You might recall that last month an American businesswoman in the great, freedom-loving nation of Saudi Arabia was arrested, strip-searched, finger-printed, and detained for having the audacity of hanging out in a Starbucks with a man who wasn't a relative.

Spurred in part by the infamy of this incident, a brave female journalist with Arab News is now posing some tough questions for the famously brutal Saudi religious police (Known as the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice).

Among the questions she's seeking answers for: "Why is having coffee in a public place with an unrelated man considered 'illegal seclusion'?"; "Is a strip search really necessary for women arrested for khulwa (illegal seclusion)?"; and finally, "Is brutally beating a suspect to death a form of promoting virtue or preventing vice?"

We here at the Professor Politico Show commend this woman for her courage in trying to put a cruel and corrupt system on trial.

From BoingBoing.com:

The Chinese government this week dispatched military troops and police to important monasteries in Tibet to crack down on the largest protests by ethnic Tibetan Buddhist monks in the Himalayan region in 20 years. Witnesses are reporting that trucks full of troops have surrounded Drepung monastery in Lhasa, as police surround nearby Sera monastery.

From the National Secular Society:

After an acrimonious debate in which the bogeyman of secularism was repeatedly invoked, the House of Lords (in England) on Wednesday accepted the amendment to the Criminal Justice and Immigration Bill that abolishes the common law of blasphemy and blasphemous libel.

The amendment had originally been introduced by Lib Dem MP Dr Evan Harris in the House of Commons, but the Government had persuaded him to withdraw it after promising to introduce its own amendment later in the Lords. This it has now done, although — if Baroness Andrews’ speech was anything to go by — with something less than enthusiasm.

More here.