Military Funeral Picketing partially banned, WBC are tools.

[tkioz]

You know I really don't understand the whole American "WE CAN NOT COMPROMISE OUR FIRST AMENDMENT RIGHTS". You already have. It's illegal to yell FIRE in a crowded area. That's restricting free speech for public safety...

Also It's strange that Americans act like you must have totally unrestricted free speech in order to be "free"... there are many many nations around the world with "freedom", but have limited protection for the freedom of expression. For example, Australia has only one catagory of protected speech, that is political commentary, and we get along just fine.

You don't need totally unrestricted freedom of expression, you can limit it in areas without becoming a dictatorship.

Slightly off-topic, but funny story I had a conversation with a guy once who didn't understand what "amendment" actually meant and claimed that the U.S Constitution was unchanged since "Washington wrote it"... seriously how do I, an Australian, know more about your constitution then an American who can afford to holiday in Australia...

 

[Valanthe]

I'm a pretty big defender of free speech, I don't generally like any kind of censorship, but honestly, I think Obama made an excellent compromise here. the WBC are still free to practice their Hate Speech, because let's face it, there's no other motive to picketing a funeral than to spread hate (to the point doing so is a criminal offence up here in Canada, thanks the gods), and the grieving loved ones of a man who died following JFK's advice, and not asking what his country could do for him (or her, this is the 21st century after all), but doing what he could for his country.

I'm shocked that there haven't been mass counter-protests from Christians yet. I've seen parades by Muslims opposed to terrorism, and yet I've never seen any group of Christians rock up at a funeral to - for instance - pray for the WBC. In my opinion, that's what will hurt them the most. Just have hundred of their fellow Christians between them and their target, and whatever hateful slogans they yell these counter-protestors can just assure them that Jesus will forgive them if they stop this behaviour. Don't threaten, don't yell, just tell them Jesus loves them and will forgive them for what they're doing.

Too late for many of the older ones, I suspect, but it'll certainly get the message across to the younger ones and teenagers that what they're doing is non-Christian. Drive away the young ones, force them to re-assess their lives and beliefs, and I bet you'll see a lot of them leaving the church. It'll die as its members do, without any new blood to keep it going.

You know, this isn't a bad idea, get some Christian groups with a couple of "Forgive them Lord, for they know not what they do." signs to stand between the WBC and whatever their protest du jour is. It would be Youtube worthy at the very least.

 

[Kargathia]

What if the situation was flipped what if a law was passed that said you are no longer allowed to critic the WBC to their face , you can do it anywhere else but you aren?t allowed to say anything to them while they are picketing funerals, what then?
I?d imagine you?d be outraged, and rightfully so . what makes it ok to do it to them ?

Yeah what they do is fucked up and you should call them out on it but censorship only makes them feel more like heroic underdogs fighting for justice.

This law does also mean you can't go and picket WBC funerals with highly offensive placards.

Personally am pretty ok with this - freedom of speech is a good thing, but upholding it when it is used to grossly violate another's rights is somewhat short-sighted.

Slightly off-topic, but funny story I had a conversation with a guy once who didn't understand what "amendment" actually meant and claimed that the U.S Constitution was unchanged since "Washington wrote it"... seriously how do I, an Australian, know more about your constitution then an American who can afford to holiday in Australia...

They have heard people refer to it all their lives, which leads to the supposition they're familiar with the actual document, when in fact they're merely familiar with the mentions of it.

One of these cases where it helps to pay attention to what you've taken for granted all your life.

 

[tkioz]

I am positively shocked no one has gone Rambo on their asses yet.

I'm shocked that there haven't been mass counter-protests from Christians yet.

Christians have condemned their behaviour, many many times, it just doesn't make the headlines. Hell I'm a Christian and I believe their behaviour is the opposite of Christianity.

 

[chadachada123]

This is such a huge non-issue.

I seriously do not understand how this ever became anything more than a private issue.

If I owned a cemetery, my policy would be that, during a funeral, only funeral viewers or people visiting other graves are allowed on my property. The WBC would never be allowed on my property during a funeral unless they had buried family members there.

Can someone explain why EVERY FUCKING CEMETERY IN EXISTENCE doesn't already do this? Can someone explain why you (generic parents), with a dead son or daughter, would be retarded enough to pick a funeral home that doesn't have such a policy and that you know will be picketed BECAUSE of this lack of a policy?

Can someone please explain this?

There is no protection of free speech while on someone else's property, so how this ever became an issue is far beyond me.

I seriously see no one at fault here besides those in charge of the cemeteries and the parents that clearly can't make good decisions, and see absolutely no reason for the government to get involved in a civil manner.

 

[SonicWaffle]

I am positively shocked no one has gone Rambo on their asses yet.

I'm shocked that there haven't been mass counter-protests from Christians yet.

Christians have condemned their behaviour, many many times, it just doesn't make the headlines. Hell I'm a Christian and I believe their behaviour is the opposite of Christianity.

Condemning is a very, very different thing from standing between them and their victims. Tutting disapprovingly to yourself isn't going to change any minds.

 

[Anti Nudist Cupcake]

YES THEY SHOULD CHANGE THE DAMN THING

Your first amendment really isn't all it is cut out to be. It lets people do psychological harm to the grievers of dead soldiers. You Americans have been taught to cling and cherish the term "Freedom of speech" so much that you think that the only possible way to be able to live freely is by letting evil people desecrate your dead, IT DOESN'T HAVE TO BE THAT WAY. Sacrificing the freedom to rally at funerals to call dead family members of other people FAGGOTS won't take away YOUR right, the normal good-hearted citizen, to voice your opinion on how your government runs things. It will take away the right of an entire group of strangers coming together to call your dead brother a ****** at his funeral.

No it isn't a slippery slope. Just because the WBC won't be allowed to call a man that died protecting his country and family a faggoty homosexual doesn't mean that you can no longer have an opinion and speak it. MY country is proof of that. Is having hate speech legal truly so crucial to your own freedom? Will you never be able to voice your words without doing so hatefully? Can you really NOT live without it?

Laws against hate speech isn't going to guarantee your country getting a thought-police, wake up and stop letting fear of "but maybe then..." blind your judgement. The point of free speech was to combat evil, IE the evil of oppression against good-willed words such as speaking out against an unjust ruler. Now that evil rises again it is allowed to exist because you cannot distinguish right from wrong. Great job.

 

[SonicWaffle]

You know, this isn't a bad idea, get some Christian groups with a couple of "Forgive them Lord, for they know not what they do." signs to stand between the WBC and whatever their protest du jour is. It would be Youtube worthy at the very least.

Bingo. Considering how often we get people complaining about how Christianity is only ever protrayed negatively in the news and whatnot, such a thing would be pretty good PR too.

 

[Schadrach]

The 1st is sacrosanct, and shouldn't be "bent" except in the most extreme cases.

What he should have done is borrowed a Republican favorite and recommended setting up "free speech zones" 300' away from the funeral. Given that WBC is composed almost entirely of lawyers, they would certainly sue, and one of two things would result -- either "free speech zones" would be found unconstitutional and we could find some other way to deal with the assholes having used them to defend free speech, or they wouldn't be and WBC would be dealt with, by caging them when they protest.

It's a win-win.

 

[Zoe Castillo]

--

 

[RJ 17]

Well, yeah, the last part was obvious.

So this happened. For those of you not able to load that up for some reason, Obama put restrictions on the way that military funeral protesters could protest, i.e. staying back 300 ft. and other restrictions. OK, let's just get it out of the way that WBC are pretty much the only people we're talking about because no one else has reached their level of scum to protest dead soldiers.

Now, not too many people are standing up for the underdogs in this case due to the underdogs being swine that the KKK considers too rash and bigoted, but there is discussion on whether or not we should bend the rules of the 1st amendment (freedom of speech for you European people who hate liberty and apple pies) even if those rules allow douchebags to do what they do best by desecrating every inch of space they take up.

So, Escapists, should America let the people who I'm running out of insulting names for protest lest we invalidate the 1st amendment? Should I be taking my meds more often? And why is there a floating piece of garlic bread levitating in the corner of my room trying to convince me that OJ didn't do it? Let me know below. Quickly.

For starters, a little bit of info about WBC that you might not have known is that it's actually one huge scam. All the top people in the church (the Phelps family) are actually lawyers. They hold such controversial protests in the hopes that someone flips out and assaults one of them or something, in which case they immediately sue the pants off the assaulter.

Now beyond that, their free speech is not being violated. They're not being told they can't protest, but there's just restrictions being placed on their protest in order to keep the piece. This isn't an uncommon practice, as most cities require you to get a permit for certain mass-rallies (i.e. a public march or rally), particularly controversial ones so that the authorities can make the necesssary arrangements to keep the peace. A few years back I saw one of those Real Police Videos shows that talked about a city in which the KKK had gotten a permit to hold a march and a rally and as such extra police were required to ensure that a riot didn't break out.

So yeah, placing that restriction upon protesting military funerals isn't a violation of their right to free speech since they are not being censored. They're just being told they can't get up into people's faces.

And the talking garlic bread isn't a problem until it evolves into a full-blown meatball sub that tells you to burn down all your furniture and kill all the phonies.

 

[Kargathia]

This is such a huge non-issue.

I seriously do not understand how this ever became anything more than a private issue.

If I owned a cemetery, my policy would be that, during a funeral, only funeral viewers or people visiting other graves are allowed on my property. The WBC would never be allowed on my property during a funeral unless they had buried family members there.

Can someone explain why EVERY FUCKING CEMETERY IN EXISTENCE doesn't already do this? Can someone explain why you (generic parents), with a dead son or daughter, would be retarded enough to pick a funeral home that doesn't have such a policy and that you know will be picketed BECAUSE of this lack of a policy?

Can someone please explain this?

There is no protection of free speech while on someone else's property, so how this ever became an issue is far beyond me.

I seriously see no one at fault here besides those in charge of the cemeteries and the parents that clearly can't make good decisions, and see absolutely no reason for the government to get involved in a civil manner.

A combination of many cemeteries being public-owned, and them simply being not that large. Almost every cemetery I know one could easily get within hearing distance of any grave without entering the actual cemetery.

 

[LordOmnit]

But a US court already said that the WBC was protected by the first amendment TWICE!

Spoiler

http://journalism.about.com/b/2011/03/02/supreme-court-rules-that-first-amendment-protects-churchs-right-to-stage-anti-gay-protests-at-military-funerals.htm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/02/AR2011030202548.html

What they were doing was completely legal, fucked up, but legal. But people didn?t like what they had to say so they decided to pass a law banned it. And I'm sorry but if first amendment means anything then it means the right to tell people what they don?t want to hear, even if it?s wrong.
Again if the situation was flipped you'd be outraged, but we don?t like it so fuck them it?s not like they have any rights

What I meant was that there is a precedent where freedom of speech is limited in certain manners because unlimited freedom of speech would lead to chaos. I never intentionally tried to argue that what they were doing was ACTUALLY illegal, just, like you, that it is wrong.

But I do disagree with your hypothetical flipped argument because (barring ridiculous and unrealistic circumstances) that could never happen: 1) because it is decidedly a matter of free speech and saying something to someone's face rather than announcing it to the world can't be restricted unless it is found to be some kind of harassment, which could never happen 2) because they are travelling to a "forum" not of their own for their "free speech" to be heard. It's just like the free speech time block at my university where you can expect to meet opposing opinions because, well, it's free speech in a public forum. Now, I'm willing to bet that the WBC looked up beforehand how close they are allowed to get to the funeral procession before they would be considered intruding on it so that they would still be in a- so to speak- free speech zone.

Captch: in the limelight
... is what WBC needs to not be

 

[tkioz]

I am positively shocked no one has gone Rambo on their asses yet.

I'm shocked that there haven't been mass counter-protests from Christians yet.

Christians have condemned their behaviour, many many times, it just doesn't make the headlines. Hell I'm a Christian and I believe their behaviour is the opposite of Christianity.

Condemning is a very, very different thing from standing between them and their victims. Tutting disapprovingly to yourself isn't going to change any minds.

Never get into a fight with an idiot, they'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience. That's the logic I use when dealing with idiots like the WBC. If I stand in front of them waving a sign, I'm giving them exactly what they want, attention.

Condemning their behaviour simply makes it clear that they do not speak for me, just as when other organisations condemn their behaviour it makes it clear they do not speak for those organisations.

 

[BOOM headshot65]

I am positively shocked no one has gone Rambo on their asses yet. They protest soldier funerals in some of the states with the most firearms per person IN THE WORLD, and somehow emerge unscathed. That is self-restraint from the people that I didn't think they had, and to that I say BRAVO!

That being said, the sooner they die, the better this world will be.

As well as those being the states with the biggest respect for the military. [http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YMMV]

And fun fact: the elder Phelps wear body armor to thier protest, so says a Patriot Guard biker I talked too, so he may be lying but I dought it. To this I have to say "If you think your spreading Gods message, dont you think he would protect his messengers? What are you afraid of? Some Marine finally snapping at his buddies funeral and getting the M-16 from his car."

OT: Thank God. After years of communites taking "Stop WBC" into thier own hands, now the Feds are actually doing something about it.

 

[Kargathia]

True, but let?s not pretend that this law was passed to protect them or to stop other people from doing the same this was clearly passed as a way to sensor them . Because what they were doing was completely legal , fucked up , but legal. But because people didn?t like what they had to say so they decided to pass a law banned it. and im sorry but if first amendment means anything then it means the right to tell people what they don?t want to hear, even if it?s wrong .

It was passed to bar anyone from being a **** on this magnitude, and incidentally they are the only ones who are. I couldn't care less whether they consider it a personal insult.

Also, the first amendment gives you the right to say what you want, not to wilfully grief and insult attendees of a burial.
You'll note that they'd still be completely free to say whatever they like to the very same people - just as long as they're not burying anyone.