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Fred Phelps, the Founder of Westboro Baptist church, is dead.


Βyakuya

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http://kansasfirstnews.com/2014/03/20/founder-of-westboro-baptist-church-rev-fred-phelps-sr-dies/

 

...and they will not being holding a funeral over his death. The man who founded a religious hate group who used all the freedom of speech he had in his pants pocket and denounced gays and military funerals...he died at age 81. A lot of people are starting to believe that the Church's downfall will soon rise, but the church is excluding most upcoming events regarding his death and will continue the usual picketing.

 

The guy in a way is an asshole, but he had a well built career and background, and for a death like him, we would likely either express sympathy in order to invoke more respect from the church members, or use this as leverage to build up tension. Either way for now they're still going to to yell at people for their sins without looking at theirs. Discuss?

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I don't want to be that guy, but in this particular case...

 

Who cares?  He's dead.  Good riddance.  I don't expect people to be all sympathetic about it, but raising a commotion about it only continues the never ending circle of hatred.  

 

butifpeoplewanttohavegaysexonhisgraveiwontstopthem

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I don't want to be that guy, but in this particular case...

 

Who cares?  He's dead.  Good riddance.  I don't expect people to be all sympathetic about it, but raising a commotion about it only continues the never ending circle of hatred.  

 

butifpeoplewanttohavegaysexonhisgraveiwontstopthem

 

I'm with you, bro.

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The guy left a very bad legacy behind. I never really cared enough to look at what he looked like or what he said in any interview or his background or anything whatsoever, but whatever he started was most likely increased by the followers throughout the years. What the concern to me really is, is that I've seen how deeply engraved the hate doctrines are in many of the followers (from interviews I've watched) and it's most likely something that's gonna keep going.

Especially when families into it are teaching their kids from a very early age.

 

Then again, any religion is passed on that way and it hasn't stopped any of them from losing power, so who knows.

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The man's already dead; let's just leave it at that. Let's not give his followers any reason to martyrize him or anything of the sort.

 

Granted, his followers picketed gays and other non-traditional persons (which is especially bad in a society that's slowly accepting them). But even so, we shouldn't be snooping to their level just to have them suffer their own medicine. Even with their founder dead, it's still sad that they're still going to continue their picketing. Eventually though, they will fall (either the remaining members learn tolerance, as some former members already have, or they answer to their own force later on). Until then, the cycle of hatred and intolerance will continue.

 

Other than that, I really don't care about this guy or his followers. Thankfully his followers haven't picketed here in the Hawaiian islands or we'd be hearing about their rants to no end (especially since they legalized it this past year).

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His name's really close to "Fred Phucks"

 

Yes, that is the most I can contribute to this conversation.

 

That, and I can point out that the dude was excommunicated from his own stupid church right before he died.

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Well, I despise the ideas the guy had , and the church. But, he's dead, he lived a long life, nothing much to say about that. I won't celebrate or use someone's death. The best thing people can do is not make a big deal out of it. If they use the same tactics the WBC used out of spite, that will only make things worse. The best thing to do is to show compassion for his loved ones and stay out of it I think.

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I'm glad I didn't walk into a hate mongering thread.  Because you would be no better than he was.  But, as George Takei said, "I take no solace or joy in this man's passing. We will not dance upon his grave, nor stand vigil at his funeral holding "God Hates Freds" signs, tempting as it may be.  He was a tormented soul, who tormented so many. Hate never wins out in the end. It instead goes always to its lonely, dusty end."

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All I'm gonna say is -- don't be provoked by his death and the trolltastic opportunities that death provides you. Just move on as if nothing has happened (and nothing has indeed happened, for at the end of the day, intolerance unsupported by majority opinion will always -- always -- come up short).

 

So if someone wants to have gay sex all over grave, as Tentacruel suggested half-jokingly, I'll stand by and look the other way round (I'm not a voyeur, thank you) -- but people can make a bigger statement by just ignoring him, by just staying quiet and keeping the peace.

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Just saying, but, they did more than picket against gay people. The WBC did picket funerals of soldiers who died declaring that they were happy that person died, because the goovernment supports gays. They were HAPPY someone died. This guy, doesn't deserve the peace of eternal rest, or any kind of respect at all. It is completely monstrous to proclaim that sort of thing, and he did it with no shame, or regret.

 

Frankly, I think that's why they're not giving him a funeral, since people might do to them (the WBC) what they've been doing to good honest soldiers.

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Ok, I don't think anyone would argue that he did a ton of scummy things, with stuff like picketing funerals only the half of it. However, I don't see the point in being glad/satisfied/whatever with the fact that he's dead, or dancing over his grave and anything like it. Not only is that a scummy thing for one to do, but it'd also be lowering yourself down to WBC's level, which I don't think anyone wants.

 

Yes, the man is dead. We can only hope that his church ceases its activies (or at least slows them down), and that we forget this small blemish in world history.

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Being dead is the best possible time to criticise someone. The timing means that any contrary viewpoints will get both more publicity and be more relevant due to the absurd "never speak ill of the dead" axiom that the media fairly often subscribe to. Now is the time to remind everyone that Fred Phelps was a wizened, wrinkled, bipedal ballbag of hate. The trouble with the no-criticism mentality is that it creates a false dichotomy - that our criticism of WBC and Fred Phuckface is the same as their criticism of queers, jews and (probably) lampposts. Criticism of Phelps is perfectly justified and correct; Phelps' virulent criticism of whatever was bothering him that week is bollocks. 

 

tl;dr: People who criticise Phelps are doing so correctly; Phelps' criticism is bullshit.

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Being dead is the best possible time to criticise someone. The timing means that any contrary viewpoints will get both more publicity and be more relevant due to the absurd "never speak ill of the dead" axiom that the media fairly often subscribe to. Now is the time to remind everyone that Fred Phelps was a wizened, wrinkled, bipedal ballbag of hate. The trouble with the no-criticism mentality is that it creates a false dichotomy - that our criticism of WBC and Fred Phuckface is the same as their criticism of queers, jews and (probably) lampposts. Criticism of Phelps is perfectly justified and correct; Phelps' virulent criticism of whatever was bothering him that week is bollocks. 

 

tl;dr: People who criticise Phelps are doing so correctly; Phelps' criticism is bullshit.

Criticize him, yes. Do that a lot. He was a little bug who got pissed at things he couldn't control, so he decided to piss everyone else off.

 

But there's a fine line between criticism and douchebaggery. Like I said, if we sink down to his level, those uninvolved onlookers might see the criticizers and wonder, how are they any better than he was? Sure, we might not have done it to a scale that he did, but just by showing that we are capable and willing to do so...

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