How to defend free speech
With the persecution of Salman Rushdie, the continuing furore over ‘offensive cartoons’, and polluters, dictators and terrorist bagmen using British libel law to shield their misdeeds from public scrutiny, the…
Human Rights & Ethics
I may as well be a unicorn
As an African-American atheist woman Jamila Bey wonders if she even exists
Cartoon cowardice shames our press
In the aftermath of the firebombing of Charlie Hebdo, reprints of the magazine's Muhammad cover were conspicuous by their absence, notices Frederick Stjernfelt
Book review: The Secrets of Pain by Phil Rickman
Natalie Haynes endures a painful crime novel
The revolution is coming
Can orgasms change the world? Sally Feldman revisits the politics of the climax
Censorship on the terraces
Legislation aimed at football chants will not tackle Scotland's sectarian violence, argues Padraig Reidy
The rise of the female suicide bomber
Al-Qaeda leaders are increasingly in favour of using women in terrorist attacks, reports Mia Bloom
The cutting season: Female Genital Mutilation and the UK
Over the school holidays hundreds of British girls are taken abroad to undergo a procedure that is internationally recognised as a violation of their human rights. Alice Onwordi reports
Norway’s tragedy calls for perspective
We must respond to extremism by protecting liberal values, argues Kenan Malik
Equal in love?
Peter Tatchell says it is time to end the twin bans on gay civil marriages and heterosexual civil partnerships