Westboro goes to Court

[loCAtek]

They're finally being taken to the Supreme Court;



Military Funeral Protests Outrage Families, Lawmakers
Legislation Aims to Curb Group's Tactics
8 comments By ADRIENNE MAND LEWIN
March 15, 2006
PrintRSSFont Size: Share:EmailTwitterFacebookMoreFarkTechnoratiGoogleLiveMy SpaceNewsvineRedditDeliciousMixxYahooThey've appeared at military funerals across the country, armed with signs reading "God Hates You" and "Thank God for Dead Soldiers."

Members of Westboro Baptist Church protest at a military funeral.
(ABCNEWS)Members of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., have outraged family members and communities alike with their antics. They say America's war casualties are God's wrath for tolerating homosexuality.

Now they're getting their wish for a federal-level fight.

After attending a funeral in Michigan on Saturday where hundreds of veterans and other supporters of the soldier's family countered the protesters, Republican Rep. Mike Rogers plans to introduce legislation against the demonstrations, possibly as soon as Thursday.

It would restrict protests at funerals at national cemeteries for 60 minutes before and after a service, and require protesters to remain 500 feet or more from the grave site or individuals at the funeral.

"American families burying their husbands or wives and sons or daughters who died while fighting for their nation are being subjected to horrible verbal and visual attacks by protesters," said a statement by Rogers, who served as a funeral officer during his own service in the U.S. Army. "No grieving family should be faced with such disrespect or threats and intimidation."


Church Members Welcome Challenge
Shirley Phelps-Roper, a lawyer for the church members and daughter of its leader, the Rev. Fred Phelps, said the group was ready for a First Amendment fight.

"We've been just pining for, so hoping that someone in the United States House or Senate would get busy and get something going to dismantle the First Amendment at the federal level," Phelps-Roper said.

"Little Mr. Mike Rogers does not like some words on some placards on a public street," she said. "He's ready to give away the crowning jewel of all of our freedoms."

Rogers told ABC News that the law would allow freedom of expression while still protecting the soldiers' families.

"I think it clearly passes muster because the Supreme Court has ruled that time, place and manner can be regulated," he said. "You can't regulate their content."

I've heard a few other debates that say the Westboro protesters while insensitive aren't breaking laws. However, let me toss into the mix that I disagree because the reason they give for their protests isn't political. What the Westboro church claims to be protesting; are the citizens of the US who are homosexual. Is not targeting a group explicitly for harassment considered a 'Hate Crime'?

[Scooter]

Not gay people, they aren't covered by federal hate crimes laws.

I get uneasy about any attempts to delimit areas where free speech may be exercised. I rather like the solution that Matthew Shepard's friends came up with at his funeral, they used pvc pipe to make really tall angel's wings which they wore, and stood in a line creating this wall of white between the protestors and the mourners, so that friends and family attending the funeral didn't have to see those agents of Satan or their hateful messages.

I would think at military funerals there would be plenty of soldiers willing to volunteer for similar duty.

[Gob]

I bet heh soldiers would be more willing to beat seven shades of shit out of the lunatic Phelps crowd.

I liked Charles Firth's way of dealing with them...

[Scooter]

I almost pissed my pants the first time I saw that.

I wonder how long they would stay at their posts on the picket line if an entire gaggle of really obviously gay men kept coming on to them like that. It would probably repulse them so much they'd run for their lives.

[Gob]

Big gang of gay men and women, dressed to kill and camping it up to the nines, would remove these freaks from any event they were picketing.



"Hi, Phelpsy baby, give me a big kiss you old softy!"

May also give some of the men uncomfortable hard-ons, for reasons they would deny, but which probably underlie their neurosis...

[Beaglz]

Since I do not live more than 2 hours from Phelp's church, maybe I can go to westport and dig up a few of the flaming guys down there and march them right to phelp's door.

[Long Run]

Free speech is not absolute. People should have the privacy to bury their loved ones without whack jobs interfering.

[Grim Reaper]

I would think at military funerals there would be plenty of soldiers willing to volunteer for similar duty.

That would be the Patriot Guard Riders. They're a group of bikers that show up to military funerals, when invited, to help guard against idiots like Phelps.

[loCAtek]

Not gay people, they aren't covered by federal hate crimes laws.

Really!? How is that justified? Isn't that a civil right?

[Grim Reaper]

Not gay people, they aren't covered by federal hate crimes laws.

Really!? How is that justified? Isn't that a civil right?

It wasn't covered until a couple months ago. On October 28, 2009, President Obama signed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act as part of the defense authorization bill. It expanded the federal hate crime law to include sexual orientation.

[Big RR]

But I doubt it would make this sort of thing a "hate crime" as no crime is actually being committed. Certainly if threats were directly made against one or more gay individuals, it would probably be covered by the law, but just saying that gays are immoral and hated by god is neither a threat nor an action, it's an opinion and is protected by the first amendment. And while I think these Westboro guys are jerks, I wouldn't hav it any other way.

As for the proposed law, I'd have to see what it actually states; time, place, and manner of speech can be reasonably regulated, but the standard of review is high and the restrictions must be narrow. I feel sympathy for what these families are going through, but I also fear restriction of free speech just because some (quite rightly or not) find that exercise offensive.

[Andrew D]

When they show up, the groundskeeper should hose them down. Preferably with water with pesticide in it.

[Big RR]

Didn't a sheriff in Selma do that years ago (no pesticide as I recall). Aomehow, I doubt if the groundskeeper would be condmened by anyway near as many people as the sherif was.

[Andrew D]

Well, various sheriffs, etc., in the Old South used water cannon -- a far cry from the ordinary garden hose which I had in mind. Unfortunately, these are national cemeteries, which makes them public property. My late father is buried in a private cemetery in DC. He was a veteran (Bronze Star). If the Westboro cultists had shown up at his funeral, I'd have been waiting in line to kick the crap out of them.

And that would have had nothing to do with their First-Amendment rights. Only the government can violate a person's right of free speech; a private person (acting in a truly private capacity) cannot.

These Westboro people (a term I use guardedly) are filth. I see nothing wrong with forcing them to stay well away from grieving families while spewing their disgusting shit. And, no, I don't think that the First-Amendment rule should be based on the content of what they say. I likewise shouldn't be allowed to get anywhere near the grieving families, if they don't want me near them, while playing a beautiful and appropriate piece on a portable piano.

The point is context. And the relevant context here is people's trying to bury their loved ones with some dignity and peace. It's not as if the people burying their loved ones are out to make some sort of political statement -- which distinguishes this sort of case from, for example, "free speech zones" set up to keep those who disagree away from someone who is quite consciously setting out to make a political statement -- and I don't see how anyone has a First-Amendment "right" to disrupt what is essentially a private (despite taking place on public property) ceremony not intended to make any political statement at all by turning a funeral into a political cartoon.

[loCAtek]

But I doubt it would make this sort of thing a "hate crime" as no crime is actually being committed. Certainly if threats were directly made against one or more gay individuals, it would probably be covered by the law, but just saying that gays are immoral and hated by god is neither a threat nor an action, it's an opinion and is protected by the first amendment. ...

Just asking for the info, but isn't harassment a crime and be it solely verbal? If I understand correctly, a workplace can be considered 'hostile' by contunducting harassment of verbal or written form while it may be directly threatening. Now, a hate group like the Nazi Party or the KKK can hold a parade if all they doing is promoting themselves, but these protests are targeting individuals and other groups with verbal and written abuse.

[Big RR]

Andrew--isn't a military funeral, with all the flag waving and gun salutes and taps, a political statement (perhaps of support for the government and war effort)? Not that I begrudge anyone having one, but I do think it is at least partially political.

Lo--not certain what has to be done for harassment to rise to the level of a crime, but in this case i am unsure one could make such a case. Individuals are not be targetted, the US government and its policies are, and the individuals are just being caught in the crossfire. If one were, e.g., to protest a war outside (or at the gate of) a military installation and call it genocide, many of the soldiers will be bearing the brunt of those allegations and yet they are not being targetted by the protest.

I think Andrew's suggestion of "context" makes sense, but I am uncertain that the court would see the military funeral as nonpolitical.

[Andrew D]

The Westboro bigots don't care what kind of funeral it is. I have seen video of them disrupting funerals at which only a few people, presumably loved ones of the deceased, were present. I do not think that a mother weeping over the coffin of her dead son is setting out to make a political statement.

Protesting outside (or at the gate of) a military base is not analogous. It does not prevent the military personnel from going about their business inside their base. (And if one is sane, one does not try to impede them in the performance of their duties, inside or outside their base.)

People go to funerals to bury their dead. The Westboro scum deliberately set out to make it so that the bereaved cannot grieve in peace. They are shit.

Anyway, it is impossible for a private person (acting in a truly private capacity) to violate anyone's First-Amendment rights. And what the members of Westboro Baptist Church of Satan need is to have private people explain to them exactly why disrupting funerals is a bad idea.

[Big RR]

Protesting outside (or at the gate of) a military base is not analogous. It does not prevent the military personnel from going about their business inside their base. (And if one is sane, one does not try to impede them in the performance of their duties, inside or outside their base.)

People go to funerals to bury their dead. The Westboro scum deliberately set out to make it so that the bereaved cannot grieve in peace. They are shit.

I agree they are shit, but in both cases, the protesters do not prevent anyone from "performing their duties"; the families still bury their dead (and the military folks carry on in my example), they just don't do it in peace.

Anyway, it is impossible for a private person (acting in a truly private capacity) to violate anyone's First-Amendment rights. And what the members of Westboro Baptist Church of Satan need is to have private people explain to them exactly why disrupting funerals is a bad idea.

Can't argue with that.

[Andrew D]

Maybe a solution would be for Congress to provide that whenever a funeral is taking place in a national cemetery, the portion of that cemetery which is involved in the funeral -- including a 1000-foot radius around the coffin -- is the private property of those conducting the funeral for as long as the funeral lasts (including the part when the participants walk back to their vehicles and slowly drive off). That way, the Westboro trash would be violating private-property rights, and there would be no First-Amendment issue at all.

It would be like a very short-term leasehold. The government would still have the underlying ownership, but the management of the property would be, for that bit of time, at the discretion of the tenant. And the tenants could exercise their discretion to persuade the Westboro self-evident-dangers-to-everyone-around-them that they really ought to be somewhere else.

[Sue U]

As with any time, place and manner restrictions on speech, the key is what is reasonable, particularly when it comes to balancing the rights of the grieving with the protestors' rights to denounce policies they find offensive.I don't think it unreasonable to give grieving families some personal space. In this case, it cannot be doubted that the aim of such a restriction is in fact based on the content of the speech, even though in theory it might equally restrict expressions of support. But I think it is possible for the government to create "speech-free zones" for such occasions: i.e., not every public place need be a public forum.

[W]hat the members of Westboro Baptist Church of Satan need is to have private people explain to them exactly why disrupting funerals is a bad idea.

An eminently reasonable solution in any event. I would further suggest that the explanation be conducted in private -- say, around back of the mausoleum.