Year: 2019

The “Reluctant Activist”: Being Outed as an Atheist in a Muslim-Majority Country

Published by Sam

Secular Rescue’s mission is predominantly rooted in protecting emboldened atheist activists whose lives have become the targets of extremists because of public or social-media based human rights advocacy. It is relatively easy to spot an activist from a sideliner: nearly all or a majority of activist writing focuses on the inhumanity of hateful intolerance against those who choose no religion over some faith. However, many of those who seek emergency assistance from the Center for Inquiry’s Secular Rescue program are deemed “reluctant activists”: those who do not intentionally engage in public advocacy for freedom of conscience or the freedom to not believe in God but nevertheless become de facto activists. Such is the case of Ali, a young Tunisian ex-Muslim who was outed in his community, in a public way, as an apostate from Islam. He didn’t deny it and continued to try to live a secular life but was persistently harassed and unable to find work—declined because of his atheism. Like most atheists in Muslim-majority countries, early threats came from family: he was threatened …

Genetic Engineering to Clash With Evolution

Genetic Engineering to Clash With Evolution

Published by José

In a crowded auditorium at New York’s Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in August, Philipp Messer, a population geneticist at Cornell University, took the stage to discuss a powerful and controversial new application for genetic engineering: gene drives. Gene drives can force a trait through a population, defying the usual rules of inheritance. A specific trait ordinarily has a 50-50 chance of being passed along to the next generation. A gene drive could push that rate to nearly 100 percent. The genetic dominance would then continue in all future generations. You want all the fruit flies in your lab to have light eyes? Engineer a drive for eye color, and soon enough, the fruit flies’ offspring will have light eyes, as will their offspring, and so on for all future generations. Gene drives may work in any species that reproduces sexually, and they have the potential to revolutionize disease control, agriculture, conservation and more. Scientists might be able to stop mosquitoes from spreading malaria, for example, or eradicate an invasive species. The technology represents the first …

From Sudan to Kenya: A Secular Rescue Success Story

Published by Sam

Secular Rescue is a program of the Center for Inquiry that identifies those writers, activists, and everyday citizens in countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Iraq who live under the threat of violence and death and provides financial and diplomatic assistance to help them escape to safety. The Center for Inquiry’s international work for free expression and the rights of the nonreligious comes in many forms and takes place in different arenas, but they are not mutually exclusive. Here’s an example of what happens when different programs support the other and become better in the process. For International Blasphemy Rights Day last year, CFI published a short piece by Sudanese writer Mohamed Salih Aldsogi, “On Apostasy And Blasphemy In Sudan,” in which he explained the relatively recent history of the country’s blasphemy laws. “This oppressive state of affairs that robs citizens of their basic freedoms of thought and expression has to end,” he wrote, concluding, “Sudanese secular humanists have a major role to play in making such a future possible.” It’s no surprise, then, that …

Defying Fear: Secular Rescue Story

Published by Sam

Secular Rescue is a program of the Center for Inquiry that identifies those writers, activists, and everyday citizens in countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Iraq who live under the threat of violence and death and provides financial and diplomatic assistance to help these them escape to safety. Nur E Emroz Alam “Tonoy” is known in Bangladesh for his columns at major news outlets such as the Dhaka Tribune, where he has taken on controversial issues, championed equality and free inquiry, and aimed a critical eye at extremist religious beliefs and political ideologies. But as has become sadly predictable in Bangladesh, his work has made him a target for those very extremists. Overwhelmed by threats to his life, Tonoy fled Bangladesh and began to seek the help he needed to keep himself alive and to keep writing. Tonoy reached out to Secular Rescue and told us in no uncertain terms, “I’ll certainly be killed if returned to Bangladesh.” He feared murder at the hands of Islamist militants, such as those who slaughtered Avijit Roy and several …

Durba’s Escape: Secular Rescue Story

Published by Sam

Secular Rescue is a program of the Center for Inquiry that identifies those writers, activists, and everyday citizens in countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Iraq who live under the threat of violence and death and provides financial and diplomatic assistance to help these them escape to safety. A woman going by the name of Durba Zahan has been at the epicenter of the crisis from before the time of the Center for Inquiry’s direct involvement with the threats to secularists and free expression in Bangladesh. A student of art and history, Durba was familiar with the work of the secularist bloggers and activists that had been hacked to death or gunned down for their outspoken criticism of religious extremism. In 2013, hardline religious political parties cast women bloggers as threats to the state. “They tagged us as being whores, that we did not belong to good families and we should be raped and killed,” Durba told us. That same year, fellow atheist blogger Rajib Haidar was hacked to death. It would be the first …