Volume 119 Issue 4 July/August 2004

Cover Story

Driving out the demons: They brandish crosses, sprinkle holy water and have grown in number from 20 to 300 in ten years. Orlando Radice charts the renaissance of Italys exorcists

Courage and Commitment: Jim Herrick reports from Africas first humanist conference
Give us a sign: Why shouldn't humanists have their own code for conveying solidarity, asks Alan Brownjohn
Reaching the Untouchables: Ken Hunt calls for an end to a pernicious form of mind control
Moral Monopoly: Evan Harris warns of the dangers of religious lobbying
Pie in the sky: Laurie Taylor tastes the delights of a very creative city
Pyrrhic victory: Editorial

The other side of the street: Laurie Taylor interviews Stan Cohen: Sociologist Stan Cohen, who died on 7 January 2013, spent his life analysing and opposing injustice and inhumanity. In this extended interview from 2004, he talks to his friend and collaborator Laurie Taylor about torture, social control and our extraordinary capacity to deny
Why I'm glad my daughter had under-age sex: Amid the clamours for censorship, celibacy and an end to teenagers' rights to confidentiality, Sally Feldman fulminates against the misguided moral crusaders
Europe's Malcolm X: Dyab Abou Jahjah is thirtytwo years old. He was born in Lebanon, which he left at the age of nineteen for asylum in Belgium, even though he now happily admits that in reality he was an economic migrant. After holding a trade union position looking after the interests of migrant workers, he founded the AEL in February 2000. Rosemary Bechler met him in the old community centre in Borgerhout, the Moroccan district of Antwerp
Writhing on Ecstasy: Acid House inspired even the most unlikely ravers to brave the dance floor. But did it leave anything behind once the high was over, asks Caspar Melville
Steal this idea: Frank Jordans welcomes an ingenious liberation from copyright law
Cultural obscenity or badge of honour?: David Dunkley Gyimah explores the myriad meanings of a forbidden word

Good without God: Jim Herrick reconciles the mystic and the rational
Passing the time: Peter Cave is irritated by Gallic philosophy
A Heroine in Tibet: Julia Simpkins on a writer's journey to Tibet
Spreading freedom: Toby Saul keeps on rocking in a free world
Baby talk: Jonathan Rée on the scientist in all of us
Burntout case: Stuart Sim descends into the murky world of the crime novel
All men won't be brothers: A poem by Keith Morton
Sculpted insights: Sally Feldman on Carol Shield's bid for immortality
Don't touch the product: Pádraig Reidy falls under the spell of a preacher man
Has doom had its day?: Andrew Tudor on the decline of the disaster movie