Idiots to picket East Peoria Marine's funeral
Fred Phelps' band of insane anti-gay "Christians" is planning to picket the East Peoria funeral services this Saturday of Gunnery Sgt. Terry W. Ball.
Phelps, as I told you earlier this week, travels the country to protest at funerals of soldiers and Marines killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. He and the Westboro Baptist Church claim that God is killing the soldiers because America is too tolerant of "fags."
You can read the group's incendiary flier here (pdf file). Be warned, however. It's vile stuff.
This is the sort of thing Sgt. Ball's family can expect:
From the Peoria Journal-Star:
Ball and his unit were driving along a road they often patrolled on June 12 when he spotted something unusual. After he got out of the vehicle, he approached the suspicous-looking object and told his unit to stand back, Sharon Ball said.
"He saw something in the road that didn't look right, and when he walked up to see what it was they detonated it," she said.
Military officials told relatives that Ball's actions prevented others in his unit from being wounded, Sharon Ball said.
"Because he held his men back and walked up there, someone told his wife he had saved his unit's life," she said.
Gunnery Sgt. Ball was awarded the Purple Heart and the Bronze Star.
(Hat tip to both Marathon Pundit and a subscriber, who included this link, which has a little more info and some ideas for action).
UPDATE: I put this in comments, but I think it needs to be moved up here because the debate is going a bit haywire.
As Archpundit points out, Phelps had longtime ties to the Democratic Party (Al Gore) before he went off his nut.
This isn't a Right v. Left thing. This is extreme hate, which recognizes no conventional political boundaries and defies all reason.
posted by Rich Miller @ 8/11/2005 02:40:00 AM
35 comments
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I'm still waiting for the right wing to denounce these people.
Just like the left wing denonuced their militant fringe groups like the Black Pathers, PETA, Greenpeace, etc
Why are you giving these people the attention they want, Rich?
I'm not sure if folks like this are 'right' or 'left'. I don't think it matters either. Politics should be seperate from sacrifice and I don't like to see protestors of any sort, supportive or whatever, get involved in any way.
You understand why DoD is touchy about privacy and photos when you read stories like this.
The cops should shag this people and if they protest, crack them on the head. Heck with the civil liberties/ACLU stuff.
Anon 6:51, I don't subscribe to the theory that ignoring them will make them go away. They're coming. That's news. Like it or not.
I have a stupid question.
What does "IEDs" mean? One sign they have says "thank god for IED's"
IED is "improvised explosive device".
Many if not most IEDs are a subset of landmines.
But the U.S. military would look bad if GIs were being killed by landmines since the brass swore up-and-down it would be a bad thing for the United States to join the Ottawa Treaty to ban anti-personnel landmines.
So the term IED was created to get around the obvious questions about landmines.
"In opposing the Ottawa Treaty the official DOD position was that landmines were useful to the U.S. military. Supporters of the treaty said this was not true. In Iraq is the U.S. military using landmines against the insurgents? Doesn't this assymetry suggest supporters of the landmine treaty were more correct than the DOD? Landmines are of little use to the high-mobility military of the United States, but a very effective weapon to use against the U.S. military."
Improvised Explosive Device
It's too easy to denounce people picketing funerals of GIs.
I'd like to ask someone that considers the anti-gay marriage amendment a priority issue how their theology differs from this guy.
Or doesn't anybody think the anti-gay marriage amendment is a priority anymore?
But the U.S. military kicks out soldiers if they are openly gay... I don't get it.
The horrible thing here isn't the wacko guy (although he is obviously crazy). The sick part is that from the photo it looks like they have their kids (someone's kids) involved.
Do these kids have any chance after being so filled with hate?
A question to debate: Which is worse, an occasional belting of a child or filling their heads with ideas like God hated fags? Not that either is going to be a nominee for Parent of the Year, but one could get your child into DCFS custody and I am willing to bet that the later will have a more lasting negative impact on the kids life.
Man! I had no idea that God hated homosexuals. Even after the countless comments from leaders like Sen. Santorum and Rep. Delay, I really wouldn't buy it all.
I thought, selfishly, that gay people weren't responsible for unseen federal spending or the death of soldiers and civilians in Iraq. Geesh!
Thanks Rich for exposing this preacher and his followers. And, as disgusting as it is, I'm not truly convinced that this kind of stuff isn't talked about from the pulpit in less crude language every Sunday. These guys have 'success' because idiots are willing to follow them.
It used to be the David Koresh fanatics who believed they'd get to heaven only through him or Jim Jones or something. Now, thanks to the mainstream and popular intolerance of homosexuals, these idiots strive to make the news.
Sad, yes. To do this at a soldier's funeral, beyond distasteful. But, in the final analysis, a comical display indeed of how twisted our country's religious fanatics have become - and I use the word 'fanatic' loosely.
These displays are based on the principle that being gay is evil and immoral - something that enormous numbers of people, and a solidly high percentage of religious folks - believe without question. And, don't for a minute think that with the likes of folks like Alan Keyes, our nation is getting any better.
After reading the original post and the comments that followed, I am reminded of the comment once made by President Andrew Jackson (in his case, it was in reaction to critics of his deceased wife, but I think it is valid in this case):
"May Almighty God forgive them for what they have done, for I am unable to forgive them for their actions."
If these individuals bring their protest act up to Chicago when Army soldier Miguel Carrasquillo (who was Killed In Action in Iraq on Tuesday) is buried, I suspect these sick minds will be lucky if they are only beaten to a pulp. Pull that stunt in Humboldt Park and you may not pull it again.
If you did witness Phelps' demonstrators experiencing citizen justice, would you be able to identify any of the citizens administering justice?
"I'm sorry officer. It happened fast. The faces were kinda a blur. I think their shirts might have been red or blue. But it might have been the signs too."
There are so many other ways to get their message out in the open. One of which is the civil way: go to states that don't have a marriage amendment and circulate petitions. Or call their local state reps/senators/Congressmen/Senators and complain. Don't do this. It tears a community and family apart enough without having to deal with this.
" I'm still waiting for the right wing to denounce these people."
You obviously haven't been paying attention (must be your ADD), because it's been happening a lot.
These same group of ***clowns were down at a funeral in Anna, IL for a soldier out of the 123rd FA, and Phelps & his bunch almost didn't make it, except for the police who headed off about 150 bikers who had blood in their eyes and were totally up for a very serious beat down of Phelps and his merry band.
In fact, there's been some very, very, very creative ways that these clowns have been dealt with when they show up to picket - creative uses of fire engines are really popular, but the garbage truck one was the best one I heard of.
I don't think you mentioned any right-wing repudiations of this group. Just the biker stuff. You can't just say "it's happened" without offering evidence.
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Anon 6:49 - equating this right wing, anti-gay mob with Greenpeace is absurd.
I agree Greenpeace's methods are a little too daring for most sane people, but Greenpeace targets people engaged in illegal activity.
These right wingers are invading the funerals of bereaved families. Instead of defending them, think back to your last family funeral and how you would feel, because according to their argument, every tragedy in America from hurricanes to plane crashes can be attributed to our acceptance of diversity.
If it was anti-war protesters who had showed up waving signs that said "I told you so", every elected Democrat would condemn them.
But few Republicans have the guts to stand up to the extreme elements of their party. That's what Terry Schiavo's case was all about.
I agree with you, YDD. Why would the "left wing" (is there one?)denounce PETA. I mean, they are a little over the top and inappropriate sometimes. But in fact, they are right. We, and the companies who provide us our food every day, do treat many animals with cruelty.
But on the other hand, these freaks are not right. G-d doesn't hate gay people, he loves them. Doesn't G-d love all mankind? How tasteless do you have to be to protest a funeral just to get yourself some attention?
The only time I protest at a funeral is if the after-party food is inadequate.
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You know what links all these protestors is not right vs left, but whether or not you think America is the major threat facing the world.
These folks think America gets the IEDs it deserves because America is a liberal country.
Other folks think America gets the IEDs it deserves because its a neo-Imperialist power.
Strange allies linked by the common perception America is the source of the world's ills.
It's this shared vision that unites these crazies.
I think I qualify as the "religous right" although I don't like that term. I'm a deacon in an evangelical church and a Republican campaign consultant.
I denounce the disgusting tactics of these protestors. A funeral is no place to make a political point OF ANY SORT.
It is a matter of decency far more than theology. Even if I agreed with every point of these people's theology (and I have some problems there, too) I would still condemn their tactics as being FAR, FAR beyond the pale of anything that Christ or his Apostles would have done.
HoosierDaddy,
On what do you disagree with Phelp's theology?
Bill Baar,
You seem disconnected with reality.
Why do Iraqis attack GIs with landmines and other IEDs?
If the United States didn't invade Iraq, would these GIs be killed?
Let's say the United States didn't invade Iraq, but had all the same policies regarding homosexuals. Who these GIs be attacked?
To equate a critique that makes sense "if we didn't invade Iraq these attacks wouldn't happen" to "if we weren't tolerant of homosexuals these attacks wouldn't happen" shows that your grip on reality is tenuous.
The Boy Scouts ban homosexuals and God seems to be heaving a number of lightning bolts and other tragedies at them this summer. The military also bans homosexuals and soldiers are dying every day. My guess is that God doesn't mind homosexuals that much (after all, He made them that way).
Tessa - Just trying to point out that this group's position as God's spokesperson on homosexuals does not hold water. If I offended anyone, my sincere apologies.
You know, I really dont agree with what these people are doing, and in fact, I think they are the lowest scum on the earth to do that to someone while their family is feeling the deepest kind of grief, with nothing to hold onto or comfort them except for their son's bravery, selflessness, and willingness to give his life for something bigger than himself. Even then, death is no cakewalk, and even those rationalities still do not make it any easier to deal with the fact that a loved one is gone. Personally, I wish they would have let those bikers through to have at them.
That said, it's not really my business what these people do, and as heinous and disgusting their behavior is, there has been behavior that is just as bad, if not worse throughout our country's history. No matter. They are Americans, like us all, and they reserve the right to protest or believe whatever they want. Fine. I'll leave their judgement up to God. But the fact that they would poison their children's minds into believing this BS, and actually convincing these children (who are of course, quite impressionable, like all kids are)to follow this cause, not only putting them in physical harms way, but even more serious, putting them in lifelong mental harms way. That alone merits this Phelps fellow being thrown in jail, and his children taken away. Does this guy not realize the damage he is doing to his/whoever's children's minds? Does he not realize that regardless of his beliefs, that he is only furthering hate within our own country? Maybe not, but maybe that is why he should be thrown in prison.
Unlike PETA, Earth First and other loonies of the left, punks like the Phelps crowd are more of what much of conservative America would like to say out loud, but are too repressed. I've seldom heard a lib say they would blow up an animal lab, no matter how much Montrachet they drank; but conservatives, when they let their Karl Rove facade down a bit, morph right into those "respectable looking and sounding" Phelps creeps. They always start with "I'm not against gays (usually) but I don't want to given them "special rights"... But I'm an optimist; decades from now people will wonder how society could have accepted homophobia like racism so easily.
you think that Fred Phelp's ideas are what conservative america really thinks but is just scared to say out loud? You, my friend, have read too many New York Times opinion pieces.
This band of miscreants is not right-wing just because they hijacked a religion that is connected with the conserative people of this country. These protesters are simply misguided, brainwashed peons helping Mr. Phelps get the attention he craves. Whatever wing you want to classify them as...
I agree with Anon 5:35. As Archpundit points out, Phelps had longtime ties to the Democratic Party (Al Gore) before he went off his nut.
This isn't a Right v. Left thing. This is extreme hate, which recognizes no conventional political boundaries and defies all reason.
Carl,
Yes, I think GIs and Americans would have been continued to be attacked as they were at Khobar Towers, Mogadishu and our embassies in Africa, and the USS Cole (Not to mention constant attacks on US and Brit planes protecting Muslim Shia and Kurds in the Northern and Southern no fly zones. (and Americans would be attacked if we invaded Iraq or not).
I took Bin Laden's fatwa of war against the US Seriously.
I took President Clinton's speech of if 1998 on Saddam seriously, and voted for Gore over Bush in 2000 in large part becuase of it because I didn't think Bush took Nation Building seriously (because it's only social revolution in the Arab world that can turn this totalitarian extremism around).
I took Richard Clarke seriously when he talked of the threat of UBL's boogie to Bhagdad.
And I'm glad we have Rumsfeld as SecDef because he understands the threat we face, and the courage to say so the obvious,
"While most of our people are determined to defend our country and our way of life, a few seem attracted to the seductive idea that we might be able to retreat behind convenient fictions that obscure the lethality and the intention of the enemy. I want to mention a few of those fictions, and then talk a bit about the way head in the global war on terror, the struggle between civilization and extremists, and then respond to some questions."
And I'm thankful we have people who serve to defend the right of people to: among other things, make disgraceful, shameful, jackasses of themselves in protests at a funerla of someone who gave his life to defend our country's way-of-life that's respectful (not tolerant, but respectful --there's a huge difference) of all our diversity.
I'd still knock these jerks in the face if I was there.
We have a long tradition of this kind of offensive religious pacifism that tolerates gross intolerance and slaughter in the name of peace. Read some stuff by AJ Muste and his friends from the 30s and 40s.
Some saw German aggression as a kind of divine judgment. "Our sins have found us, that's all," explained John Haynes Holmes, pastor of New York City's Community Church. "If Hitler triumphs, it will be as the punishment of our transgressions." A.J. Muste, a Congregationalist minister turned peace activist, compared pro-democracy hawks to "the men who tortured and killed the victims of the Inquisition." Albert Palmer, president of Chicago Theological Seminary, said Americans should be "solving the problems of social and economic justice" at home rather than condemning Germany "through a haze of Allied propaganda."
The Christian Century magazine, the nation's leading religious journal, devoted itself to opposing U.S. intervention. Writing as late as November 1941, editor Charles Clayton Morrison denounced an Anglo-American alliance as "the most ambitious imperialism ever projected." He then offered this dark prediction: "For the United States to make a fateful decision to enter this war on the mistaken and irrational assumption that it is a war for the preservation of anything good in civilization will be the supreme tragedy of our history."
Phelps is a sad and pathetic man--for the many disagreements many of us may have over other issues, it's simply a no brainer that this guy is wrong and evil. We don't need to blame "the other side"--we just need to make sure people like Phelps are made to be unwelcome--whatever strategy we as individuals may deem as best to do that is open to debate, but the goal is the same.
Frankly, I can't even imagine turning this into a partisan issue--he's a *#$R*&# and we all honor our troops who fall in combat. He doesn't. Screw him.
"IED is "improvised explosive device". Many if not most IEDs are a subset of landmines."
not true - artillery shells are not 'land mines', but when rigged to work in that fashion they become IED's. It would be more correct to say that landmines are a subset of IED's, and even more correct to say that neither is a subset of the other, but that they have commonalities. (The Wenn diagram would look like the mastercard logo.)
"But the U.S. military would look bad if GIs were being killed by landmines since the brass swore up-and-down it would be a bad thing for the United States to join the Ottawa Treaty to ban anti-personnel landmines. So the term IED was created to get around the obvious questions about landmines."
That's some creative mythmaking, Mr. Nyberg, but it doesn't wash. The force needed to knock a vehicle out greatly exceeds that required for antipersonnel purposes. When the enemy stacked 3 antitank mines on top of each to take those Marines out last week, they improvised on an existing 'product' to achieve their ends. (In Bosnia, some mean bastards would do the same and put a small A/P mine on top - resulting in a single man catching a blast large enough to throw a 31 ton vehicle into the air. Literally, "overkill".)
IED's are ad hoc compilations of whatever they can get their hands on that is explosive. This can include land mines, both A/P & anti-vehicular, c-4, artillery shells, grenades, etc.
Besides, even if we had signed the treaty, these people would never have followed it.
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