for Inquiry (CFI), American Atheists, and the International Humanist and Ethical Union. Demonstrations were held in Dhaka, New York City, Washington, D.C., London, Ottawa and other cities around the world. Secularists sought to express their solidarity with those jailed for speaking their minds about religion. Protesters drew attention to those who were being persecuted for exercising free speech, seeking to convince the international community to exert influence to have the bloggers set free by the Bangladeshi government. Background The events that sparked the rallies began during the shahbag protest when Bangladeshis rallied on the streets to demand capital punishment for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Center For Inquiry
The Center for Inquiry (CFI) is a US nonprofit organization that works to mitigate belief in pseudoscience and the paranormal, as well as to fight the influence of religion in government. History The Center for Inquiry was established in 1991 by atheist philosopher and author Paul Kurtz. It brought together two organizations: the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (founded by Kurtz in 1976) and the Council for Secular Humanism (founded by Kurtz in 1980). In January 2016, CFI announced that it was merging with the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. In June 2009, Kurtz left CFI over a conflict with then-CEO Ronald A. Lindsay. Committee for Skeptical Inquiry Through the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), and its journal, ''Skeptical Inquirer'' magazine, published by the Center for Inquiry, CSI examines evidential claims of the paranormal or supernormal, including psychics, ghosts, telepathy, clairvoyance, UFOs, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch (HRW) is an international non-governmental organization, headquartered in New York City, that conducts research and advocacy on human rights. The group pressures governments, policy makers, companies, and individual human rights abusers to denounce abuse and respect human rights, and the group often works on behalf of refugees, children, migrants, and political prisoners. Human Rights Watch, in 1997, shared the Nobel Peace Prize as a founding member of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines, and it played a leading role in the 2008 treaty banning cluster munitions. The organization's annual expenses totaled $50.6 million in 2011, $69.2 million in 2014, and $75.5 million in 2017. History Human Rights Watch was co-founded by Robert L. Bernstein Jeri Laber and Aryeh Neier as a private American NGO in 1978, under the name Helsinki Watch, to monitor the then-Soviet Union's compliance with the Helsinki Accords. Helsinki Watch adopted a practice of public ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
PZ Myers
Paul Zachary Myers (born March 9, 1957) is an American biologist who founded and writes the ''Pharyngula'' science-blog. He is associate professor of biology at the University of Minnesota Morris (UMM)PZ Myers Biology Faculty from where he works in the field of . He is a critic of and the |
Hemant Mehta
Hemant Mehta (born February 25, 1983) is an American author, blogger, and atheist activist. Mehta is a regular speaker at atheist events, and has been a board member of charitable organizations such as the Secular Student Alliance and the Foundation Beyond Belief. Mehta used to run the ''Friendly Atheist'' blog on Patheos, in which he and his associates published articles several times a day, and also co-hosts a weekly podcast called the ''Friendly Atheist Podcast''. The blog stopped its activities on Patheos from December 14, 2021, as Mehta and some of his other associates moved to a new platform called OnlySky (Onlysky.media). Mehta currently also publishes on Substack. On April 1, 2020, Mehta won his first appearance on the television game show ''Jeopardy!'' Biography Mehta was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1983. He graduated from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2004 with a double degree in math and biology and began teaching in 2007. He acquired a master's degree i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Taslima Nasrin
Taslima Nasrin (born 25 August 1962) is a Bangladeshi-Swedish writer, physician, feminist, secular humanist, and activist. She is known for her writing on women's oppression and criticism of religion. Some of her books are banned in Bangladesh. She has also been blacklisted and banished from the Bengal region (both from Bangladesh and West Bengal state of India). She gained global attention by the beginning of 1990s owing to her essays and novels with feminist views and criticism of what she characterizes as all "misogynistic" religions. Nasrin has been living in exile since 1994, with multiple fatwas calling for her death. After living more than a decade in Europe and the United States, she moved to India in 2004, but was banished from the country in 2008, although she has been staying in India on a resident permit long-term, multiple-entry or 'X' visa since 2004. She now lives in New Delhi, India. Early life and career Nasrin was born to Dr. Rajab Ali and Edul Ara in Mymensi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maryam Namazie
Maryam Namazie ( fa, مریم نمازی; born 1966) is a British-Iranian secularist, communist and human rights activist, commentator, and broadcaster. Early life Most of her early work focused on refugee rights, especially in Sudan, Turkey, and Iran, and she has actively campaigned against sharia law. Namazie became well known in the mid-2000s for her pro-secularism positions and her critique of the treatment of women under Islamic regimes. In 2015, her lectures were opposed by groups labeling her as too provocative. Namazie was born in Tehran to Hushang and Mary Namazie, but left with her family in 1980 after the 1979 revolution in Iran. She has subsequently lived in India, the United Kingdom, and the United States, where she began her university at the age of 17. Career Refugee work Namazie first worked with Ethiopian refugees in Sudan. After a 1989 military coup when Islamic law was instituted in Sudan, her clandestine organisation in defence of human rights, Human Ri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mukto-Mona
Mukto-Mona is a Bengali language blog for secularists, atheists, and freethinkers. It was founded by Avijit Roy who was subsequently killed by militants in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The attackers are believed to be members of Ansarullah Bangla Team. History Mukto-Mona, meaning freethinkers in Bengali, was founded by Bangladeshi-American secular blogger Avijit Roy, who was based in Atlanta, United States. He created a Yahoo group titled Mukto-Mona 26 May 2001 which he made into a website next year. He was killed in February 2015 in Dhaka, Bangladesh by militants. His wife, Rafida Ahmed Bonya was injured in the attack. Bonya took over the management of the blog after the death of her husband. The blog was awarded The Bobs – Best of Online Activism award by Deutsche Welle in June 2015. A number of atheist bloggers associated with Muto-Mona have been targeted and killed by Islamists Islamism (also often called political Islam or Islamic fundamentalism) is a political ideology whic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Avijit Roy
Avijit Roy ( bn, অভিজিৎ রায়; 12 September 1972 – 26 February 2015) was a Bangladeshi-American engineer, online activist, writer and blogger known for creating and administrating the ''Mukto-Mona'', an Internet community for Bangladeshi freethinkers, rationalists, skeptics, atheists and humanists. Roy was an advocate of free expression in Bangladesh, coordinating Worldwide Protests for Free Expression in Bangladesh, international protests against government censorship and imprisonment of atheist bloggers. He was hacked to death by machete-wielding assailants in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on 26 February 2015; Islamic militant organization Ansarullah Bangla Team claimed responsibility for the attack. Early life and education His father, Ajoy Roy, was a professor of physics at the University of Dhaka who received the List of Ekushey Padak award recipients (2010–2019), Ekushey Padak award. Avijit earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from BUET. He earne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Inquiry
''Free Inquiry'' is a bimonthly journal of secular humanist opinion and commentary published by the Council for Secular Humanism, a program of the Center for Inquiry. Philosopher Paul Kurtz was the editor-in-chief from its inception in 1980 until stepping down in 2010. Kurtz was succeeded by Tom Flynn who worked as Editor in Chief until 2021. Paul Fidalgo was named editor in 2022, beginning with the October/November issue. Feature articles cover a wide range of topics from a freethinking perspective. Common themes are separation of church and state, science and religion, dissemination of freethought, and applied philosophy. Regular contributors include well-known scholars in the fields of science and philosophy. Controversy In Free Inquiry's April–May 2006 issue, the magazine published four of the cartoons that had originally appeared in the Danish newspaper ''Jyllands-Posten'' and that had sparked violent worldwide Muslim protests. Kurtz, editor-in-chief of Free Inquiry sa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2013 Bengali Blog Blackout
On 4 April 2013 (0700 GMT) all Bengali blogs were blacked out for an indefinite time to protest the arrest of four bloggers in Bangladesh (Moshiur Rahman Biplob, Rasel Parvez, Subrata Adhikari Shuvo and Asif Mohiuddin). The blackout was to back a demand for the unconditional release of the arrested bloggers. A fundamentalist group named ''Hefajat-e-Islam Bangladesh'' started a campaign to hang freethinking bloggers, and demanding tough blasphemy laws. In response, the government started monitoring Bengali blog sites and sending letters to their authorities to terminate the alleged "anti-religious" blogs and provide information about the alleged "anti-religious" bloggers. Individual bloggers showed their solidarity with this blackout by changing their profile photos on Facebook and by tweeting with the #MuzzleMeNot hashtag. Different international organizations expressed deep concern about taking free-thinking bloggers into custody. After 92 hours of blackout, blogs returned online ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
