Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Religious Nut's Ability to Speak Freely.

I came across this video a few months ago and it still makes me sick. This lady and her church which mostly consists of her family members, protest at soldier's funerals for religious purposes. Only recently has the Iowa govener put a bill into effect that says they have to stay 500 ft away. They hold signs outside these funerals with such statements as " You are going to hell." " Don't worship the dead." and the worst " Thank God for Dead Soldiers." Through her Fox news interview, Shirley a member of the West Burrow Baptist Church says she feels good for warning people that the wrath of God is pouring out on this nation. She mentions that one of God's weapons of choice is sending people's children home dead. She goes off on different types of people, including gays, soldiers, basically anyone not like her. The things she says absolutly disgust me. I come from a military family, if she were to show up at any person in my family's funeral or anyone I knew I would probably go crazy on her. I have no respect for her.I am also a Christian and the things she says about God and being a Christian makes me cringe. It embarrasses me that she calls herself a Christian and that she makes God out to be a hateful, awful, murdering God who takes pleasure in our sorrows. I completly disagree with every word she says. I think she is a sick twisted person. But the problem I have with this is that we do have freedom of speech in this country. Technicaly Shirley and her family have the right to say these things and to hurt these people with their words. So we have freedom of speech, but is there any common courtesy? Is there a point where freedom of speech is taken too far? Or are there no limits?

I have posted the hyperlink for the video on youtube, because I am technically impaired and it may not work here is what you can search it under : "Religious Protesting Nut on Fox News."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMhCDKxPjHU

6 comments:

Pat said...

I think laws like that are fine because they aren't taking away their rights to say such things, they're just regulating where they're allowed to say them. We already have laws prohibiting campaigning within 500 ft of a polling station and people are not allowed to beg within 100 ft of ATMs; these laws are necessary to keep people from being unduly intimidating others. I think restricting funeral protests to 500 ft away from the funeral is the same kind of thing.

Pat said...

Also I have a theory that these people are non-Christians who are trying to turn everyone they can against Christianity.

That's the only thing that make there actions make sense to me.

Nathan said...

Actually they are a Christian sect (though a more accurate term would be cult) that is a branch from the baptist church to some extent. You may find their website helpful, though I'll put a warning that it is highly offensive. http://www.godhatesfags.com/

This reminds me of the situation in northern Idaho with the neo-nazi group that called upon the freedoms offered in the first amendment to spread their messages of hate and prejudice. Though I wish there were an alternative it is in my opinion that we uphold the freedoms we hold dear in spite of the ways they are being used by these people. It is disgraceful how they carry themselves however I don't feel it is right to limit or judge the majority on the misgivings on a radical ultra-minority.

I have actually met a few members of this church when they came to Spokane a couple years ago. They were picketing my church because we had a female pastor and part of what they believe is that women should be subservient to men in all regards and that they have no place at the pulpit with the power to instruct or lead. (They base this, as with many other beliefs they hold, on misquoted verses of scripture taken out of context). Suffice to say they were deranged and hostile in my interaction with them and apparently I'm going to hell, which was a bummer. Though the worst part was this family had very young children (I'd say 5-10 or so) standing with them holding up hateful signs with offensive slander painted in big bold letters.

Kay Fort said...

Some people just aren't acting like christains anymore..they aren't truely following what they believe, that is the problem. That is why so many people hate church (besides a lot of blindness). Theres been a whole little investigation on this..look up "Lord, save us from your followers" if you can.

jordanrichelle said...

It's whack jobs like this who put a bad wrap on Christianity, BUT we're supposed to love them anyway. Not easy. I think people abuse the freedom of speech. The fact that I think this bothers me; because a part of me knows that I believe they are abusing their right because I don't agree with their opinion.

Yet... there is common courtesy, some kind of respect. It's ironic that the soldier’s whose death she is celebrating died protecting her right to freedom of speech. (And don't tell me that this war is not about protecting our freedoms; if it wasn't this one soldier’s death she would've been celebrating a soldier’s death in the Revolutionary War had she been around then.)

I feel people have come to feel as though they are the center of the world; and no one else matters, case in point this psycho.

Lynn said...

That woman seems so brainwashed, crazy to me I barely know where to start. She avoided really answering any questions at all. She does not seem to truly know anything.