Man, a lot of celebrities like to hang around in dark rooms. I guess that’s where they keep their phones. (But seriously, this is pretty cool. Here’s the petition link if you need it.)

(via Jezebel.)

In the Olympic games there are currently 30 more medals available to men than are to women. This Olympic games was a landmark one in that it is the first in history in which all 204 participating nations sent female athletes to compete, but there is still ground left to cover. Which is why we’re so glad that current shadow Olympics minister Tessa Jowell recently announced her intention to lead the campaign to make 2016 Rio “the first gender equal games” in history. 

Brenda Chapman has had a career worth following. Based at Disney, Dreamworks, and then Pixar, Chapman’s contributed to the story of The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast, storyboarded classics like The Little Mermaid, and directed The Prince of Egypt. Now, Chapman’s announced she’s leaving Pixar for LucasFilms, to consult in their animation department on a mystery project. 

It was inevitable, and quite understandable, with the tragedy of the Aurora shooting, that there would be a period of time in which people would be hesitant to go to the movies. Luckily for Christopher Nolan and the rest of the rest of the Dark Knight Rises team–not to mention everybody out there who would have hated to see the cinematic tradition be done in for good by a senseless, horrible tragedy–the film seems to have rebounded somewhat, managing to set some records despite the pitfalls.

Your “small government” lawmakers are at it again, passing laws in the U.S. House of Representatives that give the government — namely, agencies such as the Department of Homeland Security and the National Security Agency — the power to basically obliterate your privacy — in this case, via private businesses, namely large corporations. The good news is that President Obama has threatened to veto the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) if it made its way through Congress, due to its vastly overreaching provisions. However, while he has come out against the House bill, what if the Senate tones things down a bit?

It’s 2012, we are still at war in the Middle East, and women are still not allowed to fight in Army combat roles. And women who are in the Army and being denied the chance to serve to the same extent as their male counterparts have found a new way to prove that they can fight on par with men: MMA-inspired cage matches. With men.

After suing her high school — and winning — for displaying a religious mural in the auditorium, saying that it was a direct violation of the separation of church and state, 16-year-old Jessica Ahlquist of Rhode Island was attacked in the local media and vilified by her community. Basically, for not being religious enough. While she doesn’t identify herself as an atheist, Ahlquist had grown increasingly uncomfortable with the religious displays in her public school as well as the invented “Holiday Tree” controversy happening in her state. And now, because she refused to back down despite being called an “evi little thing” by a state representative, an atheist organization has stood up for her in the most productive and generous way they could think — they gave her a $42,000 scholarship.

The Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation, the largest breast cancer research, treatment, and awareness organization in the United States, shocked a lot of people earlier this week when it announced it would no longer be making its usual grants to Planned Parenthood, eliminating more than half a million dollars of funding that would have allowed PP to offer breast cancer exams and education to women without the income to otherwise receive them.

Luckily enough, John Scalzi, author of Old Man’s War and president of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, is trying to help Planned Parenthood out, and urging others to do the same.

Tunisia hasn’t exactly had the easiest time lately, what with the 2010-11 Tunisian revolution, their president fleeing the country, and the recent election of a veteran human rights activist to the new presidency. Now, controversy over a television airing of Marjane Satrapi‘s 2007 film based on her 2000 graphic novel and memoir Persepolis, is rallying rights activists and political figures to again defend freedom of speech.

While the list of lawmakers opposing the internet censorship bills PIPA and SOPA continues to grow, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) tweeted this morning that he will be postponing the January 24 vote. No new date has set, but this follows his decision not to force Democrats to vote for the bill in order to prevent a potential veto by President Obama. It also appears that SOPA’s lead sponsor in the House, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), has put the bill on hold following Reid’s announcement. However, Reid is pledging to continue working on the bill and released a statement about his intentions. Unfortunately, his intentions still involve voting on and passing PIPA in some shape or form. Let’s also point out the irony of Harry Reid making this announcement on a site that thrives on sharing so much copyrighted material.