Nearly 50,000 people have signed a petition calling for the Scottish government to ban events planned by a self-described pick-up artist who has said rape should be legal. Daryush Valizadeh says he has organised nine meetups – although he will not be present – for followers across the UK this weekend, including in Glasgow, Edinburgh, London and Cardiff. Cat Boyd started the petition on Monday, calling on politicians in Holyrood to stop Valizadeh...

Every story I have ever told has a kind of breach to it, I think. You could say that my writing isn’t quite right. That all the beginnings have endings in them. By Lidia Yuknavitch.

While evidence of abuse of the disabled has piled up for decades, one for-profit company has used its deep pockets and influence to bully weak regulators and evade accountability

Women’s rights advocate Julie Lalonde was stalked by an ex-boyfriend for over a decade—and kept silent about it. Now she’s finally able to share her story.

In September 1992, two Israeli widows went to the home of their lawyer. When the women arrived, the lawyer told them that he had received some photographs during his recent trip to Munich but that he did not think they should view them. When they insisted, he urged them to let him call a doctor who could be present when they did.

When he felt authorities weren't doing enough to protect his hometown, he organized more than 100 women to police the streets. When 43 students went missing in a controversial case that drew global attention to Mexico's struggles with violence and corruption, he led search parties trying to find them. And when more families in his state came forward reporting that their loved ones had disappeared, he organized searches for them, too.

Early one weekend morning in January 2014, Janet was sleeping fitfully in her parents’ home in Toronto. A junior studying elementary education at a nearby college, she had gone home for the weekend in a state of nervous collapse. For months, someone going by the name ‘‘Obnoxious’’ had been harassing her online. He had called her cellphone repeatedly and sent her threatening texts. Worst of all, he had threatened to ‘‘swat’’ her at school...

Guantanamo Bay, the prison infamous for reports of prisoner abuse, torture, and illegal interrogation methods, might finally be shut down. President Obama announced on his first day in office that the closing of Guantanamo Bay was a top priority, but he and his administration have so far been frustrated by the lack of progress on that front. However, the New York Times reports that the Pentagon's finalized plans for closing the prison are expect in the coming weeks.

Japan must ban sexually abusive images of children in manga comics, despite claims that such a move would threaten freedom of expression, the UN’s special envoy on child protection has said. Maud de Boer-Buquicchio praised Japan for passing a law last year that banned the possession of abusive images of children, but said it contained loopholes that allowed exploitation to continue.

The tradition, imposed by men, supposedly marks the women's first 30 to 50 hours of flight service. To make it as a female flight attendant in China, you must have the body of a model and the strength of a martial artist. Each of the coveted positions attracts thousands of applicants — an interest that has little abated despite routinely documented abuse. At China Southern Airlines, worthy candidates must be no older than 24 and above average height.

A new offence of emotional abuse and controlling behaviour has been announced by the government. The Home Office is giving police in England and Wales new powers in a drive to crack down on domestic abuse. At the moment the government's definition of domestic violence recognizes the impact of threatening behaviour but it has never been a law.

It was a low blow, captured on a man's GoPro that has led Pinellas County Deputies to put his estranged wife in jail. "This is just one of many instances where I've had to use the camera to either prove her guilt or prove my innocence and that's the only reason I am carrying it," said Michael who recorded the attack. 10 News is protecting his identity since he is a victim of domestic violence.

In the US, poverty, deprivation and exploitation draw thousands of its own children down into a dark underworld that offers few ways out. It is a world few Americans are aware of. But tens of thousands of American children are thought to be sexually exploited every year. It's believed that every night hundreds are sold for sex.

I met Angelo on a film set in Berlin. We'd both been booked for a German TV commercial. The producers were worried that the all blond-haired, blue-eyed cast would send out the wrong message, so they'd done a last-minute search of out-of-work non-German actors in the city and found Angelo, a black Canadian, and me, a ginger Paddy. There was a lot of downtime on the shoot, so Angelo and I got to talking. But our conversations kept getting interrupted...

New report reads like a passive-aggressive letter between spouses

Police officers in Ferguson, Mo., have routinely violated the constitutional rights of the city’s black residents, the Justice Department has concluded in a scathing report that accuses the officers of using excessive force and making unjustified traffic stops for years. The Justice Department, which opened its investigation after a white Ferguson police officer shot and killed a black teenager last summer, says the discrimination was fueled in part by racial stereotypes held by city officials.

The real story about child maltreatment during the recession is a grim one. I spent months studying this topic, using a number of different data sources, including Google search queries. I found that the Great Recession caused a significant increase in child abuse and neglect. But far fewer of these cases were reported to authorities, with much of the drop due to slashed budgets for teachers, nurses, doctors and child protective service workers.