What WBC does isn't so much the honest expression of a political viewpoint or even an ideology, as it is a refined business model - get in as many faces as possible over the most emotional possible issues (I mean, protesting at funerals?), and sue everybody for physical harassment if they so much as touch your sleeve.
I don't know if the goal is to make money or what, but it seems very obvious to me that they are coming up with the most vile things they can think of for the sake of getting a rise out of people.
I don't know why anyone would waste time arguing with them when they are clearly just looking for attention and may not even believe everything they're saying.
Ehh, I remember that site (godhatesfags.com) getting hacked on a weekly basis back in '99 - even recall someone stole ownership of the domain itself... That site deserved it every time and Westboro Baptist Church still deserve it for the despicable methods they use... believe in whatever you want, but be tactful in some way or another...
The raft of state legislation in 2007/2008 setting up perimeters (300 - 500 feet, depending on the state) was in direct response to the stepped-up funeral protests of 2006 which were in extremely close, personal proximity to the mourners.
Now, they are 300-500 feet away, but only due to specific state laws.
Absolute bullshit. Free speech isn't meant as a defense of reasonable, well-mannered expression, because such speech needs no protection. It's meant to defend the kinds of expressions that people would actually want to censor.
Let's be clear here. Stalking, harassment, and invasion of privacy--those all may or may not be legitimate things WBC can be rightly accused of. If the WBC is in the wrong, they're in the wrong for disrupting people's funerals by shouting at the top of their lungs, not for the specific things they happen to say in the process. "Hate speech" is a bullshit political euphemism, and the right to march down the street or stand on a street corner to share your views is the essence of free speech. It doesn't matter whether you're the WBC, the Ku Klux Klan, or Lyndon LaRouche.
EDIT: It should also be noted that in the United States (where Phelps is based), restrictions on "hate speech" have not fared well in the courts, as they are usually seen as an unconstitutional restriction on free speech.
No, if anything they have declared war on a very specific tactic: protesting at funerals.
There are well established limits on free speech, such as yelling "Fire!" in a crowded theater (Schenck v. US, 1919).
Pretend for a moment that we live in a world where the Schenck case never happened. A group (call them the "Eastboro Baptist Church") has started using the tactic of running into movie theaters and yelling "FIRE!". After all the commotion, they spread their anti-gay message.
This "fire" ruse is starting to get on some people's nerves, so an online group (call them "NAMED") says that they are going to protest the Eastboro Baptist Church.
That's not a "declaration of war on free speech", it's an argument that shouting fire in a crowded theater does not deserve protection under the First Amendment.
Also, for anyone who isn't aware, the Supreme Court has already heard oral arguments (Snyder v Phelps) about whether these funeral protests are protected speech, and will issue an opinion at end of term in a few months.
Schenck is an abomination of a case and clearly was decided on the side of fascism and repression of utterly harmless free speech.
The problem is that no one shouts fire in a crowded theatre, and anyone who did would rightly be indicted on a number of charges not pertaining to speech. The Schenck case had nothing whatsoever to do with theatres or people wrongly alerting theatre goers to a fire.
The metaphor was used by Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., who was an embarrassment to the country, to stop people from criticizing US involvement in WWI, claiming that criticism of US imperialism was identical to shouting fire, and was a clear and present danger, which is obvious bunk to everyone as it is not the same thing at all.
And here we are again. Someone is saying unpopular things and the reaction is to claim censorship is justified because there is a theatre that is not on fire somewhere.
Let me be very clear. There is no theatre. There is no fire. There is no one shouting fire in a theatre. And if there was someone shouting fire in a fireless theatre the result would be that the other patrons would tell the person yelling to shut up and sit down.
It is time to stop defending the abomination that is the Schenck decision and the lunatic that was Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
"It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes." - Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., in Buck vs Bell, ruling that the government has a right to sterilize women against their will for the same reason the government has a right to vaccinate people against their will. The decision upheld Laughlin's Model Law, which was then used as a model document for the Law for Protection Against Genetically Defective Offspring, passed in 1933 in the German Republic, allowing forced sterilizations of those thought defective there as well.
This saying is (probably incorrectly) attributed to Voltaire: "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
The question is, would I defend to the death your right to turn up at someone's funeral and deliberately cause distress to their grieving relatives? Probably not.
There's free speech and then there's harassing people. If Anonymous want to hack into these people's website in order to prevent them speaking then I can't approve. I still can't describe picketing funerals as free speech.
Eh, I don't know if this is really happening or not. If you go over to the actual "press release" on anonops and look at the comments, there's quite a discussion on if this should fly or not. Sure, there's some people calling on doing it for the lulz. But there are quite a few saying no, they will not participate, as much as they dislike Westboro. A few are calling for not silencing them, but doing some "investigation" and trying to dig up any dirty laundry to get rid of them that way.
But being that some of anon's strength lies in numbers, the disagreement and discussion is a good thing, I think. Even if some people go for it and disregard the argument that silencing free speech they disagree with is bad, the chances that they can do much damage are smaller.
Did you even read the statement? This is most definitely not a war on free speech.
We, the collective super-consciousness known as ANONYMOUS - the Voice of Free Speech & the Advocate of the People...
Being such aggressive proponents for the Freedom of Speech & Freedom of Information as we are...
Look, I'm all for free speech. It is an absolute necessity. It should be protected at all costs.
...Except for when you have a group that is so deranged and have abused this right to free speech that we hold so dearly that it is barely recognizable. As far as I'm concerned, we can make this one exception, and the world will be a better place. Throw them in the "yelling FIRE! in a crowded theater" category.
They make good money at what they do.