Free Republic

When “Black Lives Matter” was born in the ashes of the riots in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014, they were rightly considered a fringe group by most Americans. Violence has always been part of their mantra. Particularly repulsive was their call in public marches for the murder of police officers (“Pigs in a blanket, fry ‘em like bacon!” and “What do we want? Dead cops. When do we want it? Now!”) They are loudly and unapologetically racist. All of this was quite out in the open.

Amanda Norris, the executive director of Chik-fil-A’s menu, told Business Insider that “a vegetarian option or a vegan option is something we're looking at, we're thinking about, and have some research and development." According to the report, Chick-fil-A has been researching vegan menu items for a few years at this point. "We've kind of been watching it, and now we are moving more from the watch stage and getting into that understand, or really imagine stage,” Norris said. There are reportedly five stages all new menu items and initiatives must go through before launch at Chick-fil-A: Understand, imagine, prototype, validate and...

Tourist who took pebbles from Cornwall beach is forced to travel hundreds of miles to bring them back or face £1,000 fine. There's nothing like taking a pebble home from the beach to remind you of those holiday good times. But beware where you pick them up from – one man who took some from a Cornish beauty spot found himself being hunted down by officials who demanded them back. In the end he was forced to travel hundreds of miles to return them or face prosecution. The case emerged after complaints that beach visitors are being 'aggressively' threatened with...

You may have heard about the Italian Neurosurgeon, Sergio Canavero, who plans to carry out the world’s first human head transplant next year. Having secured a volunteer for the operation, the professor has just unveiled a virtual reality system that will hopefully “prepare patients for life in a new body,” an experience that could cause unexpected psychological reactions. Professor Canavero is determined to perform the operation in 2017 on wheelchair user Valery Spiridonov, who runs an educational software company in Russia and suffers from the muscle-wasting Werdnig-Hoffman disease. Assuming the complex transplant take place, Spiridonov will have his head nearly...

Students at Hillsboro High School in Hillsboro, Missouri, staged a walkout Monday to protest a transgender student who is being permitted by the school to use the facility's women's restrooms, despite being a biological male.

I’m sure you’ve seen them in the media: attractive, well-off, smiling parents holding adorable infants created by third-party reproduction and assisted reproductive technologies (ART). Of course, the narrative goes, this development is a win-win for all. Who could object to children being created for those who through either infertility or biological sex are unable to reproduce? But this picture hides the highly profitable fertility industry’s dirty secrets. It ignores what is required to create these children: exploitation, health endangerment, and the commodification of human life. An honest look at the facts and circumstances surrounding third-party reproduction and ART should...

David Quarrey presents his diplomatic credentials to President Rivlin, who invites Queen Elizabeth II to visit the region The first openly gay British ambassador presented his credentials to President Reuven Rivlin during an official ceremony in Jerusalem last week. David Quarrey introduced his spouse, Aldo Oliver Henriquez, to Rivlin during the event at the President’s Residence. Rivlin welcomed the ambassador, who took up his post in July, and told him of his hopes in using Quarrey’s diplomatic experience for confidence-building measures in the region. “During your term here, we will celebrate the centenary of the Balfour Declaration, which perhaps marks...

This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come. For men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, Without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those that are good, Traitors, heady, highminded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God; Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof: from such turn away.( 2 Timothy 3:1-5)For those who have the stomach- here is a short , viral video making the rounds. I wouldn’t blame you for not seeing it, for it is shocking....

A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official cited an “epidemic” of syphilis among homosexual men during an event Thursday by a lobbying group pushing for an increase in federal funding for sexually transmitted disease prevention from $157 million to $212 million. “We’re also seeing what we are calling pretty much an epidemic of syphilis among men who have sex with men – that really started in the early – 2000, 2002, but we’ve seen a dramatic increase since 2008,” Dr. Gail Bolan, director of CDC’s Division of STD Prevention, said at a briefing by the National Coalition of STD...

Gov. Bobby Jindal declared that he won't be backing down from the fight over same-sex marriage or Louisiana's controversial religious freedom bill in an opinion piece for The New York Times Thursday morning. (April 23). Jindal said he will continue to back the legislation that some have called discriminatory, even if more businesses leaders come out against the bill. In the essay, he chastises conservative leaders in Arkansas and Indiana over bowing to pressure "That political leaders in both states quickly cowered amid the shrieks of big business and the radical left should alarm us all," Jindal writes.

This latest story from our brave new world may blow your mind, so I’ll read straight from the Chicago Tribune: “A white Ohio woman is suing a Downers Grove-based sperm bank, alleging that the company mistakenly gave her vials from an African-American donor, a fact that she said has made it difficult for her and her same-sex partner to raise their now 2-year-old daughter in an all-white community.” Now, I don’t doubt the lesbian couple’s love for the child. But I find it troubling which challenges the couple was willing and isn’t willing to tolerate. They’re suing because of the...

There's never been a better reason to share one of the most intimate moments of anyone's life. Toronto couple BJ Barone and Frankie Nelson welcomed newborn son Milo into the world on June 27, just as WorldPride was being celebrated in the city amid an outpouring of love for families of all kinds.

Child of surrogacy campaigns to outlaw the practice Jessica Kern, a donor-conceived child, wants tighter controls over laws governing assisted reproduction. When Jessica Kern gave evidence to lawmakers in Washington, DC, last summer opposing the legalization of surrogacy in the district, she was pointedly asked why she wasn’t grateful for the procedure that created her. “The question was so simple and dismissive,” she recalls. “Like I would choose this for myself? When the only reason you’re in this world is a big fat paycheck, it’s degrading.” Kern, 30, of Culpepper, Va. — the product of the old-fashioned, traditional method...

In a paper published in the journal Nature, bioengineers at The Scripps Research Institute in the San Diego neighborhood of La Jolla said they had successfully inserted two synthetic molecules into the genome of an Escherichia coli bacterium, which survived and passed on the new genetic material. In addition to the naturally occurring nucleotides adenine, thymine, guanine and cytosine, which form the rungs of DNA’s double-helix structure, the bacterium carried two more base-pair partners, which study authors have dubbed d5SICS and dNaM. For more than a decade, scientists have been experimenting with so-called unnatural base pairs, or UBPs, saying they...

To most ears, it probably sounds inoffensive. A little outdated and clinical, perhaps, but innocuous enough: homosexual. But that five-syllable word has never been more loaded, more deliberately used and, to the ears of many gays and lesbians, more pejorative. “ ‘Homosexual’ has the ring of ‘colored’ now, in the way your grandmother might have used that term, except that it hasn’t been recuperated in the same way,” said George Chauncey, a Yale professor of history and an author who studies gay and lesbian culture. Consider the following phrases: homosexual community, homosexual activist, homosexual marriage. Substitute the word “gay” in...

The Alliance Defending Freedom is making its case to defend traditional marriage in Oklahoma, arguing same-sex marriage is bad for children. The Christian legal advocacy group said legalizing gay marriage would harm children, undermine society, and make traditional marriages unstable. Lawyers representing an Oklahoma clerk who refused to grant a marriage license to a same-sex couple cited courts and anthropologists in saying children are better off in a home with a mother and a father. They also added traditional couples would be less likely to marry, or stay together if marriage became a genderless institution not focused on procreation. Last...

Jesus Christ would absolutely bake a cake for a gay person. He’d bake a cake for a straight person. He’d bake a cake for a girl, a boy, a person who isn’t sure what they are, a black person, a white person — Jesus would bake that cake if it, in some way large or small, drew that person closer to Him. And Christians should too. Christians should show love and compassion to gays, straights, and everyone else. Christians should show God’s love in hopes of drawing people to a relationship with Christ. 95% of that may just be relationship...

Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) introduced a bill Thursday to ensure states don’t have to adhere to the federal definition of “marriage” and “spouse.” S. 2024, the State Marriage Defense Act, would require that the federal government give the same deference to the 33 states that define marriage as the union between one man and one woman as it does to the 17 states that recognize same-sex unions. “Under President Obama, the federal government has tried to re-define marriage, and to undermine the constitutional authority of each state to define marriage consistent with the values of its...

<p>Topeka resident William Marotta had argued that he had waived his parental rights and didn’t intend to be a father.</p> <p>Shawnee County District Judge Mary Mattivi rejected that claim, saying the parties didn’t involve a licensed physician. “The parties failed to perform to statutory requirement of the Kansas Parentage Act in not enlisting a licensed physician in the artificial insemination process, and the parties’ self-designation of (Marotta) as a sperm donor is insufficient to relieve (Marotta) of parental right and responsibilities to the child,” Mattivi wrote.</p>

Secretary Kerry: U.S. deeply concerned by Nigeria’s enactment of the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act Deep Concern with Nigeria’s Enactment of the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act Press Statement John Kerry Secretary of State Washington, DC January 13, 2014 The United States is deeply concerned by Nigeria’s enactment of the Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act. Beyond even prohibiting same sex marriage, this law dangerously restricts freedom of assembly, association, and expression for all Nigerians. Moreover, it is inconsistent with Nigeria’s international legal obligations and undermines the democratic reforms and human rights protections enshrined in its 1999 Constitution. People everywhere deserve...