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My friends Eden and Kristen recently wrote entries protesting the hateful rally that the Westboro Baptist Church held at the funeral of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints' President Gordon B. Hinckley. The LDS church is just one of several organizations that the Westboro crew consider infidels and "fag enablers." Even though I'm not a member of the LDS—I'm not even a Christian, even though I proudly acknowledge that part of my people's bloodline and heritage (my father is Irish Catholic and my mother Episcopalian)—I feel compelled to add to my friends' fury at the Westboro morons.
I reprint in this space an article I wrote on my old blog and also published on Blogcritics.org concerning Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church to demonstrate the rage that I also feel towards this puerile lot:
Fred Phelps Can Kiss My Ass
published on Blogcritics.org, May 20, 2006:
It's not as if I find the extreme-Left, America-hating, anti-war loonies any less despicable than I always have. But, I think there's someone who could just possibly be even worse. His name? Fred Phelps.
The fire-and-brimstone preacher, who laughably calls himself a reverend and claims he's a Christian, is obsessed with homosexuals. He damns all to Hell who even dare to stick up for homosexuals. Like our troops for defending America — "fag nation" in "Rev." Phelps' eyes.
Phelps and his congregation at the Topeka, Kansas-based Westboro Baptist Church have praised 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina as punishment for a nation that, according to him, enables gays. He delivered an obscenity-laced sermon to praise the fatal beating of gay teenager Matthew Sheppard. His supporters regularly attend the funerals of those killed in Iraq, mocking the dead and their families for fighting for America. According to Phelps, if America wants to bring its ideas of freedom and democracy to Iraq, then Iraq will turn into a "fag nation" as well.
It would be wrong to assume, as a knee-jerk liberal would, that Christians have embraced this toxic-brained lunatic. It is simply not true. Even Jerry Falwell has spoken against him.
In his earlier days, Phelps tried to convert Mormons, insulting them in the process. He lived in Canada for a while. After blessing the U.S. with his return, the former pugilist continued to advocate beating as a patriarch's right. He once delivered a sermon at the Eastside Baptist Church in Topeka denouncing a female member of his congregation for being a whore when he learned that she was pregnant. While still in the employ of this same church, he punched his own infant son, Mark, several times in the face when he dared to squirm during one of his sermons. Now, as much as I hate the likes of al-Zarqawi or bin Laden, I doubt that even they are sub-human enough to beat up babies.
Phelps consumed large quantities of drugs and alcohol, terrorized his family, and may even have been involved in the death of a young woman. You get the point. He's a dangerous bastard.
Reading about his guy's past is painful. But even scarier than that is that this low-life is still around, still preaching, putting America down, insulting soldiers' families, and advocating violence against gays.
Phelps' hateful zealotry, masquerading as religious fervor, reminds me of another class of people: the Islamofascists. Phelps is definitely in their league. Ergo, shouldn't this guy and his followers be considered potential terrorists, as such a comparison would merit?
The last I heard, Congress was considering federal legislation against Phelps and the Westboro Church. It can't come fast enough. If we could hound the reclusive Branch Davidians — who never bothered nor hurt anyone but their own community — into killing themselves, then why leave the Westboro Baptist Church alone? If any cult in the country deserves to be surrounded by tanks and FBI agents, it'd be them. Hell, I'd even love it if the jackbooted boys of the ATF moved in on them; for once in my life, I'd cheer them on.
In the early 1990s, Congress expanded the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act to include hate crimes. So, why, damnit, is Phelps and his congregation not being targeted under this law's statutes? If they are free to protest, then obviously nothing is going to bring them into line with the law.
Spare me the diatribe about the test of a democracy being how we tolerate the most odious, scummy people to shout whatever garbage they like. If that's true, then why clamp down on fiery Islamic clerics as they have been doing in Britain? Exactly right, because their words lead to terror. And, God only knows when the 150-strong congregation of Westboro will turn their own hateful words into action. We are dealing with people who have lost all sense of reality. In my opinion, Phelps and his flock are capable of anything. Laughing at and hating them is not enough.
So here's what I suggest: A flamboyant Mardi Gras-style gay pride parade should roll past the church headquarters in Topeka, followed by a patriotic "Proud to be American float," complete with military brass bands. It would look like an odd combination, sure. But I firmly believe that gay activists and conservatives should act together to cause as much trouble for Phelps as is possible. This would be the much-needed 1-2 sucker punch that the pugilist "pastor" needs.
Either that or throw the whackjob into a padded cell for life.
NICE, France — All the instructions here on Blogger are in Finnish. That's interesting.
I hate French keyboards; certain letters and symbols aren't where I'm used to them being.
Allow me to explain my absence: A few weeks ago, we had our internet connection terminated because our provider, Orange, did away with dial-up. We tried installing their broadband but found Orange so unhelpful that we told them to go screw themselves. We signed up with AOL instead, but I've had neither the time, energy nor patience to set it all up yet.
Soon after the debacle with Orange, I fell victim to a vicious cold. I hadn't been sick for years—excepting hangovers!—and began to think I had grown immune to infections. The high fever I came down with last Wednesday taught me otherwise.
Ah yes, and work—with the exception of this weekend, I am still doing lots of overtime. Still playing the part of a workaholic and actually liking it. Strange days ...
So, until I fly back to London tomorrow morning, I'm cooling my heels here on the Côte d'Azur, running, reading and lubricating myself with red wine. I sorely needed this getaway. Nice is as gorgeous as ever, especially at this time of year. The Christmas lights lining the date palms along the Promenade des Anglais are a sight to behold.
I hope to be back on-line soon. Just be patient with me. Now, if you'll excuse me, I wish to immerse myself in a hot bath to polish off a nine-mile run.
À tout à l'heure.
Yeah, I'm still here. And I can understand how people become workaholics. I fear I'm becoming one myself. No overtime is enough for me. I regularly stay beyond my mandatory seven hours and work 7-9 hours every Saturday. And here's the thing: I'm loving it. The burn-out can't be far off, but I'm determined to push it to the limit. I will earn what moolah I can before the possible crash.
I need to shave, but I can't be bothered. The beard is in Irish drunkard mode at the moment; however, it's slowly but inexorably approaching the Wolfman Jack stage. I know I'm going to have to tackle this facial keratin forest soon because the wife is starting to protest. If I leave it for much longer, she'll be protesting loudly. Shaving or nagging? Tough choice.
I hope I can write more seriously soon. Got a lot on my plate but can't bite off more than I can chew.
Hugo Chavez disgusts me. I hate that fat Commie faggot more than any other tin-Hitler world leader, and that's really saying something given my considerable rage at Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Fidel Castro, the House of Saud, Robert Mugabe and the Burmese junta. Oh yeah, and Ken Livingstone, who really is a third-world leader. He's the mayor of London. 'Nuff said.
But, as for Chavez, well, I've got to hand it to him. Who else would deal with a challenge to his authority by committing a Kent State-style counterpunch? Not even Ahmadinejad sent in his shock troopers when Iranian students were chanting "Death to the president!" (they didn't mean Bush) at Tehran University during a recent protest in the Islamic Republic.
No-one was killed in during the mêlée, which occurred after 80,000 Venezuelans protested against their president, but it demonstrates how committed Chavez' "21st century socialism" is to democracy. Not.
Chavez responded to the fracas by saying that "rich kids" were responsible for the on-campus violence and that, if he—El Gordo Fago—and his supporters responded in kind, "there wouldn't be a building standing belonging to this unpatriotic oligarchy." Imagine Chavez having the cojones—the sheer temerity—to talk of an oligarchy?
Even Chavez' supporters might tire of his anti-U.S. rhetoric. A recent Financial Times article states: "Venezuelans are accustomed to, and vigorously defend, the typical freedoms of a representative democracy. Venezuela is arguably one of the most pro-US cultures in Latin America, and even poorer Venezuelans dream of visiting Disney World for their holidays. Many Venezuelans are more obsessed by baseball than Bolivarianism." And an article for the New American Media website states that: "[A]nalysts here (Venezuela) are questioning how much further President Chavez can take his anti-yanqui rhetoric. Any rupture in commercial relations with the United States would directly impact Chavez's supporters. Plus, Venezuelans are increasingly fed up with confrontational politics, having endured them for more than seven years from both Chavez and opposition leaders."
How free can Venezuelans consider themselves when they have a leader who wants to significantly expand his powers by abolishing presidential term limits, give himself total control over the Central Bank and create new provinces governed by handpicked officials?
Also, let's not forget that Venezuelan law bars state security forces from entering the campus unless university authorities request it. Chavez officially declared that null and void.
Patricia Andrade, who heads the Venezuelan Awareness Foundation said, "'The government is creating chaos in the universities so that they will have an excuse to invade them. Wars are begun by the ones with the weapons, and the students don't have weapons—all they have is book bags.''
Andrade is right. Venezuela is in for a rough ride. A bit ironic that a democratically elected president should warp his country's constitution so much that Venezuelans will suddenly find themselves in the grip of a fascist... what's Chavez' favourite word? Oh yes, oligarchy.
This just goes to show that the U.S. is not the only country to suffer from gun rampages in schools. Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Sweden have all had their incidents of on-campus slaughters too. And now we can add Finland to the list.
An 18-year-old went on a rampage with a semi-automatic at his high school in a southern Finnish town, killing eight. He then, as is usually the case, turned the gun on himself.
Why did he do it? He considered himself above the human race. In a vid he shot for YouTube, he denounced humans and planned to deal with their inferiority. The t-shirt he wears in the video declares "Humanity is overrated."
But for all the student gunman's bragging about his superiority, he blew a pretty serious gasket and acted just like those he considered beneath him. He slaughtered, he killed, he committed several acts of homicide ... just like some humans do.
Of course, history is littered with those who considered themselves superior to the masses and never once hesitated to bring the hammer down upon them: Saddam Hussein, Josef Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Idi Amin, Pol Pot ... The list just goes on.
And to that list, we can add this scumbag of a non-human. He wasn't a third-world leader, but whatever he was, whyever he was superior—neither of which he mentioned in his vid—he was, in the end, nothing but a psychopathic nutcase.
Know that what alarms me even more than humanity's greed, planet-raping or ignorance is senseless death, human or otherwise.
By trying to "teach the humans a lesson," he ended up just like one. And that, in addition to the innocent lives massacred, is what disgusts me greatly about this tragic story.
OK, we've got a so-called obesity crisis in this country (the U.K.), right? It's gotten so bad that the British are no longer allowed to make fun of bouncy-assed Americans because they're now well on their way to waddling—as opposed to walking—themselves. They've caught the couch-potato bug too.
We hear, nearly every day, about proposals to ban junk-food advertisements and that obesity-related health issues take up nine percent of our public health care budget. It is reckoned that 14 million people in this nation will be obese by 2010. And, as we've recently heard, obesity causes cancer.
Still with me?
So get a load of this particular madness: It was reported in today's The Daily Telegraph, in a fluff article entitled "The look of love," that smiling faces are more attractive than neutral or scowling faces. Well, bend me over and call me Doris, I wonder how much public money went into that study? I'm not much for smiling myself, but then I'm not looking to attract people to me. As far as I'm concerned, people are like flies—I like it very much when they keep their distance from me.
But, in a sidebar to the article, the researcher, Dr. Ben Jones from the College of Life Sciences at the Univeristy of Aberdeen, also wrote "In a hunter-gatherer society, where size is a signal that a person is successful, being overweight is a turn-on."
Say what?!
Being overweight is a turn-on? So why are so many women starving themselves in an attempt to achieve weight loss? Why are teenaged boys nearly just as prone to anorexia or bulimia as girls are? Why is British society—or the British media anyway—creating such a fuss over an obesity time-bomb that's about to explode on this island?
But then, Dr. Jones works in Scotland, one of the fattest areas on the planet, a place where people scoff deep-fried Mars bars and haggis like it's all going to be shipped overseas tomorrow for Americans to gorge themselves on.
Nevertheless, I would like to ask Dr. Ben Jones one question: What millennium is he living in? Hunter-gatherer society? The only people who hunt these days are toothless, monosyllabic rednecks who are as much of a danger to road signs as they are to animals, and those who gather are pack-rats. There is no—I repeat, no—environmental, physical or societal reason to be overweight at this point in the history of the human species. There just isn't.
Want to talk "signals of success?" What better feeling of accomplishment can a person feel from shedding 20 pounds or more? I ask you.
As for the overweight being attractive or a turn-on, suffice to say that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. If that's your cup of tea, go for it.
But if someone ever tells me that I should gain weight to embolden my powers of attraction, they're going to get one of my running sneakers shoved down their esophagus.
What is up with the Germans? Can it be that their government officially promotes pedophilia and incest?
The German government's Ministry for Family Affairs provide booklets on parenting which assert that fathers do not pay enough attention to their daughters' vagina, and sexually messaging girls between the ages of 1 and 3 "is the only way the girls can develop a sense of pride in their sex." Amazingly, the booklet also claims that "the child touches all parts of their father's body, sometimes arousing him. The father should do the same." And, according to the booklet dedicated to the ages 4-6, children should be learning the movements of copulation from their parents.
Disgusted yet? Well, these booklets are obligatory reading in nine German regions. They are used in nurseries, kindergarten and elementary school. Author Michael O'Brien, who specializes in the West's "crisis of culture" and who investigated these government-sponsored sanctions of sexual manipulation of young children asked, "Will those children who are not liberated by their parents have special classes in their schools where they're introduced to these practices?"
Germany has become notorious for the blatant pornography in billboards and television advertisements. Teen magazines in the country publish photos of nude adolescents engaging in certain activities, photos which would be declared illegal in many other countries.
And the fun for Germany's youth doesn't end with being sexually messaged before the age of three and taught how to do doggie-style before six. They can sing songs about their sexual liberation as well. The German Federal Health Education Center has also produced a songbook entitled "Nose, Belly and Bum" ("Nose, Bouch und Po"), in which one of the songs declares, "When I touch my body, I discover what I have. I have a vagina, because I am a girl. Vagina is not only for peeing. When I touch it, I feel a plesant tingle." School plays are staged with a cuddly, smiling bear mascot who encourages the kiddie Krauts to sing along.
Bad enough the Germans started two world wars. Now they've gone completely in the other direction. They've started to destroy themselves.
How long can it be before other Western countries start following Germany's über-sick example? I joke about American liberals wanting to hand condoms out to five-year-olds, but now I'm seriously beginning to believe that could happen. I wouldn't be surprised if our Labour government here in Britain started copying this garbage.
I doubt if any futher commentary is required, except to say that while wanting to save children in strife-torn, impoverished areas of Africa and Asia is all very well, I think German children should be added to the list of those who require immediate attention—and of the non-sexual kind.
