Free Republic

It’s not often that we think or talk about the religious beliefs of our favorite superheroes, barring the times when writers blatantly state from where these characters are coming. For example, we’re all aware of how Daredevil’s a devout Catholic, or how Batwoman’s Jewish. Speaking of which, the latest issue of Batman really hammered home the point that the Dark Knight is, in fact, an atheist. I mean, it’s technically nothing new and has been somewhat explored in the past (I believe it was Broken City that briefly touched on this before), but the latest entry into Tom King’s ongoing...

The Satanic Temple unveiled its statue Thursday of a goat-headed, winged creature called Baphomet during a First Amendment rally at the Arkansas State Capitol to protest a Ten Commandments monument already on the Capitol grounds. With Satanists, atheists and Christians among those in attendance, several speakers called for the removal of the Ten Commandments monument or for state government officials to install Baphomet as well. The Satanic Temple said the Ten Commandments monument violates constitutional freedom of religion rights and that installation of their statue will demonstrate religious tolerance. Satanic Arkansas cofounder Ivy Forrester, who helped organize the rally,...

Younger baby boomers are the most likely age group to toss and turn over political worries Suffering from insomnia? Here’s a quick cure: stop caring about politics so much. A new study shows that one in seven Americans are so riled up about politics that they’re losing sleep over it, according to a survey conducted for Bankrate.com. That adds up to 34 million people, more than those who lose sleep over health care costs or paying rent. The more education and money Americans have, the more they lie awake over political worries, the survey found. Twenty percent of those with...

“Queer Eye” star Jonathan Van Ness had to defend himself on Wednesday after he was ripped for urging his fans to be tolerant of other ideas and saying that not all Republicans were evil and racist. Van Ness decided to get political on Twitter following the results of Tuesday’s primary results. “Luckily a lot [of] extreme right people won yesterday, meaning that if we can come up w center left candidates we can take back the house & senate, not to mention many state legislatures. It is so important for the left to not go too left or we are...

n Afghan teenager who said he feared being persecuted in his home country for being gay has had his asylum application rejected by Austria after an official said he did not “walk, act or dress” like a gay man, according to reports. An official in Lower Austria found no grounds for fear of persecution based on the sexual orientation of the 18-year-old, the Falter newspaper reported. “The way you walk, act or dress does not show even in the slightest that you could be homosexual,” the official reportedly wrote in his assessment rejecting the claim. The official also found “potential...

A French doctor claiming he can treat homosexuality using alternative therapies like homeopathy was on Wednesday placed under investigation by the Swiss canton of Geneva where he has been practicing. Regional health minister Mauro Poggia asked a commission overseeing health professionals and patient rights in the canton to open an investigation into the practice of Dr. Jean-Yves Henry, he told the Le Courrier daily in an interview. “For him, it would seem that homosexuality is an illness to cure. This element is enough to justify opening an investigation,” Poggia was quoted as saying. […] Henry, who is a licenced general...

More than a dozen community groups have called on Rep. Bettie Cook Scott (D-Detroit) to apologize for a series of racial slurs sources say she used to describe her primary election opponent, Rep. Stephanie Chang (D-Detroit). Scott is alleged to have referred to Chang as "ching-chang" and "the ching-chong" to multiple voters outside polling precincts during last Tuesday's election. She's also said to have called one of Chang's campaign volunteers an “immigrant,” saying “you don’t belong here” and “I want you out of my country.”

A high school in New Jersey is getting off to a “clean” start this year. The principal discovered students were being bullied for coming to class with dirty clothes, so he’s giving them a chance to go from the classroom into the laundry room, all under the same roof, CBS2’s Lisa Rozner reported Wednesday.

New York Jets' senior manager of partnerships Anthony Bulak reached out to Blue Lives Matter founder Joe Imperatrice in hopes of partnering with the organization this season only to be rejected immediately, according to The New York Post. Imperatrice refused the proposal on the grounds that the current NFL political climate does not align with the group's mission of respecting first responders. The pro-cop non-profit cited the current NFL protests as a sign of disrespect towards "our first responders, our military members both past and present and our flag."

For decades, Russia has suffered a brain and youth drain: According to federal statistics agency Rosstat, more than 300,000 people left the country in 2016. A recent survey conducted by the state-funded pollster VTsIOM shows that 1 out of 10 Russians want to leave the country. Notably, one out of four of those questioned in the poll could name a relative or acquaintance who had moved away from Russia in recent years. Young Russians were especially keen to move: Among those aged 18 to 24, almost one-third (31 percent) of respondents said they wanted to leave the country. VTsIOM said...

The body of a missing pregnant mother has been found hours after her husband confessed to killing her and their two daughters after pretending to not know where they were for days. The body of Shanann Watts, 34, was found on Thursday at the Andarko oil and gas site where her husband Christopher works near their home in Frederick, Colorado. The bodies of the children's two daughters Bella, four, and Celeste, three, are yet to be found but police say they know where they are and are in the process of recovering them.

Seven leading members of the religious cult Aum Shinrikyō, including its founder Matsumoto Chizuo (Asahara Shōkō), were executed on July 6, 2018, for their roles in masterminding a series of major crimes including the March 1995 sarin gas attack on Tokyo subway lines that resulted in the deaths of 13 people [snip]...The decision to execute prisoners now is said to have been based on the difficulty of doing so in 2019, as the year of the imperial succession, or 2020, when the Tokyo Olympic Games will take place.

In the well-to-do town of New Canaan, Conn., families pay top dollar to live on picturesque New England streets, frequent the area’s upscale boutiques and send their children to some of the best schools in the state. But in recent years, a scandal had quietly been brewing at a couple of those schools: Someone had been taking the children’s lunch money — after it had been paid. For years, cash was disappearing from cafeteria registers at the high school and middle school, apparently unbeknown to school officials. Nearly $500,000 was pilfered from 2012 through 2017, the authorities said. On Monday,...

The first college or university in the nation is installing Alexa-enabled Amazon Echo Dots in every single dorm room across campus. St. Louis University, a private four-year university in Missouri’s capital city, unveiled a plan to install 2,300 intelligent assistant-enabled Echo Dots in residence halls and student apartments before classes begin later this month. The Alexa-enabled Echo Dots will be programmed to answer over 100 specific questions about the campus and student activities, such as the hours for the library or a list of upcoming public lectures.

FREDERICK, Colo. -- Denver7’s Jace Larson has been told by two law enforcement officials that the husband of the missing Frederick family has confessed to killing them and officials believe they know where the bodies are. The law enforcement officials said police were in the process of recovering the bodies late Wednesday, adding Chris Watts had been detained. A cause and manner of death have yet to be determined.

The inexorable rise of identity condiments has led to hard times for the most American of foodstuffs. And that’s a shame. [snip] Along about a decade ago, though, I began to notice I was toting home as much of my offerings as I’d concocted. My contributions were being overlooked — or shunned. Why should this be? Mom’s extraordinary potato salad — fragrant with dill, spiced by celery seed — went untouched on the picnic table. So did her macaroni salad, and her chicken salad, and her deviled eggs. … When I carted home a good three pounds of painstakingly prepared...

There were three unconnected jihad attacks yesterday in widely separated places: London, Philadelphia, and Dordogne. The three lone mujahideen used divers methods in these attacks. In Westminster the weapon of choice was a car; in Philadelphia it was a gun; and in Périgueux it was a knife (two knives, actually). The attackers in Europe were immigrants; the one in Pennsylvania was an African American. The three incidents have these characteristics in common: 1. They were low-grade jihad attacks, as such things go. Nobody was killed, and only a handful of people were wounded in each case. 2.The three attackers —...

Vanderbilt University has changed the name and description of a scheduled workshop that accused “white women” of failing to do enough to combat white supremacy. After Campus Reform reached out to Vanderbilt for information about the workshop, which was originally described as including reflections on “white fragility, radicalism, emotional labor, safe spaces, gaslighting, and...documented case studies from activist spaces,” the university quickly and quietly altered both the name and description of the event.

If you haven’t watched “Nanette,” Hannah Gadsby’s fearless comedy special on Netflix, do that now. (We’ll wait.) In it, Ms. Gadsby takes on the fragility of masculinity — and at one point drills into Pablo Picasso, who, well into his 40s, had an affair with a teenage girl. Ms. Gadsby, who has a degree in art history, recounted how Picasso justified the relationship by claiming that he and the girl, Marie-Thérèse Walter, were both in their prime. Seething, Ms. Gadsby said: “A 17-year-old girl is never in her prime. Ever! I am in my prime.” She is 40.

The maker of Corona and Modelo beers in October took a 9.9 percent stake in the Canadian cannabis company. The deal included the option for future investments, giving Constellation a first toehold in an industry the brewer said it expects to soon be legalized across the United States. Shares of Canopy Growth surged 23.2 percent in Wednesday trading, while Constellation's stock fell 8.9 percent. With this latest investment and the execution of some warrants, Constellation says its stake will become 38 percent of Canopy. Constellation also received an opportunity over the next three years to buy up to 139.7 million...