******** Fred Phelps 2.9 Million Times

I want to be a vuvuzela in my next life because I'd get to be really annoying and still get blown alot.

Feck Fred Phelps

Should the police have permitted them to move closer, so that Mr. Snyder would have seen or heard more, & perhaps impressed more SCOTUS justices?
Maybe there should be a formula: distance in meters from funeral + decibel level of protestors at edge of funeral + total square footage of signs > 300 is OK.

Re: Feck Fred Phelps

It matters very much. Why not give the jury instructions that accurately state the legal standard (i.e. tell the jury they are not allowed to use the content of the speech as the sole basis for a finding that the defendant's conduct was outrageous, and that they should not be swayed in making their decision by whether they agree or disagree with the message expressed by the defendant) and let the jury make the ultimate factual findings? Why are judges better qualified that the jury or in a better position to make such a heavily fact-dependent determination?

Feck Fred Phelps

I was actually asking about the police or the protestors!
Did Phelps want to stand directly outside & directly confront the mourners? Did the police move them away, so that their message(s) would not be seen or heard, or for safty and security reasons?

Actually, I agree with you on this. The problem, IMO, is that judges believe that juries are all too willing to ignore rights of free speech or protest, especially where the defendant intrudes on the privacy or personal space of the plaintiff. There is evidence to support the judicial opinion, for example the damages imposed in this case. If Westboro had expresed its opinions elsewhere, or had some legitimate beef with the decedent or his family, I don't think the public would be too outraged. If investors had stood outside Madoff's son's wake or funeral, I can't see many being sympathetic.

I would fight to protect Phelps and his followers right to free speech.

I would also fight to defend my right to laugh if someone hosed them down with gasoline at their next protest and set them on fire.

Feck Fred Phelps

I wouldn't fight to protect anyone's right to protest. I might argue in support of their right to free speech, but not in the face of someone who has in no possible way offended them or could offend them. And, if some judge ruled against them, I'd expect life to continue.

Again, I would probably take the opposite position from you. I would try to stop someone from dousing them, whether with gasoline, or with water from a red can marked "flammable". I'd try to prevent that person from lighting a match as well, or throwing it on the protestors. If that happened, I'd try to extinguish the flames.
Now, an actual beat-down? I could live with that. I'd probably help pull the attackers off, after a few seconds.
Wouldn't be the first time.

Feck Fred Phelps

proactive: Separate the parties.
reactive: Let them do what they want until some law gets broken, then step in & crack a few heads. All in the name of restoring order, of course.

Re: Feck Fred Phelps

These folks visited my son's high school after a string of suicides. They were standing right across the street from the entrance to the school, not even 50 feet away. What the school did that day was delay the start of the day by 30 minutes when the Phelps family was scheduled to leave.

These folks are mostly about "trolling for law-suites". I'm not even sure they care about what they are protesting. They had people stationed with video cameras everywhere recording everything, hoping someone would do something stupid, so they the can sue/blackmail an organization with big money. On that day they had a tight schedule. It was early an morning protest at our son's high school, then to Stanford ("big pockets, very sue-able"), and then finish the day off at offices of Twitter.

A local reporter interviewed the people protesting which was mostly the Phelps family and one or two non-relatives. What became clear to him was only Phelps' daughter (about 40 years old) was really into protesting. The Phelps' grand kids were holding the signs and checking their iPhone twitter accounts at the same time. They were kind of bored, according to the reporter. I suspect the protest at the Twitter HQ, was just so the grand-kids could see visit the place.

Feck Fred Phelps

http://www.imdb.com/media/rm571709440/ch0002420

An interesting idea for dealing with then comes from the recent Chicago Alderman election. The longstanding Machine Alderman in my ward, Gene Shulter, handpicked his successor, another go along to get along type. He was, against all expectations, beaten by a 30 year old Northwestern professor named Ameya Pewar. (I think this is the first time one of those outlayer candidates Ive voted for has actually won) One of the Machine tricks was to park a Mayflower van on the street in front of Pewars HQ.

So, if the WBC is in a designated area, why not let the form, set their lateral range, then park a bus right in front of them. Let em bark at the Greydog.

(of course, wrist rockets and mothballs is entertaining and cant really hurt them)

Second amendment remedies.

Gene Shulter. Haven't heard that name for awhile. But it calls to mind visions of red and white lawn signs in front of every building in my neighborhood.

As to the bus plan, it could supplement an already-established tradition of peaceful anti-WBC counter demonstrations that are pretty cool. Here's a brand new article about them.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/04/AR2011030402461.html

The first time I encountered the gay-bashing members of Westboro Baptist Church was in 1998, when they picketed the funeral of my close friend Matthew Shepard, who was beaten and left to die tied to a fence in rural Wyoming.

What most shocked me was that, even as I attended the funeral of someone who had been murdered in a hate crime, I hadn't realized how deeply some people hate.

It wasn't until I saw those neon-colored signs with their ugly words against the snowy Wyoming landscape that I understood what my community was up against.

When the Rev. Fred Phelps and his parishioners came back to Laramie the next year to protest at the trials of the men who murdered Matthew, they were in for a bit of a surprise. Several friends and I led a counter-protest, dressed as angels, silently encircling them, our huge outstretched wings blocking their vicious signs from view.

Having been face to face with the Phelps gang, my heart goes out to all the families, who, in their most vulnerable hour, have had to deal with this small band of cruel ranters.

After Laramie, it all changed. Westboro Baptist Church members realized that the more high-profile their protests, the bigger the response, so they started picketing at the funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. This past week, the Supreme Court upheld their right to do so. But where they go, angels have appeared as well, to form a living shield.

I wish I could find some better pictures. It's pretty impressive.



Now, don't get me wrong. Your last proposal is good, too, and the angel wings would provide excellent cover.

Feck Fred Phelps

Yet, some criticize the police for such efforts, stifling free speech!

I think I agree with all of this - the speech of the Westboro Baptist Church is hateful, disgusting, and should not be accepted by anyone with two or more functioning brain cells.

It's also exactly the kind of speech that needs to be protected under the First Amendment because if we decide what kind of speech is not protected we open a Pandora's Box. What's next? We find that the speech of all political minorities is hateful and disgusting and thus therefore be muted? Like it or not, the First Amendment was designed exactly for groups like the Westboro Baptist Church.

Correct.

Re: Phuk Fred Phelps

As noted in my points previously mentioned, I disagree. Voting in favor the hateful, disgusting speech of the Westboro Baptist Church is a win for America, no matter how distasteful

You must spread rep...

This