Westboro Baptist Church v. Normal People, Round 5

[theTwiz]

Supreme Court just agreed to hear the case originating from back in 2006:
http://www.deseretnews.com/article/700015011/Supreme-Court-shouldnt-encourage-Westboro-Baptist-Church.html

2010 is shaping up to be quite an interesting SCOTUS year.  First gun rights and now freedom of speech.  Maybe we'll get a verdict on that whole gay thing this year, too. [/sarcasm]

edit: this thread is also for hilarious photo-shopped images of fred phelps.
[attachment=0:36z6b997]bbmphelps.jpg[/attachment:36z6b997]

[karadan]

Phelps displays a special kind of insanity. He seems to revel in the hatred adorned him by the rest of humanity. Someone that twisted is beyond saving. I just find it incredible that his brand of madness can actually be taken on by his followers who will certainly carry on his message after he is gone. That's what worries me. His school of thought will grow albeit, slowly, but it will grow, like all other cults before them. At what point would public pressure be enough that someone steps in and either dissolves the church or just burns it down Waco style?

Personally, if someone were to blow the leaders of that church away, i wouldn't shed a tear. They are as much an enemy to peace, reason and sanity as the taliban.

[pinkocommie]

Phelps displays a special kind of insanity. He seems to revel in the hatred adorned him by the rest of humanity. Someone that twisted is beyond saving. I just find it incredible that his brand of madness can actually be taken on by his followers who will certainly carry on his message after he is gone. That's what worries me. His school of thought will grow albeit, slowly, but it will grow, like all other cults before them. At what point would public pressure be enough that someone steps in and either dissolves the church or just burns it down Waco style?

Personally, if someone were to blow the leaders of that church away, i wouldn't shed a tear. They are as much an enemy to peace, reason and sanity as the taliban.

I just watched a few year old documentary on the WBC the other day and in that documentary they mentioned that most of the members of the church were family members with a disproportionate few being "outsiders".  They talked about some family members who were 'gone' and I honestly thought they meant dead until it was explained that when someone in their family doesn't agree with something the church does, they're essentially shunned and never spoken to again.  In the documentary they talked about quite a few people who were 'gone' which led me to believe that people leaving the family were not a rare occurrence.  Admittedly, I know very little about the group beyond the documentary I watched because those people make me a little stabby and cause me to throw up in my mouth a little, but I didn't find them nearly as threatening as I did before.  Has the church grown a lot in the past few years?  Seeing as though the documentary was from 2006, a lot may have changed in 4 years especially with all the media coverage they've gotten.  

The funniest thing about the documentary, and I can try to find the link if you're interested, is when the interviewer asked the daughter he was following around if she thought she belonged to a cult and she had to ask what a cult was and then hysterically started claiming every other church was the cult, and that they were the only people on earth who were real Christians, talking about how when the apocalypse came only a very small group would be saved and all that.  All with a huge smile on her face.  Truly mentally disturbed.

Also, I love this picture:

[karadan]

I saw this doc last year:

[youtube:5ditfwu9]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmIr9P-vkSQ[/youtube:5ditfwu9]

I like Theiroux because he seems able - for the most part - to stay impartial and just get facts from people. He's also very good at getting closed-off individuals to open up to him. I think it is because he's so self-effacing. Anyway, from the documentary, there seemed to be a number of young girls belonging to the WBC. They seemed to have two distinct personalities, that of the ignorant cult member, and that of the personality needed to blend in with normal society for every-day things like school. I don't remember them talking about the people who've left but they must have chosen not to talk about them this time round.

Even though Phelps is utterly insane, he isn't stupid. He'd want to boulster the ranks as much as possible and has probably learnt from past issues enabling him to retain as many members as possible through god-knows-what kind of emotional blackmail and downright brainwashing.

I sincerely hope that the WBC is so radical that it simply cannot sustain itself and will die out when phelps kicks the bucket.

[theTwiz]

I sincerely think that Phelps himself doesn't believe a word of anything he preaches.  I think it's just a scheme to get attention, and on occasion a lawsuit that can be won by arguing the first amendment, resulting in a settlement for the church to use to finance it's activities.

Also, the girl you're referring to in the documentary: if it's the same girl I'm thinking of, there are times when you can tell she doesn't believe any of it and is just reciting stuff from memory out of fear of backlash from her family.  It's in the eyes.  Pretty sure that if you were to separate her from her family, and she was convinced her family couldn't get to her or would find out about anything she said, she'd come clean as a non-believer - in the Westboro teaching at least.  Although on some level, she probably blocks this out from herself and isn't even aware of it most of the time.

[Sophus]

I sincerely think that Phelps himself doesn't believe a word of anything he preaches.

Same. I doubt any of these people are even fooling themselves.

[Evolved]

[theTwiz]

the fact that the picture you just posted violated photobucket's terms of use makes me want to see it even more now.  repost please?

[LoneMateria]

[youtube:24wyszoh]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDeJhFDyH7M[/youtube:24wyszoh]

Unfortunately this video makes the WBC actually look somewhat sane.

[Evolved]

the fact that the picture you just posted violated photobucket's terms of use makes me want to see it even more now.  repost please?

Here ya go.

[Evolved]

Check this out.  

http://laughingsquid.com/san-franciscos-answer-to-westboro-baptist-church/

[LoneMateria]

Check this out.  

http://laughingsquid.com/san-franciscos-answer-to-westboro-baptist-church/

The rick roll one would have been great if they got the wbc in the frame.

[LoneMateria]

You know you are extremists when the KKK won't associate with you or your hatred.  (Found this on reddit no I did not visit their site)

[pinkocommie]

That is all kinds of awesome.