Protesting Virginia Tech Funerals

[quote]husker29 wrote:
I am a christian and I attend church.

I am ashamed these people call themselves christians and have a church.

[/quote]

With all the Southern black churches that have been burned in the past, you’d think someone could find a way to put his arsonist energy where it truly belongs…

How long will it be before someone puts a bullet in Phelp’s head? And when it happens, will his church protest his funeral?

If they go through with this I would be pretty sure they will need a huge amount of police protection. If they don’t get it and show up with signs tailored towards these kids they will almost certainely see harm come there way from someone.

This is too tragic of an event and too many deaths for them to get away with it this time. They have been chased away and gotten in near violent situations before but this time they are really asking for it.

[quote]scottiscool wrote:
If they go through with this I would be pretty sure they will need a huge amount of police protection. If they don’t get it and show up with signs tailored towards these kids they will almost certainely see harm come there way from someone.

This is too tragic of an event and too many deaths for them to get away with it this time. They have been chased away and gotten in near violent situations before but this time they are really asking for it.[/quote]

Ya think we can get some fellow T-Men to car-pool down to VA. and “protest” the protesters?

I have a 3’ length of heavy chain in the back of my truck that I’d like to try out.

Cure for Phelps Disease…

[quote]gendou57 wrote:
There are limits to free speech, legally anyway, that prevent people from inciting a panic.
Unfortunately, I doubt that the Phelps people are considered attempting to incite a panic or a riot, as all they do is peacefully picket and yell things. What they do is, technically, no worse than a standing in a crowd of anti-war protesters with a pro-war sign, or standing outside a vegetarian restaurant with anti-vegetarian signs.

They’re covered by the Constitution, right to free speech, expression of religion, and peaceably assemble. The government can not stop them.

Personally, I feel that it is right for the government to allow them to protest. Its the price to be paid for living in a free country.
Of course, I also think its right that private citizens should be allowed to forcibly remove them when obviously incited. They’re cowards hiding behind the government to protect their hate.

-Gen (I’d die to make sure they could say what they say, but I’d just as sure beat the hell out of them after they’d said it) to the Dou[/quote]

I disagree. I’ve seen these people in action at a funeral. They ARE attempting to provoke a reaction. They aren’t protesting, they are trying to attack and offend the greiving families at a funeral. They say shit like “your son deserved to die” and “your son is in hell”. That is a personal attack on a family who is at their most vulnerable. The family at the funeral I attended with the PGR showed a tremendous amout of class and restraint but ignoring them.

It was a heartbreaking thing to watch the Phelps family heckling the mother of a dead soldier as she was entering the church crying. I SERIOUSLY doubt the founding fathers would consider this freedom of speech.

These people intentionally inflict pain and anguish on innocent people. Why do we tolerate and protect them?

[quote]PGJ wrote:
I SERIOUSLY doubt the founding fathers would consider this freedom of speech.

These people intentionally inflict pain and anguish on innocent people. Why do we tolerate and protect them?

[/quote]

There are A LOT of people getting REALLY pissed off about this. On Facebook there are several groups about this and the one I joined already has 17,000 people. To be honest, they probably aren’t going to show. I actually hope they do come, because they definitely won’t be leaving.

Freedom of Speech my ASS!

Did Phelps just SKIP the “Sermon on the Mount”?

Mufasa

Maybe a Servant of God like the one that visited Virginia Tech will visit them soon.

[quote]BigRagoo wrote:
How long will it be before someone puts a bullet in Phelp’s head? And when it happens, will his church protest his funeral?[/quote]

LOL.

I will be going to at least one of the funerals because my friend Maxine was one of the ones shot and killed at VT. If this guy even thinks he’ll come anywhere near her service he’s going to have a rude awakening. I have a good 'ol T-Nation ass kicking in store for him if he shows his face in Northern VA.

[quote]PGJ wrote:
These people intentionally inflict pain and anguish on innocent people. Why do we tolerate and protect them?

[/quote]

Because it is the insistence that we tolerate which we find intolerable that epitomizes free speech.

If they’re not yelling about running in and flipping over the coffin, or yelling “Come get us, Fag Lovers” at the funeral attendees, then the State has no right to withhold them.

The only effective way to stop them is to either ignore them, which is not only hard but in my opinion the last thing we want to do, like ignoring a cancer, or drown them out, which people have been doing somewhat effectively.

These people won’t stop. Even if there WERE laws in place to stop them they wouldn’t stop, and then the government would be putting people in jail for protesting. A funeral, yes, but still arresting someone for protesting goes against a great deal of what America stands for.

Personally, I’m trying to find a ride to one of the funerals the Phelps will be attending. Hopefully I can help drown them out, or at least show people that we won’t take their bullshit lying down.

Here’s hoping they don’t show.

-Gendou

Does this Phelps guy sounds like a repressed homosexual to anyone else?

From Wikipedia:
By Phelps’s own admission, he never dated, and had no interest in members of the opposite sex.

And EVERYTHING he does is about gayness, he seems a little obsessed, and even if he’s not a repressed homo, he’s definitely got some serious gay issues (was he raped as a kid or something).

[quote]Agressive Napkin wrote:
Does this Phelps guy sounds like a repressed homosexual to anyone else?

From Wikipedia:
By Phelps’s own admission, he never dated, and had no interest in members of the opposite sex.

And EVERYTHING he does is about gayness, he seems a little obsessed, and even if he’s not a repressed homo, he’s definitely got some serious gay issues (was he raped as a kid or something).[/quote]

So, he’s like Mr. Garrison before he came out of the closet and had his sex change?

[quote]gendou57 wrote:
PGJ wrote:
These people intentionally inflict pain and anguish on innocent people. Why do we tolerate and protect them?

Because it is the insistence that we tolerate which we find intolerable that epitomizes free speech.

If they’re not yelling about running in and flipping over the coffin, or yelling “Come get us, Fag Lovers” at the funeral attendees, then the State has no right to withhold them.

The only effective way to stop them is to either ignore them, which is not only hard but in my opinion the last thing we want to do, like ignoring a cancer, or drown them out, which people have been doing somewhat effectively.

These people won’t stop. Even if there WERE laws in place to stop them they wouldn’t stop, and then the government would be putting people in jail for protesting. A funeral, yes, but still arresting someone for protesting goes against a great deal of what America stands for.

Personally, I’m trying to find a ride to one of the funerals the Phelps will be attending. Hopefully I can help drown them out, or at least show people that we won’t take their bullshit lying down.

Here’s hoping they don’t show.

-Gendou[/quote]

But they AREN’T protesting. They just show up and start insulting and heckling the greiving family. Usually, when people protest, they want something (social change, ending a war, equality). These guys don’t do that. They condemn people. They don’t offer any solution.

I think if a member of a greiving family just snapped and took out the Phelps clan as they were “protesting” a famly members funeral, they could legitimately claim they were provoked. No jury would convict them.

Imagine your 18 year old sister or brother (or child) laying in a coffin, while these jerks scream: “They’re burning in Hell right now! In HELL!!”

I would be hard pressed to restrain myself.

I’m amazed that this Phelps character is still breathing, in all honesty.

[quote]Headhunter wrote:
Imagine your 18 year old sister or brother (or child) laying in a coffin, while these jerks scream: “They’re burning in Hell right now! In HELL!!”

I would be hard pressed to restrain myself.

I’m amazed that this Phelps character is still breathing, in all honesty.[/quote]

The worst ones are “your son deserved to die” and “thank God for IED’s”. I mean, they scream this AT the parents. THAT is not free speech, that is provoking violence. I’m telling you, no jury would convict.

The good news is that the WBC really doesn’t have a congrgation. It’s all his family. He was an ordained baptist preacher who was basically kicked out of his own church so he started his own thing. From what I understand, his intent is to provoke a fight so he could sue someone. I suppose that’s an urban legend, but that’s the only thing that makes sense.

We protect the right of women to have abortions, criminalize the mistreatment of dogs, and worry constantly about the ethical treatment of known terrorists held in Gitmo, but we do NOTHING to protect a greiving Mother.

I’ve had to knock on a mother’s door and be the one to tell her that her son is dead. That was the worst experience of my life. NOBODY has the right to add insult to that.

I’m IN!!! Do you mind if a T-woman joins you? I live about 2 hours north of tech I’ll meet ya there!

on a serious note, I know that the VA police have already issued multiple statements saying that Virginia law allows them to break up a protest when it upsets a funeral, and they fully intend to exercise that right.

Hopefully these Sick people will spend the day in jail. It’s psycho extremists like these that are giving Christians an ever increasing bad name! I am a Christian and everyone I know thinks these people are mental patients.

[quote]derek wrote:
scottiscool wrote:
If they go through with this I would be pretty sure they will need a huge amount of police protection. If they don’T get it and show up with signs tailored towards these kids they will almost certainely see harm come there way from someone.

This is too tragic of an event and too many deaths for them to get away with it this time. They have been chased away and gotten in near violent situations before but this time they are really asking for it.

Ya think we can get some fellow T-Men to car-pool down to VA. and “protest” the protesters?

I have a 3’ length of heavy chain in the back of my truck that I’d like to try out. [/quote]