A Peek Inside The Westboro Baptist Church

[somone]

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/02/134198937/a-peek-inside-the-westboro-baptist-church

A Peek Inside The Westboro Baptist Church
by Barbara Bradley Hagerty

... Given the number of funerals they protest and their resounding victory in the Supreme Court on Wednesday, one might conclude Westboro Baptist Church is an enormous enterprise. But the church in Topeka, Kan., claims only about 100 members, almost all from the family of a man named Fred Phelps... The Phelpses and their church are isolated in more ways than one. Few news organizations have profiled them. One exception is Bill Sherman, the religion writer for newspaper Tulsa World. He visited them in their compound in an upscale neighborhood of Topeka. He found them polite, normal people — and a model of success.

"They're college educated. They're well-spoken. The daughter herself argued before the United States Supreme Court," Sherman says. "They're not what I expected." Eleven of Fred Phelps' 13 children have law degrees. Four are estranged from the family, and most of the rest live in the family compound and practice law. "They have a very well-respected law firm in Topeka," Sherman says. "People in town said, 'Well, we don't like them, but if we want to win a case, we'll go to them.' "

Church spokeswoman Phelps-Roper says their booming employment and family law practice pays the bills for their travels across the country, when they shout their anti-gay message. They travel in vans to keep down the costs, which she says can add up to $200,000 a year. Do they have secret contributors? Phelps-Roper is adamant they do not. "We all work, and we all pay our own way," she says. "We don't ask for anything from anyone, and we don't take anything from anyone."

The protests are in themselves a source of some income, according to Potok. Over the years the Phelpses have filed lawsuits against communities that try to stop them from demonstrating. "And as a general matter they have won," he says. "They know their First Amendment rights very well, and they've been very good at defending them." When they win, they often receive tens of thousands of dollars in court fees. And their winning streak is likely to continue, now that the Supreme Court has decided that Westboro's right to free speech trumps the right of families to bury their loved ones undisturbed...

[Drale]

1. Do these people actually have a church building someplace?

or are they just a group of freaks who found each other on the internet or something?

[Kurovski]

10. it's virtually a family affair.

Mrs. Phelps' uterus was occupied for 13 years

Maybe longer.

By the way: all their website are down and have been for almost two weeks. They were hacked.

[MuseRider]

2. I don't know about this.

First off they are certainly not in an upscale neighborhood. It is a nice, clean, old middle class neighborhood, the same place they have been since the 50's, early 60's at the latest.

I know of only one person who has used their firm, that does not mean that they do not go and win but the comment about people using them if they want to win is absurd. I have never heard that from anyone and there is no special knowledge about their winning all the time either. Well respected in Topeka? Hardly. Who did this guy from Tulsa talk to? WTF?

As far as what they do to cities who try to stop them? Now that is the truth. I know they have taken Topeka for one hell of a lot of money. The reputation of Topeka as being a community who lets them thrive is nuts. They have been suing the city forever, there is nothing left to do but ignore it all.

[xchrom]

3. +1

[Wilms]

4. Your BS detector is giving you a correct reading.

There's a number of articles about that author's issues.

Here's one...


Barbara Bradley Hagerty Doesn’t Know What She’s Talking About
http://friendlyatheist.com/2009/10/20/barbara-bradley-hagerty-doesnt-know-what-shes-talking-about/


And another...

The Ballad of Barbara Bradley Hagerty

More troubling still is her association with Howard Ahmanson's Fieldstead and Co. and Fieldstead Foundation. Ahmanson is a California millionaire who uses his trust fund to finance right-wing Christian, anti-gay, anti-evolution groups and politicians. He was previously associated with Christian Reconstructionism, which advocates a Biblically-based governement for the U.S. (Neither Ahmanson nor his philanthropic endeavors have their own websites. Make of that what you will.)

http://betterangels.blogspot.com/2004/05/ballad-of-barbara-bradley-hagerty.html

[MuseRider]

6. It helps to know them.

They have been carrying on about something since I was a child in school with the kids. They really got bad with the anti gay protesting that began a long time before anyone outside of Topeka even knew about them.

Sadly it took protesting soldiers funerals to get most people upset about them. This is only the latest in their long history. Where were all the mad people when it was only the LGBT community under the gun?

I know that Topeka did all it could to stop them. I know the community is against what they do. That comment about people going to them if they want to win just blew my mind. Must have been a quote from Margie or Shirley.

[Kurovski]

8. Thanks for the info.

I don't believe that they don't get outside funding either.

[truth2power]

5. And during the Bush reign of terror protesters were confined

to "free speech" zones a mile away from the event.

But these pukes can get up in the faces of families in the midst of their grief. Evil is at large in the world.

[Kurovski]

9. I'm seeing it said that they are indeed put in "zones"

[onethatcares]

7. when fred or any of them dies, I want to

demonstrate at theirs funerals.

I have that right guaranteed by the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America and affirmed by the USSC on this date.