Via a helpful email, I learned that an actual vampire has been unearthed in Venice:

By Daniel Flynn ROME (Reuters) - Italian researchers believe they have found the remains of a female "vampire" in Venice, buried with a brick jammed between her jaws to prevent her feeding on victims of a plague which swept the city in the 16th century.

Matteo Borrini, an anthropologist from the University of Florence, said the discovery on the small island of Lazzaretto Nuovo in the Venice lagoon supported the medieval belief that vampires were behind the spread of plagues like the Black Death.

"This is the first time that archaeology has succeeded in reconstructing the ritual of exorcism of a vampire," Borrini told Reuters by telephone. "This helps ... authenticate how the myth of vampires was born."

Really?

Can it be denied that the brick in the mouth was an effective deterrent? After all, isn't the scientific evidence undeniable that the vampire woman has not feasted on anyone since the 16th Century?

Surely, photographs don't lie.

Of course, that was back in the unenlightened days of superstitious practices.

However, I also learned that in modern South Africa today, lesbians are being systematically subjected to brutal rape (the idea being that rape somehow cures lesbianism) while the government turns a blind eye:

Lesbians living in South Africa are being raped by men who believe it will 'cure' them of their sexual orientation, a report has revealed.

Women are reporting a rising tide of brutal homophobic attacks and murders and the widespread use of 'corrective' rape as a form of punishment.

The report, commissioned by international NGO ActionAid, called for South Africa's criminal justice system to recognise the rapes as hate crimes as police are reportedly failing to take action over the spiralling violence.

As to why treating rape as a hate crime would be more effective than simply treating it as a brutal crime of violence, I'm not sure. Is raping someone you hate worse than raping someone you don't hate? And why wouldn't some of the rapists claim they "love" the lesbians so much that they want to "help" them?

Not that I'm trying to make a comparison between 16th Century treatment of vampires and current day South African practices, but it's all very confusing.

For example, actual witch-hunts are not only alive and well in South Africa, they're said to be on the rise:

Every year, many alleged witches are persecuted and burnt at the stake. Witch-hunts claim thousands of lives every year, especially in countries such as Cameroon, Kenya, Congo, Sierra Leone and South Africa.

Witch-Hunts: A Rising Trend

In fact, witch hunts are so common in South Africa that hundreds of people die in witch-burning episodes each year. And in the Northern Province, no less that ten villages have been established, which are exclusively populated by "witches." Their lives are at risk in their home communities. This trend to persecute, kill and banish "witches" is, many fear, on the rise.

But Western progress is bad. We have no right to judge other cultures.

Seriously. In California there's even serious discussion of a "cultural defense" to criminal prosecutions. In the name of being "progressive," of course.

Hmmm....

Maybe South Africans who burn witches and rape lesbians should move to California.

(Who knows? They might even be able to seek "asylum"!)