My column this weekend compares the annual “Freedom of Thought Report” from Humanists International with the U.S. State Department’s “International Religious Freedom” report.

After reading on BBC this morning about women being killed in Papua New Guinea just for being accused of sorcery, and a man in Pakistan lynched for a rumor, these reports, and confronting the Thought Police, is much more urgent.

An excerpt from “Freedom of Thought is Good for All, Religious or Not”:

“We hear quite a bit about freedom of speech and freedom of religion but not so much about freedom of what’s in our heads—freedom of thought. Who would think (pun intended) this would even be an issue, especially in the Internet Age. Believe it or not, we can believe anything we choose. Is that news to anyone? We are at liberty to conjure up anything in our brain through reason, a leap of faith or imagination. Except, there are places in our world where those thoughts need to be kept safely tucked in our cranium or there could be consequences. Seems strange to say that, yet there are people who have assumed the position of Thought Police. And, of course, such attempts to manage the mind have been with us for a very long time.”

Look for the full column this weekend in the Citizen-Times.