1,001 Facts That Will Scare the S#*t Out of You: The Ultimate Bathroom Reader (109 page)

822

FACT :
In 2005, as many as twelve Iraqi barbers were executed by militant Islamic gangs for
shaving men’s beards
and giving Western-style haircuts.
The ones who gave mullet cuts were executed twice.

Robert F. Worth, “A Haircut in Iraq Can Be the Death of the Barber,” New York Times, March 18, 2005,
www.nytimes.com
.

823

FACT :
Malawi president Bingu wa Mutharika vacated his home, a 300-bedroom mansion, in 2005 believing it
to be haunted
.
It wasn’t ghosts he heard in the night, but Madonna, sneaking around looking for more kids to steal.

“Ghosts Scare off Malawi Leader,” BBC News, March, 2005,
www.news.bbc.co.uk
.

824

FACT :
More than a dozen Nigerian Muslims were sentenced to death by stoning in 2007 for “sexual offenses”
such as adultery and homosexuality
. Many others were flogged by horsewhip for drinking alcohol.
Hopefully they drank enough not to feel anything.

“Gay Nigerians Face Sharia Death,” BBC News, August 10, 2007,
www.news.bbc.co.uk
.

825

FACT :
Afghanistan passed a new law this year allowing husbands to refuse food
to wives who refuse sex
.
Brilliant! Either men get laid or their wives lose weight. A win-win.

“New Afghan Law Does Not Allow Marital Rape . . . But Lets Men Refuse to Feed Wives Who Deny Them Sex, Says Cleric,” MailOnline, April 17, 2009,
www.dailymail.co.uk
.

826

FACT :
In Saudi Arabia, sodomy is considered a legal offense for which you can be
sentenced to death
.
I’m guessing there are a lot of things punishable by death in Saudi Arabia.

Nadya Labi, “The Kingdom in the Closet,” The Atlantic Monthly, May 2007,
www.theatlantic.com
.

827

FACT :
Despite the fact that
fourteen women a day die
because of domestic violence in Mexico, eight states have no laws against it.
Wait. Mexico has laws?

Laura Carlsen, “Women’s Rights Eroding in Latin America,” CounterPunch, March 12/13, 2005,
www.counterpunch.org
.

828

FACT :
An eleven-year-old schoolgirl in New Delhi, India died at the hands of her teacher in 2009.
The student was beaten and forced to stand outside in the hot sun
for nearly two hours for her inability to say the English alphabet.
I hope that guy was fired.

“Delhi Girl in Coma after School Punishment Dies,” Times of India, April 18, 2009,
www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com
.

829

FACT :
When a flash flood swept a bus into a river near New Delhi, India in 1973, seventy-eight passengers drowned because they belonged to two separate castes and refused
to share a rope that would have saved their lives
.
India sounds fun. Let’s go there.

Bruce Felton and Mark Fowler, Felton & Fowler’s More Best, Worst, and Most Unusual (New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1976).

830

FACT :
In 1974, the Public Works Minister for the state of Kamataka, India, informed the state legislature that
his political enemies had hired witches and sorcerers
to kill him. The state’s chief minister ordered police to find the sorcerers.
“Round up the usual suspects!”

Chuck Shepherd, John J. Kohut, and Roland Sweet, More News of the Weird (New York: Plume Books, 1990).

831

FACT :
The land that later became the country of Liberia was purchased by the American Colonization Society in 1822. They bought it for
a box of beads, several pairs of shoes, soap, some rum, and several spoons
, among other things.
They overpaid.

David Wallechinsky and Irving Wallace, The People’s Almanac (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 1975).