The European Court of Human Rights has upheld France's ban on wearing a burqa or a niqab in public.

As actor Gary Oldman discovered to his chagrin this week, political correctness has a way of transforming verbal hand grenades into verbal boomerangs, writes Paul Thomas.

Amid bad news from Iraq, we must remember most of Islam's faithful are ordinary people living ordinary lives.

New Zealand women are earning thousands of dollars less than their male counterparts just five years after graduation, a report reveals.

During an Italian national team training camp in Coverciano last month, Mario Balotelli was forced to endure the sickening experience of having racist bile spat at him.

A prominent Saudi cleric has sparked outrage by saying that online conversations between men and women are religiously forbidden.

NBA basketball owner Donald Sterling's viciously racist comments in the US remind again how lucky we are in NZ to have a comparatively settled racial landscape, writes Paul Lewis.

Three in four NBA players are black. Almost half its teams' head coaches are African American. And yet of all the NBA's team owners and owners of big league baseball and football teams, only Michael Jordan is African-American.

Women earn less than men because they are seen as pushovers when they don't negotiate hard and are seen as "ball-breakers" when they do, a psychologist says.

After 2,000 years of persecution, India's two million eunuchs are to be formally recognised as a third sex and listed as a "backward" caste entitled to reserved government jobs and university places.

New Zealand has a long and ignominious history of suspicion and hostility towards people of Asian descent.

Transgender model Amy Brosnahan has found hope in a pub beauty pageant - and she's not alone in being embraced by a more tolerant New Zealand.

The 21-year-old, born in England and now living in Wellington, said she once attended a support group for children of same-sex parents after moving to New Zealand. Her family was the only one there.

A transgender Auckland teen rewrote pageant history early this morning after earning a place in next month's final of the Battle of the Babes.

New Zealand's male-dominated business culture with its old-boy sports and education network is sabotaging the promotion of women, says exiting Summerset Group boss Norah Barlow.

An aspiring transgender model has vowed to take to the catwalk tomorrow night despite a row over whether she was eligible to enter a beauty contest.

A vintage relationship guide aimed at women reveals the outrageous sexism practiced by men during the Forties.

Australia's federal Attorney-General George Brandis is serious when he says on his watch, "people do have a right to be bigots".

Serving world leaders their lunch is a serious affair. No room for "blondes" or women in dresses then, it appears.

It's unlikely many of us lost much sleep at the thought of Fred Phelps slipping away, writes Jack Tame.

What I want to think about is how grateful I am to the refugees who come and settled in NZ and how angry I am at the disregard with which we treat them, writes Dr Avril Bell.

A company which sacked its general manager because he did not fit in with the company, even though he was a "nice person", has had to pay the man more than $36,000.

A cafe worker who had her pay cut when she was pregnant and was then not given regular shifts after having her baby has been awarded more than $13,000.

The campaign to promote self-esteem in young girls was started by Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg.

Minutes before Mojo Mathers was due to give a speech last week, she began to worry.

The law is not always an ass but it can produce an absurdity. The decision to allow a failed job seeker access to his competitors' CVs is one of them.

Google have changed their predictive search function to remove derogatory terms associated with Maori.