Purity ring banned
A 16-year-old British schoolgirl appealed to the High Court challenging the ban on her wearing a purity ring at school. The ring symbolizes her decision to abstain from sex until marriage, and it is banned as part of the school’s no jewelry policy.
The girl’s lawyers say her right to express religious beliefs is not being upheld. The girl said she should be allowed to express her religious devotion since Muslims are allowed to wear headscarves, and people of other faiths are allowed to wear bangles in school.
The school said it is merely enforcement of uniform policies, not encroachment on religious rights.
This is the most recent in a series of clashes about wearing religious symbols and clothing in European schools. Muslim headscarves are banned in French state schools, and another British girl was forbidden to wear a Muslim gown to school.
Prostitution candid camera
The mayor of San Fior, Italy, is attempting to embarrass men into not using prostitutes by photographing cars that pick them up and then publishing the details in the newspaper.
By arming police with digital cameras and instructing them to take photos of cars that stop to pick up prostitutes, the mayor will then publish information about the cars, including license plate numbers.
The reason for the crackdown is so people who have to be at work early aren’t kept up at night by the sound of cars. The mayor is awaiting approval from lawyers, who are researching whether this violates privacy laws.
Magic act of nature
A lake in southern Chile has disappeared. The speculation is that the ground just opened up and swallowed it whole.
Fed mostly by water from melting glaciers, the lake used to be in the Magallanes region of Patagonia. The lake’s surface area was between 10 and 12 acres, which is about the size of 10 soccer fields.
The Chilean National Forestry Corporation said when it patrolled the area in March, everything was normal, but on their May patrol the lake was completely gone.
The forestry’s director said all that was left of it were hunks of ice on the dry lakebed and a huge fissure. The disappearance is under investigation.
One theory is that a tremor hit the area and cracked the ground, draining the lake.
Stumped by a stick
Two teenage thieves failed an attempt at car theft because they couldn’t figure out how to use manual transmission.
The teens, armed with a gun, approached a man outside of a pizza restaurant in Marietta, Ga., and stole his wallet and car keys.
While the thieves sat in the car and tried to start it, restaurant employees called the police. The police captured the teens as they tried to escape on foot into the woods nearby.
Author sued for not being a prostitute
The film company that bought the rights to adapt the book “Sarah” into a movie is suing its best-selling author for pretending to be a 19-year-old male prostitute to gain a movie deal.
The book is about a transgender boy who works alongside his mother as a truck-stop prostitute. The book came out in 2000 under the pen name J.T. Leroy, described as a male teen prostitute.
The book was actually written by 41-year-old Brooklyn mother Laura Albert, who now lives in California.
Antidote Film Company claims it was falsely induced into the movie contract, saying part of its attraction to the book was the unique life story of its author.
The company would like to recover the $110,000 it paid for the novel’s movie rights.