Why I defend the Westboro Baptist Church #WestboroBaptistChurch #FreeSpeech #Liberty

 I do not agree with what you have to say but I defend to the death your right to say it. -Evelyn Beatrice Hall

Let me start this out by making my views on homosexuality clear. I don’t give a rat’s ass what consenting adults do. I really don’t. Whether your choice of getting down includes snorting crack off the dicks of Puerto Rican trannies or whether you prefer good old missionary with your hetero spouse is your business. Whatever people do with their genitals doesn’t affect me as long as they aren’t trying to force me to participate. I am not offended by homosexuality.

What does offend me? Well, let’s see, mass destruction of the environment, cruelty towards animals, and stifling of free speech. People who oppose the Westboro Baptist Church the most tend to be liberals who claim to be in favor of free speech but I am calling them out on their bullshit. They only want people to be able to speak freely when they approve of the content of what they are saying. They may only have opposing opinions when they walk on eggshells and are careful to use politically correct terminology. This is not what this nation agreed to when we decided to allow freedom to express ones opinion. Free speech must include ALL opinions even the ones we find downright stupid and deplorable. The Westboro Baptist Church challenges America’s values of freedom of speech because so many people find their message so horrible. Yet, if you value freedom then you must care about their right to express themselves accordingly.

Awhile back I was sitting at a coffee shop listening to some loud mouth liberal call them the number one domestic terrorist threat in America. I decided to challenge him and told him that in all their years they have been protesting and preaching, they have not broken the law or been violent. He told me that you do not have to be violent to be a terrorist. You only need to be hateful. This is untrue. Terrorism is politically motivated violence. You are not a terrorist because you annoy people or hurt their feelings. You may be an asshole but you are certainly not a terrorist. Have we become so pussified that we throw the word terrorist around so lightly just because people make us mad? There are websites and facebook pages dedicated to stopping the Westboro Baptist Church and encouraging people to write letters to the President to have them banned from the U.S. Is this really what we want? Exile for those who we do not agree with? He went on to whine about how disrespectful they are to the troops for protesting outside of their funerals. Again, they are completely within their rights to do so. I am no fan of the military and find the actions of the troops more akin to terrorism than anything the Westboro Baptist Church has ever done. To my knowledge Shirley or Fred Phelps have never bombed school children or operated drones. The troop worshippers attempt to tug on my heart strings doesn’t work and certainly does not change my stance on free speech.

As for peoples’ baseless fears that they will eventually spread hate by gaining members and forcing their beliefs on others is absurd. Everyone hates them. Even other conservative Christian groups find them too extreme. The Ku Klux Klan even organized a counter protest against them! They are comprised of under thirty people who are family members. They do not carry guns, they have never struck back at people who have spit in their faces, thrown objects at their children, or made bomb threats at them. There has been ZERO evidence of violent behavior ever.

People forget that Fred Phelps was a prominent and successful attorney who started his own law firm where he championed issues like civil rights and police brutality. He took on many pro bono cases where impoverished blacks were abused by police. He helped strike down Jim Crow laws. He had his car windows shot out and was met by mobs of angry people who screamed “nigger lover” as he walked into court with his black clients. He stuck to his guns all his life. I do not agree with his views on gays but I respect anyone who goes against the grain even when the world seems against you.

The irony is that people who oppose them for being hateful are the biggest bunch of haters themselves. Here is a quote from a google review of their church. Fuck these pieces of shit!!! MAY THEY ROT IN FUKING HELL! I am a Christian and I love gay people. jesus loves everyone but he hates them! i hope they get murdered and ripped apart by a pack of dogs. they are evil and corrupted by satan. they should be killed and anyone who likes them deserves to die! These scum bag fuckers can come protest at my house and see what happens! I would rip them apart. Shirley Phelps is a stupid ugly bitch who is gonna get hers one day!

Some people have accused them of not being “real Christians.” Have these people actually read the Bible? I am not a Christian but I have read what the Bible says about homosexuality and it isn’t a fan of the practice to put it mildly. I will just include the two passages which are impossible to misinterpret from Leviticus:

“You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”

“If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.”

Surely put to death…jeez, that’s kinda harsh, amirite? It appears that the WBC are actually being “real Christians.” The Christian God just isn’t that fond of gays.  I never cared for the book myself so I did not become a Christian. People like to pick and choose from the Bible based on what fits their lifestyle and what they like. But the values and rules that the Bible espouses does not always fit conveniently with what we like. It is easier to accuse other people of not being real Christians than to do research and find out that they actually may be right.

Gays are allowed to marry now. Hate crimes against gays in this country are rare. Even the infamous Matthew Shepard case turned out to not be a hate crime after more details were revealed. It was a drug deal gone bad that sadly ended in murder. Although Shepard  did not value life that highly himself as he knowingly spread HIV without disclosing his status to partners. Gays have parades and organize events and parties all over the country. You are more likely to be physically harmed for saying you hate gays then saying you support them. You should not be physically attacked for saying either. I am glad that gays are afforded the same liberties as I am. I want the same liberties for people like the Westboro Baptist Church too. The right to express themselves without fear of exile, attack, police brutality, or getting banned from an area. Our duty as Americans is not to walk on eggshells for fear of possibly offending a special interest group. Our duty is to protect freedom and liberties, the very values we have prided ourselves on since the founding of this nation.

The Cult of #DamienEchols

 I bet this is making the panties of fat goth girls in corsets so wet. Damien apparently received thousands of letters of fan girl mail. I mean, just look at him. How can anyone resist this gentlemen scholar? Anyone with plastic skulls and occult tattoos must be cool. And did ya hear he hangs out with Johnny Depp?! LIKE OMFG!!!!11!!!1

I remember being a disgruntled, gothy teen girl in the late 90s watching Paradise Lost and thinking it was the most profound documentary I had ever seen. I became an instant supporter of the West Memphis 3. I called myself a supporter of the WM3 anyway. In reality, I mostly cared about Damien. Most of his supporters are like that though. If it was just about Jason and Jessie I doubt Genesis P-Orridge and Marilyn Manson would be rallying for their cause. I could relate to him at the time. I too, grew up in a small town and liked dark music, played Ouija board, and wore black all the time. I was convinced by that one documentary that what happened to Damien could happen to me and I had to spread the word that this poor boy was sent to death row just because of how he looked. I was also convinced that John Mark Byers was the real perp. I mean, just look at him. Big, crazed, hillbilly who yelled really loud and admitted to whipping his son with a belt. Clearly this was not a huge leap to a triple homicide of children. Ugh. I was kinda dumb back then. The supporters were doing the same thing they did to Byers as they accused others of doing to Damien. Byers, being an attention whore played it up for the cameras and gave them a great performance.  

But there was never any evidence that Byers was involved and the supporters switched things up when they stopped accusing one parent of a murdered child and moved on to the next. Now they are trying to get us to believe that Terry Hobbs, stepdad of Steven Branch was the real killer. Thank the gods that Todd Moore, another father of one of the kids was out of town or they probably would be moving on to accuse him next. They do not give us any hard evidence tying Hobbs to the crimes. There was a hair that may or may not be his that was found on the Byers boy’s shoelace. This would be extremely suspicious if it wasn’t for the fact that the boys played at the Hobbs’ residence on an almost daily basis and were over there the day of the murder. If I ever get murdered I hope they do not accuse my cats of the crimes because I am routinely covered in their fur. Transfer hairs are not hard evidence. The documentaries are extremely irresponsible because they have already tried two people in the court of public opinion without any substantial evidence. They point to Hobbs having a criminal history and breaking into a woman’s house as well as domestic disputes. Let’s look at Damien Echols 500 page dossier of mental illness presented in Exhibit 500 of the trial. Damien also broke into a home and was charged with burglary. His own parents had him admitted to a mental hospital for threatening to “eat his father alive.” His mother stated that she feared he would harm her or the children in the house. He attacked another kid at school and attempted to gouge his eye out and there were witnesses who said he kicked a sick dog to death. A large breed dog skull was found among his possessions. His mother admitted he brought home the head of a dog and hung it on a clothes line. Damien told a counselor which is noted in Exhibit 500 that he could “gain power through drinking blood.” None of these factors prove he murdered those boys just as the accusations about Hobbs character does not prove anything. What it does tell me about Damien though is that he is no one worthy of my worship or admiration. Harming animals and threatening to harm your parents is not admirable. He wasn’t a suspect because he “just looked weird.” He IS weird.

I no longer relate to Damien, I find how the documentaries preyed on the stupidity of the masses including my own stupidity at the time and pointed the finger at other people as awful, I do think that Damien’s own terrible behavior lead to him being a suspect not Satanic panic alone. However, I do believe there were MANY problems with the case. The bodies were not mutilated with a knife but the result of animal predation, two witnesses recanted their statements, there was evidence of juror misconduct. I am no longer what you would call a supporter because WM3 supporters are basically fans nowadays and will belittle and flip out on anyone who questions Saint Damien’s innocence, but I am happy that they are free. There was plenty of reasonable doubt presented and I would rather have guilty men go free than innocent men incarcerated. What bothers me now is that I cannot have an intelligent conversation with a supporter without getting told over and over how fucking brainwashed I am even though I am agreeing with them that Damien and the boys are most likely innocent. They are not satisfied with that. They want me to also agree with them that Terri Hobbs did it, the documentaries are the greatest thing since sliced bread, and Damien is a hero. I won’t do that. Sorry not sorry.

Nowadays, Damien is still the attention whore he was two decades ago. He is no longer blowing kisses at the victim’s families at least. But he is a fraud. His Hermetic Reiki stint was absurd. He claims to have special healing energy that he can transfer to his patients and for only a few hundred bucks an hour he can put his energy in you. I can respect hustlers but not frauds.  Let’s hope his “energy” is all he is transferring. Dat cold sore doh. Ugh.

I want the supporters who are convinced Terri Hobbs did this to take a long, hard look at what they are doing. If they are using heresy witness accounts and Hobbs’ previous bad behavior then how is that any different than what the jury, judge, prosecution, and police did to the WM3? It really isn’t. I want them to consider what makes Damien a hero. Being a victim does not automatically elevate you to hero status. Don’t make this guy into a damned cult leader. He just isn’t that cool.