Race realism and the moralistic fallacy

J. Philippe Rushton explains why science must be governed by data and that there is no place for the belief that reality must conform to our social, political, or ethical desires.

Homosexual men have significantly lower personal incomes than heterosexual individuals

A new study in the Canadian Journal of Economics provides the first evidence on sexual orientation and economic outcomes in Canada. The study found that gay men have 12% lower personal incomes and lesbians have 15% higher personal incomes than heterosexual men and women. Christopher S. Carpenter of The Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California Irvine used data from the Canadian Community Health Survey which includes standard demographic questions as well as self-reports on sexual orientation. Like previous patterns found in the U.S. and the U.K., results show that gay men have significantly lower personal incomes than similarly situated straight individuals, while lesbians have significantly higher personal incomes than straight women. Also, similar to gay and straight differences in the U.S., gay men and lesbians in Canada are more likely to live in urban areas and more highly educated than heterosexuals in Canada. "This is the first work to document statistically and economically meaningful differentials associated with sexual orientation in Canada," Carpenter concludes. "The long-term significance of the study will be to further the call for more research into the causes and consequences of gay/straight differences in Canada and elsewhere."

Women across the Democratic Republic of Congo's war-torn East are living in fear of rape

Doctors who treat the victims, who are often horrifically mutilated, fear that the threat will only grow worse when the fighting dies down and men turn their attention to the defenceless female population. In the town of Rutshuru, Constance, 45, was lying on a thin mattress in her two-room home. She had been raped by a gunman from Laurent Nkunda's rebel army. Two armed men forced open a window and shone torches inside the tiny home, shouting for Constance to open the door or they would break it down and kill everyone inside - including her husband, Jacques, 52, and their six children. "What could I do?" she said, wincing in pain. "I opened the door, they forced us to the ground and put guns to our heads, asking where the money was. I went to the bedroom and gave them $50 which we had borrowed so we could run away from the fighting." Constance's husband was taken out of the house and forced to lie down. Then a gunman returned. "He came back to the bedroom and raped me," said Constance. Doctors have told Constance (not her real name) that she will recover - physically at least. By the terrible standards of Congo's war, she was comparatively lucky, said Joseph Ciza, the director of the HealAfrica hospital, which treats the victims of sexual violence. He said that women were often shot and mutilated after being raped. Past experience suggests that rape becomes more of a danger when an outbreak of violence dies down. "When the fighting is actually happening, the number of cases goes down, because the soldiers are busy. But once it calms down, those soldiers settle into their new bases and start to terrorise the local women. It is a way of showing their power and control," said Mr Ciza. If so, the present situation - where a fragile ceasefire has been in place for almost a week - may set the stage for an increase in sexual violence. The frequency of rape in eastern Congo, which has suffered more than a decade of war, appalls aid workers. Mr Ciza's hospital admits four women on a typical day. In the last five years, it has treated more than 18,000. In neighboring South Kivu province, the United Nations reported 27,000 sexual assaults in 2006. In some villages, every single woman has reported some kind of sexual abuse, usually inflicted by armed men from Congo's shambolic national army or the dozens of local militias and rebel groups. "I've worked in Angola and Darfur and the situation there was horrific, but in Congo the scale and brutality is at a whole different level," said Martin Hartberg, the protection advisor for Oxfam in Goma. "It is as if rape has become ingrained into the culture of these armed groups. This country has to be the worst in the world to be a woman."

Is free will a myth?

Guessedworker argues that while we have choices in life, they are not of our free will.

South Africa is one of the world's most violent countries with over 50 murders committed a day

Many South African police are battling one of the world's highest crime rates without bulletproof vests or vehicles, and little training, according to a survey by opposition lawmakers. The main opposition Democratic Alliance said its parliamentarians had visited 20 police stations in six provinces for the study, which revealed glaring shortages in equipment and resources. "The equipment is there, it is just not being handed out," said DA security spokesperson Dianne Kohler-Barnard. The South African Police Services annual report issued in October 2008 said there were 165,505 bulletproof vests, 207,323 firearms and over 40,000 vehicles for the country's 140,000 police officers. She said the lack of equipment as well as insufficient training and office space was contributing to police deaths and hampering the fight against crime. South Africa is one of the world's most violent countries with over 50 murders committed a day. "Just last month, over a period of nine days, five police offers were killed," said Kohler Barnard. In the Eastern Cape, one police station used a parking garage to store evidence, and was short of basic equipment such as handcuffs, torches, first aid kits and radios while another lacked 52 cars. In many police stations detectives had not undergone the required training, and up to 20 posts stood vacant, the study said. In the richest province, Gauteng, stations struggled without enough fax machines and telephones, and didn't have proper interrogation rooms or victim support centres. "A woman who has been raped is dumped on a bench and told to tell her story to a fascinated audience," said Kohler-Barnard. Safety minister Nathi Mthethwa said in reply to a parliamentary question by the DA that he would no longer answer queries related to police resources because this would "impact negatively on our operational deployments of human and material resources."

Related: SA's major destination point for sex slaves

A young woman recently stoned to death in Somalia first pleaded for her life, a witness has said

"Don't kill me, don't kill me," she said, according to the man who wanted to remain anonymous. A few minutes later, more than 50 men threw stones. Human rights group Amnesty International says the victim was a 13-year-old girl who had been raped. Initial reports had said she was a 23-year-old woman who had confessed to adultery before a Sharia court. Numerous eye-witnesses say she was forced into a hole, buried up to her neck then pelted with stones until she died in front of more than 1,000 people. Meanwhile, Islamists in the capital, Mogadishu have carried out a public flogging.

Sex appeal and offspring

Dienekes has some interesting research on the influence of parents' facial characteristics on children.

Related: Beautiful parents have more daughters

Women prefer looks over brains

Half Sigma explains why Bill Gates isn't too popular with the ladies. Of course men are no better when it comes to their mate preferences.

Louis Farrakhan and William Ayers vote at same polling location as Barack Obama

I wonder who will they vote for?

Barack Obama's Kenyan family to celebrate by slaughtering bulls, chicken and goats

Rob Crilly explains how they celebrate political victories in Kenya.

What McCain should have done

Steve Sailer explains what the GOP should have done if the party wanted to win the election.

Related: But Where Did Bush Go Wrong?

Will the United States break up?

John Schwenkler on the growth of the Secessionist movement.

Barack Obama's Kenyan aunt is an illegal immigrant

Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama has said he didn't know his aunt was living in the United States illegally and believes that laws covering the situation should be followed. Obama's aunt had been instructed to leave the country four years ago by an immigration judge who rejected her request for asylum from her native Kenya. The woman, Zeituni Onyango (zay-TUHN on-YANG-oh), is living in public housing in Boston and is the half-sister of Obama's late father. A statement the Obama campaign said, "Senator Obama has no knowledge of her status but obviously believes that any and all appropriate laws be followed." Traveling with Obama in Nevada, campaign strategist David Axelrod declined to elaborate on the statement, but said: "I think people are suspicious about stories that surface in the last 72 hours of a national campaign." An adviser to Republican John McCain's campaign, Mark Salter, said he had no comment on the reports about Obama's relative. "It's a family matter," Salter said. The campaign said it was returning $260 that Onyango had contributed in small increments to Obama's presidential bid over several months. Federal election law prohibits foreigners from making political donations. Onyango listed her employer as the Boston Housing Authority and last gave $5 on Sept. 19, 2008. Onyango, 56, is part of Obama's large paternal family, with many related to him by blood whom he never knew growing up. Obama's father, Barack Obama Sr., left the future presidential nominee when the boy was 2, and they reunited only once - for a monthlong visit when Obama was 10. The elder Obama lived most of his life in Kenya, where he fathered seven other children with three other wives. He died in a car crash in 1982. Obama was raised for the most part by his mother and her parents in Hawaii. He first met his father's side of the family when he traveled to Africa 20 years ago. He referred to Onyango as "Auntie Zeituni" when describing the trip in his memoir, saying she was "a proud woman." Obama's campaign said he had seen her a few times since that meeting, beginning with a return trip to Kenya with his future wife, Michelle, in 1992. Onyango visited the family in Chicago on a tourist visa at Obama's invitation about nine years ago, the campaign said, stopping to visit friends on the East Coast before returning to Kenya.

A West African regional court has ruled that the government of Niger failed to protect a young woman sold into slavery at the age of 12

The landmark ruling, the first of its kind by a regional tribunal now sitting in Niamey, Niger’s capital, ordered the government to pay about $19,000 in damages to the woman, Hadijatou Mani, who is now 24. Slavery is outlawed throughout Africa, but it persists in pockets of Niger, Mali, Mauritania and amid conflicts like the one in northern Uganda. Antislavery organizations estimate that 43,000 people are enslaved in Niger alone, where nomadic tribes like the Tuareg and Toubou have for centuries held members of other ethnic groups as slaves. Ms. Mani’s experience was typical of the practice. She was born into a traditional slave class and sold to Souleymane Naroua when she was 12 for about $500. Ms. Mani told court officials that Mr. Naroua had forced her to work his fields for a decade. She also claimed that he raped her repeatedly over the years. “I was beaten so many times I would run back to my family,” she said. “Then after a day or two I would be brought back."

Four persons stabbed in downtown Oslo by a Somali with a record of violence were in stable condition after their frightening ordeal

Their attacker was in police custody and being held at a psychiatric hospital. The stabbing drama suddenly played out around the Gunerius shopping complex. One witness said he and his wife were walking down the pedestrian street Brugata after a theater visit, when a man came walking "quietly and calmly" towards them. "Suddenly he raised his arm and he was holding a big Rambo-like knife," the man told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK). "My wife yelled 'RUN,' and we ran into a nearby café and yelled for everyone to stay inside and call the police." The knife-wielding man proceeded to go on a stabbing spree, randomly assaulting passersby including one woman who was stabbed in the throat, a man whom he stabbed in the arm and another man who was stabbed while waiting for the tram in Storgata. Police were finally able to apprehend the assailant, a 36-year-old man from Somalia, inside a local parking garage. He has a police record after earlier incidents involving possession of narcotics and violence. "It would be wrong to say he was arrested without any drama," Lasse Alver of the Oslo Police District said. "It seemed as though he was trying to attack everyone and anyone he came across." Two persons were sent to Ullevål Hospital while two others were treated at a local emergency clinic. One witness said the man had been carrying the knife in a plastic bag, and pulled it out as he encountered potential victims. He ultimately threw the knife down and ran. "He seemed unstable," said Alver after the arrest was made. "He just wanted to attack anyone he saw."

Skin color, vitamin D and sexual selection

Peter Frost argues that the selection for skin color has more to do with sexual selection than with vitamin D.

Related: Evolutionary perspective on the genetics of osteoporosis

Black and white children and cheating on test scores

Half Sigma reports on a Principal who was changing the test scores of black children to make it appear as if they were doing as well as white children.

Related: Surprising finding: blacks score lower on standardized tests

Barack Obama: the Half-Blood Prince

Steve Sailer has a new book out on Obama examining the Democrat's obsession with race.

A woman in Somalia has been stoned to death after an Islamic Sharia law court found her guilty of adultery

The woman was buried up to her neck and then pelted to death with stones in front of a large crowd in Kismayo. It was the first such execution in the southern port city since Islamist insurgents captured it from government-allied forces in August 2008. A local Islamist leader said the woman, Aisho Ibrahim Dhuhulow, had pleaded guilty to committing adultery. "She was asked several times to review her confession but she stressed that she wanted Sharia law and the deserved punishment to apply," said Sheikh Hayakallah. A group of men performed the execution in one of the city's main squares in front of thousands of people.

An African has been jailed for 30 years for murdering British exchange student Meredith Kercher in Italy

Rudy Hermann Guede, originally from the Ivory Coast, was found guilty after a trial behind closed doors. Miss Kercher, 21, from south London, was found dead at a house she shared in Perugia on 2 November 2007. Her throat had been cut. Judge Paolo Micheli also ruled that Raffaele Sollecito, 24, and Amanda Knox, 21, should face a murder trial. Leeds University student Miss Kercher, from Coulsdon, had been in the Umbrian town as part of her European Studies degree. Prosecutors claimed she was killed as part of a bungled sex game involving Guede, her housemate Miss Knox, from Seattle, and the American's ex-boyfriend Mr Sollecito, from Bari, southern Italy.