Australia: A Fag Fantasy Island

International News, By Christian Taylor, 18th July, 2008

Westboro Baptist Church, best known for their slogan “God Hates Fags”, say that they had plans to come out to Australia to picket World Youth Day, but Australian authorities wouldn’t let them in.

“Yes, these Roman Catholic priests, bishops, cardinals – all the way up to the Pope – have got a lot of shameless nerve, luring hundreds of kids to a sodomite island thousands of miles away, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, with their reputation of molesting kids!” says Westboro. “What kind of idiots – escapees from the funny farm masquerading as parents – will let their kids go to Fantasy Island of the Fags, masquerading as a nation called Australia?”

Shirley Phelps-Roper, spokesperson for Westboro, told Same Same, “If your government would give us a visa we would be there, but they won’t!”

The Westboro Baptist Church got plenty of headlines earlier this year when they vowed to picket Heath Ledger’s memorial service, because of his depiction of a gay character in the film Brokeback Mountain. Every time a media outlet tried to have a conversation with Shirley, it always seemed to end up in a screaming match.

“God Hates Australia for criminalising gospel preaching about fags,” says the controversial church. “Just quoting Leviticus 18:22, ‘Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind; it is an abomination’, will get you arrested in fag dominated Australia.”

America’s first amendment has been the very thing that’s allowed Westboro to freely preach their controversial message. Laws protecting free speech have allowed them to picket everything from funerals to theatre productions. However, when they started picketing the funerals of fallen soldiers, new legislation was written to stop them, much to the chagrin of Westboro, who have been fighting to uphold America’s free speech laws ever since.

It’s ironic that up until a few days ago, we were fighting for the same thing.

Your Thoughts

Bren

said ages ago

Except that it wasn't just gay & lesbian Sydney-siders, nor even just non-Catholics or "anti-Catholics". WYD'08 was criticised for numerous reasons by numerous people across the social and religious spectrum, including by other Catholics. Were the critical Catholics "lumping [their fellow uncritical Catholics] together under a very ugly flag" too? Catholic doctrine describes gays & lesbians as "objectively disordered" and "more or less ordered towards an intrinsic moral evil". Is that what you meant by "live and let live"? Fundamentalist religion criticises us, as is its free choice and right. Just as it is our free choice and right to criticise fundamentalist religion in return. [COLOR=White].

danny corvini

said ages ago

Catholic doctrine describes gays & lesbians as "objectively disordered" and "more or less ordered towards an intrinsic moral evil". Is that what you meant by "live and let live"? Fundamentalist religion criticises us, as is its free choice and right. Just as it is our free choice and right to criticise fundamentalist religion in return. [COLOR=White]. True, I guess I'm just not a believer that that will have much effect, except for making other church haters feel fuzzy. I think real progress is made when you appeal to people's sense of decency. I know for a fact that there are a lot of people who identify as Christian or Catholic who support homosexuality, female bishops etc, and I think we need to reach out and appeal to these people. For the record I stopped going to church in year 10, and couldn't bring myself to do while the church still preaches against homosexuality. But I am a big fan of the power of positive PR...

marly

said ages ago

These people are sick dangerous extremists and potential terrorists. Shirley phelps has 11 children some of them as young as 5 and she uses them to spread her hateful message making them picket ,wear the t-shirts , and hold the signs. Shes really deranged. I wish the authorities would take her kids away

avb7

said ages ago

interesting journalistic twist at the end Christian....very clever

Steven6p

said ages ago

Dude, I'm a pacifist but these people should be put down like the animals they are.

Bren

said ages ago

I think you underestimate the depth of belief that many Catholics invest in papal and doctrinal authority, particularly when it appeals so cleverly to orthodox bigotries about human sexuality. That works with some of the people, some of the time. Won't work with everyone all of the time. See above. Some people have a different definition of decency. Appealing to them on the basis of one's own perspective of what is decent can cause consensus to prove more elusive not less.

DaddyWayne

said ages ago

I sincerely hope that this ugly fucking bitch and her hateful, spiteful homophobic, pathetic asshole of a church is one day sued by someone for every cent thaey are likely to earn in their entire lifetime. DADDY WAYNE HATES THE WESTBORO CHURCH WITH A VENGENCE. GIVE ME A ROCKET LAUNCHER!!!! FUCKING HOMOPHOBES - AS BAD AS THE CATHOLIC CHURCH

danny corvini

said ages ago

(Originally Posted by danny corvini True, I guess I'm just not a believer that [Catholic doctrine] will have much effect, except for making other church haters feel fuzzy.) I think you underestimate the depth of belief that many Catholics invest in papal and doctrinal authority, particularly when it appeals so cleverly to orthodox bigotries about human sexuality. That works with some of the people, some of the time. Won't work with everyone all of the time. See above. Some people have a different definition of decency. Appealing to them on the basis of one's own perspective of what is decent can cause consensus to prove more elusive not less. You've taken me out of context there, where you inserted I meant will have much of an effect, except for making other church haters feel fuzzy. I guess we're fighting for the same thing - a change in attitudes - but we go about it different ways. I feel we have more chance to appeal to the moderates, the decent people, and hope that they will help affect change, than to launch more aggressive attacks on those that are a lot less likely to change, and hence offend a lot of their followers, who may support them for reasons other than their views on sexuality, in the process.

Bren

said ages ago

I didn't take you out of context. You apparently switched context without explaining what you meant. The prevailing context as I understood it (per my prior post to which you were responding) was about Catholic doctrine and about criticising fundamentalism, not about "having an aggressive, rude attitude towards all Catholics" (which, by the way, I never advocated). My subsequent point stands, that appealing to senses of decency won't work with everyone all of the time because some people, however otherwise moderate and rational they are, have a different definition of decency. Appealing to them on the basis of one's own perspective of what is decent can cause consensus to prove more elusive not less. Yes, precisely. And that difference is actually a healthy thing. Again, difference is a healthy thing. I feel that there is no One Size Fits All approach and that enabling a plurality of views to be expressed is best likely to lead to the widest understanding of, if not consensus between, us and everyone else. I think evolution and revolution both have had a place as forces of change in society and so they will continue. Sometimes honesty and truth can be shocking, confronting. Sometimes they need to be.

danny corvini

said ages ago

Yes, no doubting it's a good thing to have people out there fighting "the equality and acceptance war" on a number of fronts. It amazes me that the church can still be in denial to the point of view that it might actually be good for society as a whole to fully accept GLBTI people for who they are, rather than expecting them to live an unfulfilled unhealthy existence in denial for the benefit of "the majority" (whoever that may be). Thank god (no pun intended) that society seems to be changing its views, especially here in Australia where the majority of people seemed to unfussed by the Pope's visit, and generally support GLBTI rights. I do wonder if the church will ever change and what the price of it not changing or modernising to reflect real society will be.

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