Free Republic

In a case of "Whose life is it anyway?" a state appeals court ruled yesterday that a mentally handicapped woman has no say over whether she should be kept alive on life support. In the unanimous decision, a five-judge panel ruled that the 26-year-old - who says she wants to be kept on life support in the event she's felled by illness or an accident - isn't competent to make that decision. Instead, her mother, who is her legal guardian, gets to make the call - and she doesn't want her daughter on life support. A lawyer for the woman,...

ALI: A lot of 'em got careers, working for and with their brothers, but you don't find 'em in no white man's office in downtown New York working behind secretarial desks. Too many black women been used in offices. And not even in bed -- on the floor. We know it because we got office Negroes who've told us this. So we protect our women, 'cause women are the field that produces our nation. And if you can't protect your women, you can't protect your nation. Man, I was in Chicago a couple of months ago and saw a white...

A foreign same-sex couple battling a local Thai surrogate for custody over their infant daughter said Wednesday their lives had been "destroyed" by the 14-month legal war that has prevented their family from returning home. Manuel Valero, from Spain, and his American husband Gordon Lake, both 41, were blocked from leaving Thailand with their daughter Carmen after the surrogate refused to sign necessary paperwork following the birth last January.

A Saudi woman who defied a driving ban in the kingdom was injured and her companion killed when their car overturned in the northern Hael province, a police spokesman said on Monday. "One woman was immediately killed and her companion who was driving the car was hospitalised after she suffered several injuries" when their four-wheel-drive vehicle overturned late on Saturday, said police spokesman Abdulaziz al-Zunaidi. Ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world where women are not allowed to drive.

This month, a jury may decide if the 54-year-old founder of the Galveston Ornithological Society was acting within his rights when he impeded the progress of a bird-stalking predator by means of a bullet. Mr. Stevenson is due to stand trial for felony cat murder. "There are people with the wrong perception of this," he said in his Chevy compact on a stormy morning, driving along a wide beach at Galveston Island's western tip, where curlews, egrets, stilts and herons strut in the tide pools. He stopped at the pilings beneath the San Luis Pass bridge: the scene of the...

What do Cinderella, Pinocchio, Madame Bovary, and the Frankenstein monster share? They are among the many motherless characters that populate Western literature, and they all highlight the difficulty and suffering inherent in motherlessness. Recently, these stories have become relevant in an entirely new way. On May 16th, a Maryland State Court of Appeals decision determined that children born to surrogate mothers—with whom they have no genetic connection—can be legally motherless. In August 2001, a surrogate mother—or “gestational carrier”—gave birth to the biological twin daughters of a man identified as Roberto d.B. When the hospital put the surrogate’s name on the...

The Museum of the Confederacy will likely drop the word "Confederacy" from its name when it moves its collection to a new home.

I won't be intimidated for expressing my viewsPeople who object to her criticism of Islam should take her to court rather than take the law into their own hands, Dutch MP Ayaan Hirsi Ali tells Abi Daruvalla. Hirsi Ali has been moved to a safe house following new death threats and the publication of her private address on an Islamic website just four days after her controversial film 'Submission' was screened on Dutch TV. Ayaan Hirsi Ali was always irritated at the lack of freedom under Islam Somali-born Hirsi Ali, 34, is herself a former Muslim and an outspoken...

ID Cards for Saudi Women: "Historic Decision" "The Hijra Year 1422 (2001-2002) should be remembered as a year of victory for women. It is the year in which the authorities decided to issue separate ID cards to women; the decision was made after a long and tireless period of waiting. It was social considerations rather than religious teachings which delayed this historic decision. The ID card is women's defense against exploitation and impersonation — to both of which they have often been subject." "Though a separate ID card for women in no way violates Islamic principles, some people objected in...