On the Westboro Fanatics

[nadinbrzezinski]

Re: Westboro Baptist protesting Military Burials.

This weekend they showed up at Comic-Con San Diego with the intention of protesting the event. Yesterday they were counter protested en mass and were made fun off, repeatedly. My husband just talked to one of the people in management. They canceled the rest of the protest and left whimpering in the face of hundreds of comic and popular media fans that made fun of them.

The word needs to spread that any funeral they decide to protest needs to be counter protested en mass and making fun of them. This is the only way to protect the fallen.

As a reminder, anybody counter protesting needs to wear civilian clothes, otherwise it could be construed as the military and government squashing their Constitutional Rights.

This is a call to peaceful arms to protect our fallen.

Sincerely yours,

Nadin Abbot.
Thomas E Abbott QMC (SS) USN Ret.

PS Links

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/upload/2010/07/comic-con_reacts_to_fred_phelp/wbc_comiccon1.php

http://www.comicsalliance.com/2010/07/22/super-heroes-vs-the-westboro-baptist-church#

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. Kickety kick

[Withywindle]

2. And by "civilian clothes" we mean people in superhero costumes and furry suits.

The Westboro Baptist "church" is not a "church" in any meaningful sense. It's a black-magic cult. And by that, I mean a cult that raises what little spiritual energy it has on the power of hate and rage. That's why protesting funerals has worked so "well" for them in the past - how better to raise the dark rush of loathing than by insulting people who are already grieving, shitting on the memory of their loved ones, and retreating behind a very cruel and empty and soulless defense of "free speech" (when the whole 'justification' for their rhetoric is that America isn't fascist and repressive enough for them)?

Rage doesn't work on them, as natural as it is, because that's what they WANT.

Ridicule and laughter, on the other hand, just might. They don't understand it, for one thing, and it takes power away from them rather than feeds it. Maybe it might even help the children in the group, the ones that aren't completely rotten to the core yet, realize just how ridiculous and pointless their upbringing has been.

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. That is certainly one meaning

but if it is active duty people who do the couter protest, they cannot show up in uniform.

But just 200 people with funny signs and snickering and pointing will do that. Keep those grieving away, but the rest of us... let the hilarity ensure.

I particularly liked one sign.... SUPPORT FICTION: READ THE BIBLE.

[Withywindle]

4. I do understand that. Well, maybe Star Trek uniforms.

I like what the Patriot Guard does. A wall of intimidating bikers is very good for protecting mourners, which I feel is the main duty when they do their funeral shtick. But I worry it might feed into the Phelps freaks' sense of importance and persecution a little too much.

Armies of people having fun pointing and laughing at them with jokes they don't get, well, that has power too. :D

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Hmm a guard of Klingons

Now there is a way to truly intimidate them.

I got a flight suit with a Davion patch somewhere.... oh geekdom. I might just put it to a right use here.

[Withywindle]

6. That is the best of all possible worlds.

IDIC. :thumbsup:

[Canuckistanian]

7. Good for Comic-Con

They turned out en masse to protest hatred and intolerance.

And they did it with style.

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. Oh absolutely

and there is a lesson there.

If we had known... I would have been there in a San Diego Minute.

No, not tickies this year... but protesting... absolutely.

They have a right to the first amendment, I got the right to point, snicker and generally make fun of them.

[Gold Metal Flake]

9. Do the Westburholes use megaphones or bullhorns?

[nadinbrzezinski]

10. I got no idea, but pointing and laughing works

And if I can get Lord Jesus Christ to show for the event...

[Gold Metal Flake]

11. I was thinking that if they are in an area that allows them to use bullhorns...

...that all of those left-over vuvuzelas could be put to good use.

[nadinbrzezinski]

12. Next time there is a soccer game round this town

I will have to go pick up a few.

But hubby just pointed out, not at a funeral though

[Gold Metal Flake]

13. Of course not.

Even mocking signs would be hard to pull off at a funeral. I'm sure that the sense of decorum that sane people have at funerals is one reason the Westborholes find them an easy target. But I believe they target funerals for and more sinister reason. As I understand it the Westborholes make their money from lawsuits. Personal injury stuff and litigation extortion (the threat of a lawsuit which leads to an out-of-court settlement). A funeral is an event where the emotions of the attendants are raw and pained. A person just might be in a state of grief to a degree that the "protest" might trigger a violent reaction where in more calm circumstances they would simply turn their back. So I believe that to the Westborholes a funeral is a more lawsuit-rich environment than any other public event like a convention. If push-back in the mold of Comic-con becomes a regular response to the westfucks, they may just cling closer to funerals for less confrontation and more lawsuit money. It would be the sociopaths way.

If the above were to come true, I would think that communities would become more outraged at the more-frequent funeral disruptions and there might be more and more legislation in an attempt to combat the scumbags. The whole sitch would become more confrontational all around. But I think we need to have those confrontations with this cult.

[nadinbrzezinski]

14. Why they have to be confronted

I think...

And even mocked... but keep the burial party away from the festivities as it were.

In other words make them decide it is no longer worth it.

[Gold Metal Flake]

15. "In other words make them decide it is no longer worth it. "

Absoluteley goddamn right. That is the point in just about any confrontation with a zealot. Be it in war, be it in crime, be it in the fight for liberty v. supression, in the regulation of busineses and industries, in the resistance to a stalker or a bully.

[Doeed]

16. You ever notice these clowns NEVER picket

a Hell's Angels funeral...

or a funeral for one of the Crips or Bloods...

...don't remember seeing them at any Mafia guy's funeral either.

[nadinbrzezinski]

17. Well I doubt they woudl walk away from one of those

...

[Roon]

18. Westboro has been protesting aids victims funerals since the very early 90s

It wasn't until they started protesting soldiers deaths that people starting getting outraged..fuck it

[nadinbrzezinski]

21. Well believe it or not I never heard of them

until they started doing that in 2002.

I treated AIDS patients when it was damn dangerous. NO, not because of the patients, but how they were treated by the medical system, and they were feared by the general population.

SO please, realize not all of us are that clueless.

[proud2BlibKansan]

19. Seriously. Take it from a Kansan. Here's what to do:

IGNORE THEM!!

They NEVER protest here anymore. That's why they are everywhere else. We finally figured out they thrived on attention so we took it away. And poof! they stopped protesting at home.

[Touchdown]

20. Exactly! They're nothing without attention.

They've always been street theater, nothing more.