Westboro

it's just too long for me

that's what charlie sheen said.

No Charlie said "Noooo! They be takin' my childrens."

That was intriguing. After starting to read it (and noticing parallels between Nate's childhood and my own, although my own did not have anything close to the violence in it as his) it was impossible to stop. I am the only one of my siblings and friends/family who has turned away from the belief of God. I can't tell them for many reasons, but knowing from my childhood what they would think of me if they knew is a difficult thing to swallow. (Uh, that's what she, um, said?)

Knowing that the moment my family finds out about my decision to turn from God I will be called a lost child, a black sheep, an advocate to demons, and condemned to spend eternity in torture and suffering is tough because, as Nate said, you have to let go of the security blanket that's been forced around you your whole life.

Anyways. That man has guts, both to get himself out of the situation and to be able to talk about it publicly, clearly, and with emotional honesty. Great link, thanks Jaerik.

My Grammy tells me I'm going to Hell whenever I visit.
:D
She also lives vicariously through news opinions and anything unfamiliar to her is evil/a terrorist.

You have guts too. I am such a coward that I honestly don't even tell them that I don't believe, I just smile and nod when they bring religious things up. My stepmother already guilts me on a weekly basis about not attending church, and the rest of them are so entrenched in it that they would be first shocked, then angry, then have bad reactions. Most likely I'd be removed from the family hierarchy until I re-believed and came back to the fold. I just can't tell them. Can't deal with the upset reactions, crying, yelling, screaming. Can't deal with being told I need to leave the family until I change my mind and become a white sheep again instead of a black one. I am truly a coward. You have my respect for letting your folks know who you really are!

to be fair, whatever else one might say about him, i don't think fred is short on guts either, though he might be short some screws, nuts, bolts etc

Yeah my step mom has been on a kick about me going to hell, am evil, possibly the anti-christ, does whatever the devil wispers into my ear kick since I made it clear long ago the "story" book she gave me was dull and uninteresting and clearly couldn't be real.

Was kinda funny she introduced it as stories since she knew I like to read fiction lol. We still exchange barbs now and then. Like she says she wont watch sci-fi because it's insulting to her intelligence because nothing like that is remotely possible... and I say that's why I don't watch religion films. I get glared at I glare back and it's all good. Well at least now since I moved out.

Needless to say I don't call often... speaking of which I really should since I forgot to on my dads birthday a few days ago and it's been a few months...

I read the article and found it very insightful. I really explains a lot about these people. While I can't understand or empathize with the leader of this so-called church, I do sympathize with his followers. This isn't a church, it's a cult, and these poor people are brainwashed into doing what they do. I know what it's like to live in constant fear of your father figure, it sucks. You do things you wouldn't do under normal circumstances just to avoid the punishment that could come from not complying.

To add to the article about Phelps' son, I came across this post other day that claims these guys don't actually believe in the hate they're spewing (debatable, but they're certainly motivated by making money off it).

Fred Phelps is a Con Man: Why the Westboro Baptist Church is a Scam

For free speech cases they use what is called the "imminent lawless action" test to determine protection. For cases such as shouting fire in a crowded theater, the action would likely cause an imminent lawless action (in this case a riot).

Given this I am surprised they let WBC keep on. Since they not only logically could cause a riot, they actually have caused riots on many occasions.

I only have one thing to say about it. They would definitely fail the imminent lawless action test if they were picketing outside of one of my family members' funerals. There'd be some serious lawlessness resulting from that.

These Westboro "Church" numskulls were abused by their parents, and probably molested by priests in their youth.

All freedoms, for better or worse, have consequences. For example, a person has the freedom to chain-smoke cigarettes, even though the likely consequence is thousands of dollars spent on medical care for respiratory illness, smelling like *** 24/7, ending up rolling an oxygen tank around everywhere one goes after age 60, and dying in unrelenting pain due to lung cancer, if one is lucky enough to have that happen instead of a non-lethal heart attack or debilitating stroke, and trying to rehabilitate using the lung capacity of a toddler.

But hey, at least this guy or gal had the freedom to make this choice, right?

My rant aside, the Supreme Court had no grounds to rule against Westboro "church" in this case, even though I'm sure, as human beings, they were compelled to rule against the "church" behind closed doors. The Supreme Court is designed to rule on the legality or illegality of a person or entity's behavior or action. Its role is NOT to judge whether or not something or someone is "right" or "wrong", but rather to determine if someone is breaking the law.

The only way to deal with hate-mongers like the Westboro "church" is to ignore them. And if they refuse to be ignored, despite all signs and warnings that their actions are distasteful, unacceptable, and obnoxious, the only remaining courses of action are to defame/embarrass them, or straight up kill them. However, if you murder an extremist, unfortunately, history tells us, with rare exception, that someone will take up the cause and put the slain up on a pedestal as a martyr and potentially further galvanize the cause.

So, as much as these Westboro "church" retards are ... well, retards, the Supreme Court isn't going to rule against them unless they do something that infringes on the rights of others (I think the ***would have hit the fan loudly if they had followed through on that ridiculous promise to host "Koran-burning day" last year). Even though Westboro "church" activities are blatantly radical, completely distasteful, and display a new level of jaw-dropping ignorance and classlessness ... it's all carefully contrived to not be illegal ...

Like I said, ignore them, or find a way to embarrass them. Punching them in the face or taking them to Court won't stop them, even though I wish those things would work.

Their actions are similar to shouting fire in a crowded theater, which has been held as not a protected form of speech. Initially a test called the "clear and present danger" test was used, but it was later replaced by the "imminent lawless action" test.

Though in order for this to be called into question, a case against WBC can't just be taken to the Supreme Court. A state or federal legislative body would need to restrict that type of speech first, and that law would have to be called into question to determine constitutionality (which under the imminent lawless action test I believe it would be). Then we could restrict WBC and any other nutjob group trying to protest funerals on the basis of the imminent lawless action test.

The Supreme Court didn't rule against WBC because they weren't questioning the constitutionality of any existing law against protesting funerals, and what WBC does now isn't illegal.

The course of action that needs to be taken to restrict their type of speech is the following:
1) Establish law to restrict protesting funerals.
2) If constitutionality is questioned (it would be), the Supreme Court would test the speech with the imminent lawless action test. Since protesting someone's funeral would undoubtedly cause an imminent lawless action (similar to shouting fire in a theater), the law would probably be upheld.
3) Enjoy life without WBC shouting at your funerals.

they did follow through on it

they put the video on their website

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/us/07scotus.html

Apparently protesting soldiers' sexual preferences at their funeral has been deemed legal.

I say we take Westboro and send them to Libya.

+1 to these guys.