My Work In Progress

A few weeks ago I wrote about the incredibly futile losing cause that some people embark on when they attempt to picket or counter protest the Westboro Baptist Church. It was in advance of their actually coming here to Albany to protest against what I have still yet to figure out. Their protest announcement, which is by now unavailable on their Web site, mentioned President Obama in particular, but then again most of their protest announcements do. During their few hours in Albany, the Phelps held up their incendiary signs alongside a house at 677 Washington Avenue, directly across from Albany High School. The also protested in front of the State University of New York building on Broadway and at a spot on Fuller Road off of Central Avenue. None of spots seemed particularly sensible, but then again this is the Phelps we are talking about. Today, they are up in Plattsburgh making their rounds.

The house next to which WBC protesters carried on their demonstration in the morning

In today’s Albany Times-Union there was a brief story by staff reporter David Filkins about their trip to the Capital City on the Hudson.

Said Margie Phelps, a daughter of church patriarch Fred Phelps, “We use words and do things you can’t ignore. The irony is that they think they’re hurting us. If they really wanted to do damage, they wouldn’t show up. But the bigger the commotion, the more attention we get. More media, more photos, more coverage.”

And therein lays the whole strategy of the circus act that is the Westboro Baptist Church. If nobody took them seriously, they wouldn’t have any pull and get any extra attention. Instead, too often, when the church makes one of its bizarre trips to a new town, people come out in droves to counter them, which to me is insane because these aren’t exactly people who are fickle in their beliefs. They may be a part of a destructive cult-family, but they are certainly set in their ways and unbending. Only God Almighty can move that mountain.

Rather, I think that the Phelps touch on a raw nerve of insecurity in a lot of folks. They may not necessarily be worrying if the bold statements on the placards are true, but at the same time they also may be unsure of their own beliefs to a degree and made uncomfortable that others may believe things about God that really seem so contrary to what they’ve been taught to believe or want to believe.

counter protesters

At yesterday’s brief showing near Albany High there were several Evangelical groups that rallied against the Phelps with various speakers calling on God to spread his love around the crowd. At the same time, they were standing next to people who were angrily doing what the Phelps do, which is to condemn others to hell. There were also people with signs quoting scripture that would condemn the Westboro Baptist Church members to hell, which to me seems very insecure.

On the secular side, there were other people who felt the need to be bothered by Westboro members walking on the flag.

I stood near a cop who was asked by a few men if he could  arrest one young woman for trampling on the flag. They seemed to have some vague notion in their mind that it is permissible to arrest someone for desecrating a flag. Actually, the Supreme Court has held that most forms of desecration are protected speech. Would we want to live in a country where you’d be put in the tank for that? I wouldn’t.

In all, it was something to observe, not to get up in arms about. Margie Phelps has laid out the organization’s priority, which is to rattle cages. When people allow themselves to be disturbed by their shocking and crazy message, they betray a particular weakness that is very unappealing.

Overall, we know that the Phelps family has problems. If the Bible tells us that we can know people by their actions then I think it is safe to deduce that there is a lot of pain and fear in the Phelps family. After all, three of Fred Phelps’s four defected children have recounted stories of awful physical and psychological abuse the whole family suffered from him.

It is more than likely his church, which is mostly made up of his family members, suffers from some sort of Stockholm Syndrome. He has acted as a God-man for so long and he has put the fear of hell in their brains so much that they are all disconnected from the world, hostile and uncaring.

But if people didn’t give them the finger, curse at them or even hold their own placards, it’s more likely some more church members would fall away. That is because they only know negative attention. They only know the nasty man who runs the show there.

I’m sure the Phelps will be away a long time before they return to Albany. In the meantime, I think people have to be a lot less insecure and certainly a lot less corny.