Westboro Scumbags Are Wrong but Legally Right
I despise every single inbred idiot at Westboro Baptist Church. I personally wish every single member meet an untimely and horrible death by their God, hopefully a gay-themed one. But if I expect to be free to write such things about them, I must also support, as much as it pains me, their right to express their disgusting views.
On Friday, an appeals court ordered Albert Snyder, the father of a dead marine, to pay the Westboro Baptist Church's legal fees (1). These low-life pieces of crap had picketed the son's funeral with signs reading "God hates you," "You're going to hell," and "Thank God for dead soldiers." The Topeka, Kansas hate group believes God is punishing America because it tolerates homosexuality.
Some bloggers (2) have mistakenly assumed this appeals court to be filled with liberal idiots; however, two of the three judges were Bush appointees (3).
The problem for me is that the Westboro imbeciles complied with local ordinances and police directions with respect to being a certain distance from the funeral, see the court ruling, page 5 [PDF].
Snyder's course of action should have been to persuade his state and municipality to enforce a more reasonable distance away from funerals and memorials at the same time respecting constitutionally protected speech.
As for Snyder being ordered to pay Westboro's legal fees, I believe that we should make this the law of the land, that all plaintiffs, if they lose a case, be forced to pay the defendant's court costs.
No soldier's family should be subjected to such abuse at a funeral, but the best course of action in regard to Westboro is to ignore them, give them no headlines.
As I write this a Canadian comedian is facing a British Columbia Human Rights Commission tribunal for hate speech.
Weasel Zippers, Canada: Comedian to Face Human Rights Tribunal Because He Offended Lesbian Hecklers...
VANCOUVER — A comedian whose put-downs of a lesbian and her companion in the audience is hoping she doesn’t have the last laugh at a B.C. Human Rights Commission tribunal this week.
Was Guy Earle’s discriminatory verbal assault spurred solely by the woman’s sexual orientation, or was the professional funny man exercising his right to free speech when an audience member wouldn’t settle down?
Lorna Pardy and her same-sex partner had moved to seats near the stage after the patio closed. Pardy’s lawyer says as they spoke with the waitress they were bombarded by a series of gay slurs courtesy of Earle.
But Earle, who lives in Georgetown, Ont., and has a day job as a physicist, has a different version of events and said his remarks come with the comedy show territory.
“When you heckle me and you’ve been disrespectful through the whole show, I come from the George Carlin school of dealing with a heckler,” he said in an interview. “So yeah, I shoved it down their throat and that’s what you do.”
So while we make fun of Canada's tyrannical, primitive, and stupid lack of free speech safeguards, we must be careful not to denigrate our own.
Even though I think it wrong to sue someone for their opinions, you can chip in to the Al Snyder fund to help defray the costs of doing so. Go to matthewsnyder.org.
ENDNOTES
(1):
Washington Post, Slain Marine's family gets donations for court costs
Albert Snyder sued members of the Westboro Baptist Church because they waved signs saying "God hates the USA" and signs bearing anti-gay slurs at the 2006 funeral of his son, Lance Cpl. Matthew Snyder, who was killed in Iraq. A federal jury in Baltimore awarded Snyder $11 million in damages in 2007, saying the group from Topeka, Kan., intentionally inflicted emotional distress on the family. The award was reduced to $5 million and was overturned after an appeal by church group leader Fred Phelps.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Snyder to pay $16,510.80 to Phelps. Snyder's story, which appeared in the Sun, has prompted an outpouring of support.
(2):
RedState, 4th Circuit orders Marine dad to pay scumbags who picketed son’s funeral
The 4th circuit is full of America-hating liars, embezzlers, and rapists, who break their oaths as casually as they eat their breakfast cereal. They have Karl Marx shrines in their bedrooms and in fact never read the U.S. Constitution except as opposition research. They acquired their seats in the judiciary by selling their own underage daughters as prostitutes to Democrat senators. Also, they were influenced to overturn this case because “Pastor” Fred Phelps “serviced” every one of them.
(3):
No More Mister Nice Blog, LEFT AND RIGHT AGREE: THIS SUCKS
The case was before a three-judge panel -- and two of the three judges were Bush appointees.
Judge Robert King was appointed by Bill Clinton, but Judges Allyson Duncan and Dennis Shedd were appointed by George W. Bush -- and, in fact, the nomination of Shedd, a former aide to Strom Thurmond, was held up temporarily in 2002 by Senate Democrats out of concerns about Shedd's record on civil rights.
