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Westboro Baptist Church
Westboro Baptist Church, like its founder and pastor, Fred Phelps, is included in this section to show to what lengths and what extremes the radical religious right can go and what they can become if allowed to continue on their agdenda-filling quest. Not even Jerry Falwell, the least-liked of the religious leaders among evangelical Christians, comes close to the hate-filled, homophobic, racist rhetoric that spews forth from the mouths of the members of Westboro Baptist Church. Nearly every member of the congregation is also a member of Phelps extended family. WBC's homepage is the infamous "godhatesfags.com".1 The church is a "TULIP Baptist" or Primitive Baptist church, adhering strictly to the five principles of Calvinism (the first letter of each spelling the world "TULIP").
While other groups in the RRR tend to focus much of their energy on "defeating the homosexual agenda", WBC spends virtually all of its energies picketing gays (dead or alive) and what it calls "fag enablers". And the list of enablers is long: about the only one not on it is Fred and his church members. WBC attacks Bush, Reagan (who they say is in hell), Billy Graham, the Pope— the list is far too long to include here— for disagreeing with WBC doctrine. Even fundamentalists like James Dobson are not immune as WBC has picketed Dobson's headquarters in Colorado Springs. (Of course, these people don't think too highly of Phelps or the WBC either.) In the eyes of the WBC, if you disagree with them, you are doing so as punishment from God for enabling gays and assisting them in promoting their homosexual agenda. Every problem in the world today is due to gays in some manner, from preachers preaching that God loves everyone (including gays) to the gays themselves. Even the recent tsunami in southeast Asia has been blamed on gays and gay "enablers."
The Swedes have been especially singled out for the vitriolic hatred of WBC in this disaster— according to the WBC website, which has now launched a godhatessweden.com website as well, it's because of the Swedish tolerance of homosexuality. WBC has made a hero of a Swedish pastor, Åke Green, who was sentenced in Sweden to one month in jail after being convicted under Sweden's hate crimes laws for preaching about the the evils of homosexuality. (Green went further than simply saying that homosexuality is a sin. He called homosexuality "abnormal, a horrible cancerous tumor in the body of society" and said gays were "perverts, whose sexual drive the Devil has used as his strongest weapon against God." For his part, Åke Green wants no part of WBC and is said to be quite distressed to have his name associated with the godhatesfags.com website. He has been quoted as saying that he finds WBC's statements "appalling" and "extremely unpleasant" and is said to be surprised that the WBC has not been censored by the US government since their hatred "harms Christianity." (As if his hatred does not...)
Westboro Baptist Church's gospel of hate is extreme in its expression, but its underlying message is not all that different from groups like those profiled in this section. With Bush's second reign beginning, and the RRR believing that Bush received a "mandate" because he got 51% of the vote (yet don't see it as a mandate that 52% think invading Iraq was a mistake), these groups will become more and more extreme. How do we stop these kinds of groups from having the influence that they do? For an answer to that, please check The Solution section of this site.
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| 1 If you decide to visit WBC's homepage, prepare yourself for the hateful language. Use of the terms "fags" and "sodomites" is rabid. On the first page alone, those two terms are used more than a dozen times. Even pictures of WBC protests will usually contain the word "fag" since virtually the only thing that the WBC pickets has something to do with their belief that gays are involved. According to their second site, godhatesamerica.com, we're losing the war in Iraq because we've let "fags and dykes" into our military and God is trying to humble us. WBC justifies using the term "fags" as a metaphor for "faggot", a British term for a firebrand, which is used to fuel fires. WBC claims that gays fuel the fire of God's anger which he is now pouring out on America.
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| Click on any of the links below to read more articles about the Westboro Baptist Church. |
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Westboro Baptist Church |
| Synopsis: This site is really a page of links about the activities and beliefs of the WBC. |
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Westboro Baptist Church |
| Synopsis: An excellent resource for researching WBC— or any Christian organization for that matter. |
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It's Just About Hate |
| Synopsis: And interesting look inside the workings of the WBC and how the godhatesfags.com site came to be. |
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A Correspondence with GHF |
| Synopsis: One lesbian's week-long email correspondence with a representative of godhatesfags.com |
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An Interview with Ben Phelps |
| Synopsis: Ben Phelps, grandson of Fred Phelps and member of WBC, answers questions in this brief interview. It's easy to hate people like Ben for what they say and what they believe, but understanding the effects of abuse on the subconscious and the psyche, I personally feel pity for the man. |
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