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Friday, August 08, 2008
In defense of Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church freedom of expression
Members of the Westboro Baptist Church--the same church that protests funerals of soldiers and homosexuals with signs like "God hates fags"--plan to show up at the funeral of Tim Mclean, the young man savagely murdered on a Greyhound bus just over a week ago. They plan to come with signs, and they plan to picket his funeral with the message that God hated him, that God hates all of Canada, and that this is God's wrath for our Godless lifestyle.
Having announced their intentions, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day and other government representatives sent out word to the border guards to turn these vile people away. They succeeded in sending one van back, but members of the church are claiming that at least one member of their church has managed to cross the border, and at least one person will be busy picketing McLean's funeral on Saturday.
Response from Canadians has been swift. Organizing through a facebook group, just over one hundred Canadians plan to encircle the Baptists to keep the McLean family from having to see the signs, or hear their dumb protest. Others are making phone calls to try and keep the Baptists out of the country in the first place. And that's the rub for free speech supporters like me.
"These people are callous, vicious and shouldn't be let into our country," said Rodney Taylor, an Ottawa man who made calls to Day and the P.M.'s office to turn the church members away. "We have freedom of speech, but they are inciting hate."
Asks Warren Kinsella: "With respect, I would suggest to my libertarian readership - which has grown significantly, today - that y'all now have a bit of a dilemma. Should the Westboro Baptists be prevented, by law, from spouting hate at that young man's funeral? If so, on what basis? Notwithstanding their citizenship, Canadian rules and regulations now apply to them. What say you?"
Dr. Dawg wonders out loud: "And one last question: why is the Right so unconcerned?"
This is one of those tough cases for free speechers, and libertarians generally. I'll give answering this a shot, but I'm certain many will be unsatisfied with the explanation. Still, it's worth discussing.
One response is this: The civil actions of Canadians has already solved this problem. We don't need the state to come in and arrest the Phelps', keep them out of our country, and so on, because people have already minimized the potential emotional damage the Phelps' could inflict on the family and friends of Tim McLean. To counter the Phelps' message, many of us ordinary folks have made our sympathies plain; there are facebook groups, support groups, people are penning letters of support, and many are expressing their deeply felt outrage at the viciousness of the tragedy. The state needn't do anything at all--we're busy doing it already.
Second: There's little doubt that they are inciting hate. They are, of course, inciting hatred towards themselves, with public anger and fury directed not at "the lifestyle" of Tim McLean (presumably the reason for the protest, even though the WBC members admit they've never met him, don't know a thing about him, and are just sort of guessing), but at the Phelps' (they're all family members, with a tattoo on their arse reading "WBC"). Decent Canadians are being very vocal in expressing their disgust with the Phelps'. If anything, they are undermining their mission, rather than encouraging more hate. And so there's no particular reason to get the state involved.
Those are probably unsatisfying answers, although I myself think they're true. There's more to be said.
A separate solution, which will also not satisfy Dr. Dawg or Kinsella, is that cemeteries, if they aren't now, should be private property. If they were private property, then the owners of the cemetery could have rules for coming to a funeral. You can't come and protest, for example. I don't know of any cemetery that could get away with permitting protests of this sort on their property, and still manage to continue their operation. It is not an infringement of freedom of expression to kick somebody out of your house when you don't like what they're saying.
The short of it is this: Do I support the Phelps' right to say what they're saying? Yes. Do I agree with what they're saying? Hell no, I think it's vile, and they are, as Kinsella put it, scumbags. Should they be free to do what they're doing? Provided they're not violating private property rights, yes.
UPDATE: Terrence points me to a post by Eugene Volokh that is worth reading in this connection. Volokh is a libertarian, and brilliant. Bumping around over at the Volokh conspiracy led me to this other, related, post about Phelps, the Mohammed cartoons, and a slippery slope. In this post, Volokh again makes an argument against the tort of intentionally inflicting severe emotional distress.
(This tort, by the way, may be consistent with libertarianism, and would count as another argument--intentionally inflicting severe emotional distress counts as "harm" in the relevant sense for a libertarian. Clearly, the Phelps' are engaging in intentionally inflicting severe emotional distress. In principle, a libertarian like me might think that this is reason to legally block the speech. But, for Volokhian reasons, it looks like putting this principle into law will squelch more worthwhile speech, and so shouldn't be entrenched in the law).
Posted by P.M. Jaworski on August 8, 2008 in Canadian Politics | Permalink
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Comments
Jaws,
Sadly, I must agree with you here. (Note to Warren Kinsella: I'm not a libertarian, yet I support free speech.) I'd like to say that any WBC members who are not Canadian citizens can rightly be denied entry just as you would bar the door of your home from a possible guest who has announced an intention to be an ass, but that really won't do. Besides, it would not be an answer about what could be done about any Canadian citizens who are WBC supporters who plan to protest.
I hope the McLean family will be able to have the funeral in a private enough space that they can be shielded from the demonstrations. But as Guy Earle says "It's not illegal to be an asshole". The WBC might be one of the biggest collection of assholes, but stopping them from coming is a slap both to free speech and freedom of religion. Sad, but true.
Posted by: Fact Check | 2008-08-08 5:49:41 PM
I say we plant a dead seal on one of these bastards and have PETA meet them at the border.
Posted by: Sarcasm | 2008-08-08 7:34:57 PM
I hope that the whole lot of them get the shit kicked out of them. The border police wouldn't have let them through with their guns (we all hope), so they won't have those to hide behind.
Really.. these douchebags need a Canadian knuckle sandwich.
Posted by: Dave Lapkovsky | 2008-08-08 8:50:21 PM
Jaws:
You were kind enough to give me a heads-up here, and yes, I am quoted out of context, but that was my fault. As I noted in my update, much of the Right in fact (present company excluded) rose up shortly after I had written that, with wrath equal to that of the Left, demanding the Phelpspawns' exclusion. Some of this was obviously a shared sense of decency; some might have been tactical. After all, no one wants the Phelpspawn as allies, even if they're downright homophobic.
But I would make these quick points:
1) While libertarians don't approve of borders, we've got one, and entry into our country isn't automatic. As you will see from a later update at my place, there are three pieces of legislation that probably apply to what the Phelpspawn intend. Few would argue that a terrorist with the announced intention of blowing up the Peace Tower should be simply waved through the border, on the basis that he hadn't actually done anything yet.
2) The Phelpspawn were not simply engaging in free speech: in fact this is not a free speech issue at all. Their purpose was to disrupt a private funeral. That's no more permissible than one of the 'spawn wandering into my livingroom and spitting on the carpet. Your fairly narrow view of private property would exclude the private space of a grieving family. I dislike the category of private property, and indeed worry about the entire notion of privacy, but that's for another day. In the meantime, I think there is such a thing as simple decency, and it should prevail over the monstrous activities of freaks and psychopaths who want to shout hatred right into my ear.
3) If I may say so, it's great fun to watch the telling/unfolding of a totalizing grand narrative like libertarianism. But that's a little abstract when you're burying a son who had his head chopped off by a madman, and some of the madman's friends show up to taunt you. Frankly, I know what I'd do in that situation, and it wouldn't be to hold civil conversations like this one.
Posted by: Dr.Dawg | 2008-08-08 9:47:15 PM
Dawg,
Heh, Phelpspawn. I like that.
On a different note, what do you think of the four torts that were used against Phelps in the civil suit he lost? Or, more generally, would you satisfied if people could sue Phelps into oblivion for disrupting funerals, or would you rather see him in jail?
Best,
Terrence
Posted by: Terrence Watson | 2008-08-08 9:50:10 PM
Free speech is only for those people I agree with.
Posted by: Rich | 2008-08-08 10:53:52 PM
Surely the Phelps people are people who everyone can hate, regardless of their opinions.
Lunatics picketing at the funerals of murder victims are the reason that the LORD invented jury nullification.
Posted by: Adam Yoshida | 2008-08-09 12:18:52 AM
The difficulty for libertarian theory that this protest presents is quite generalizable: Sound and light waves do not respect the boundaries carved out by private property.
Everyone wants to limit in *some* ways the sound and light that might originate from neighbouring properties and impinge on us. We don't necessarily want to have to watch our neighbours having sex on their front lawn as our kids go to school in the morning. We don't necessarily want to listen to headbanger music at 10,000 db at 3:30 a.m. every night. Etc.
The natural way to deal with these nuisances for libertarians is by way of restrictive covenants attached to property titles -- kind of like condominium rules. There may be technical problems with making these restrictive covenants reasonable and comprehensive; and different neighbourhoods might well gravitate toward different conventions in terms of the drafting of these restrictive covenants; but there is an obvious, in-principle way of minimizing the general problem of keeping out unwanted sound and light waves.
There would also be provisions attached to property titles on the other side, too: limiting the kinds of things neighbours can to to erect sound and light barriers to protect their privacy. Covenants restricting the nearness you can build to the property borders, fence heights, etc. would arise. These things exist in municiple law for good reasons, and libertarians would not simply do without them in the interests of "unrestricted private property."
Property values in a libertarian world would be heavily influenced by the reasonableness of the restrictive covenants built into the title of the property. If a set of covenants became too dysfunctional, property values in the neighbourhood would plummet, which would provide an entrepreneurial opportunity for someone to buy up large swathes of the neighbourhood, rewrite the restrictive covenants so as to maximize the value of the property, and sell pieces off at a profit.
In a world of pure private property, would the restrictive covenants that spontaneously arise be sufficiently adaptive to prevent the kind of vile protests engaged in by the WCBs? One would certainly expect so. Why not? Allowing the WBC protesters onto one's property anywhere close to where they can disrupt a funeral would almost certainly trigger property disputes with neighbours under one restrictive covenant or another. Even if the terms were not tightly worded to rule out this kind of protest, who would want to get into a lengthy legal entanglement over the interpretation of the rules? In short, I think a libertarian world would be much safer from the kinds of concerns these protesters raise than a world such as we have now, dominated by relatively lawless public property.
As long as there are public spaces, we will have to utilize second-best solutions to public disorder problems -- like time, place, and manner restrictions on protest activity. In the case of public spaces, however, the "reasonableness" of the restrictions will be a function of popular vote rather than ech individual finding or negotiating the set of restrictions he or she feels most comfortable living under.
That's the beauty of private property, after all: it gives people maximum flexibility to shape their own living and working spaces, rather than being forced to accept the majority opinion of people they will never have to deal with.
In fact, the reason we have "public disorder" is that we have public spaces. The real problem is for the defenders of public space.
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-08-09 12:44:58 AM
Grant (and Terrence):
"Sound and light waves do not respect the boundaries carved out by private property."
I am impressed. As I was drifting off to sleep last eve, I began to turn the libertarian thing around in my mind, and hit on something quite similar. Words, say the libertarians, are in a separate category from deeds. I began to compose a few thought-experiments:
1) You have a microphone before you. If you speak, you will activate a detonator secured to a person twenty feet away. Should your speech be curtailed?
2) OK, that's extreme. You have a microphone before you: you are aware that certain words will cause a rise in blood pressure in a person twenty feet away, and will burst an aneurysm. Should your speech be curtailed?
3) Fine, that's too hypothetical. You have a microphone before you: you are aware that certain words and phrases will cause severe emotional stress and suffering possibly of several days' duration, including sleeplessness, digestive upset, uncontrolled sweating and shivering, and depression. Should your speech be curtailed?
4) Maybe that was just supposition. But a trusted team of medical doctors advises you that the last person mentioned would be far less physically traumatized by a slap across the face. You think for a moment, give up your idea of traumatizing him with speech, and in a moment of charity you approach the person and deliver s stinging slap to the chops instead.
Is there a qualitative difference among these four examples? In each case, you cause actual injury; in the last case, you cause less than you might have done by exercising your right to freedom of speech.
Terrence, the truth, since you asked for it, is that I'd like to see Phelps dead of advanced AIDS. But given that his foul version of God has spared him that thus far, then I would choose "sued into oblivion" over jailing. I read Volokh's piece, incidentally, but it is very legalistic and (at least to me) unconvincing. See my examples above.
Posted by: Dr.Dawg | 2008-08-09 6:20:28 AM
Dr. Dawg:
One important distinction to make is between what morality demands of us, and what the state can legitimately demand of us. Sometimes, the two come apart. And proving the former is not yet enough to get to the latter.
I call this the "ought-state" gap. Just because you "ought" to x, doesn't mean there ought to be a law to ensure your performance of x.
What you earlier called a "totalizing" view (libertarianism), probably just pertains to particular strains or versions of libertarianism. Ayn Rand, for example, is like this. But so are people like Murray Rothbard, who think we can get everything we want from the "non-aggression axiom."
But you should also consider the libertarianism of James Buchanan or Friedrich Hayek or Milton Friedman.
Buchanan told me that he was basically a Rawlsian contractualist in terms of ethics. Rawlsians are typically standard welfare-state liberals. But Buchanan said that if you gave those "representatives" knowledge of the public choice school of economics behind the "veil of ignorance" in the "original position," they'd agree to libertarianism, not liberalism.
Hayek, meanwhile, said he had nothing to say about Rawls' "A Theory of Justice" because he thought it was basically correct about everything. His libertarianism was "practical" in the sense that while our moral views would insist on an activist welfare state, the facts of reality (especially the various "knowledge problems" that the free and open market resolves) make libertarianism the best from a practical point of view.
It's hard to call these versions of libertarianism "totalizing" views, since they don't exactly take one principle (non-aggression, or whatever) and apply it to literally all cases, and prior to empirical facts about the consequences of various possible policies.
So that's a long preface for being able to say that we can distinguish a) the demands of morality from b) the demands of morality that we should entrench in law.
So: 1: Morality demands we not speak, and the law ought to recognize this. That's because speech, in this case, counts as a deed in the relevant sense. Speech qua speech does not cause physical harm. Speech qua deed can and/or does cause physical harm.
2: Yes, and for the same reason as above.
3: At least maybe. We need to know more. For instance, suppose my calling neo-Nazis, and the Phelps' dipshits causes this kind of distress. Well, good. They should be distressed by their outrageous, false, and ridiculous views. If they are made to feel this badly *because of beliefs and opinions that they hold*, then that should be all well and good.
If, however, they're made to feel this way not because of their beliefs and opinions, but because of, say, their non-chosen identity--including their gender, ethnicity and sexuality (notice I exclude religion, since that is a tougher case...)--then I'm inclined to say that it is most definitely morally wrong to engage in the speech, and quite possibly, depending on the details, a matter for the law.
4) No slapping.
I'll end here for now.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-09 1:18:35 PM
I can't believe we have to let these "brainwashed twisted fools " [WBC}, into Canada, let alone having to watch them protest at someones private funeral service. According to there own "scripture", Satan comes in many forms and disguises. I think I am seeing it here. If I had a choice, I would probably befriend someone leading a simple life like Tim Mclean, than these " inflated ego" religious zealots.
Posted by: glen | 2008-08-09 1:37:22 PM
Dr.Dawg:
I can only speak for myself, and I'm not a "rock-ribbed" libertarian. In a nutshell, my thesis -- "Functional Libertarianism" -- sketches the following argument:
1. The function of morality is to facilitate mutually advantageous cooperation. [This is derived from neo-Darwinism in evolutionary biology / psychology. I won't defend it here, as that would be a book in itself.]
2. Exactly what norms promote mutually advantageous cooperation in a given setting depends heavily on history-dependent conventions, the availability of technological solutions, and other sociological complications too numerous to mention. (The truth to moral relativism is just that cooperation can be facilitated by a variety of sets of norms, more or less well, such that these norms are "relative to" various conventions, technology, etc. That does not lead to a complete relativism, where it is impossible to say that any norms are dysfunctional.)
3. As Jaws points out, norms of cooperation can be enforced in a variety of ways -- i.e. more or less heavy-handedly. How heavy-handed we should be with respect to any given norn will be a function of its cost-benefit analysis: does the cost of enforcement in this weigh outweigh the benefits? -- or rather, outweigh the benefits of the next-best enforcement option.
4. The costs of enforcement through the politico-legal system (including especially the costs of false positives -- wrongful convictions) are very high in general. Therefore, only a very narrow band of morality should actually be enforced through the politico-legal system. For the most part, only libertarian principles meet the cost-benefit test for technologically advanced and multicultural societies such as we are familiar with. (As should be apparent from the above, I make no claims to universality for libertarian principles.)
5. Laws that do not promote mutually advantageous cooperation in a cost-effective way are dysfunctional and should be done away with; but equally, laws that do promote mutually advantageous cooperation in a cost-effective way are functional and should be kept, even if they violate strict libertarian principles. (I think some aspects of intellectual property law might illustrate the bifurcation of rock-ribbed libertarianism and my functional libertarianism.)
So the question you pose boils down for me to the issue of whether speech might ever be so bad as to be so destructive of mutually advantageous cooperation that we should use the heavy-handed methods of the state to prevent it. I'll only address your cases (3) and (4), because they are the only ones that present a serious challenge:
(3) I agree with much of what Jaws said, but I do concede that in certain social contexts such speech might be appropriately curtailed by force of law. Some "backward" societies are not ready for libertarian-like freedom, yet, and giving it to them would only cause dislikes and hatreds to flare up that would damage the level of mutually advantageous cooperation that already exists. I would propose an adaptationist program to deal with such societies: coax them into the 21st century gradually, at their own pace, by enlightening them about the things that cause so much unwarranted anxiety and stress in their belief-system.
For societies like our own, however, pandering to these primitive sensibilities is positively dysfunctional. As I have said elsewhere on this blog recently, societies like ours constantly NEED the kind of therapy that unpleasant speech entails. We want people to grow up without such exquisite sensibilities so that we don't have to be walking on eggshells all the time.
(4) One important consideration in any cost-benefit analysis is the boundary issues created by the laws we make. Clear boundaries are better than fuzzy ones for all kinds of reasons, and the non-physical-aggression line is a case in point. The law should be: "no slaps allowed," but it should be enforced with some discretion and leniency. "Zero tolerance" is a totalitarian philosophy, whether it is slaps, guns, drugs, or whatever.
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-08-09 4:07:34 PM
Llibertarian idealogue whackos demonstrate once again why they are not taken seriously and will never hae a shred of influence. You jackasses are no different than Islamic fundamentalists - philosophy before practicality.
Epsi
Posted by: epsilon | 2008-08-09 4:38:12 PM
Uh, Epsi: Classical liberal philosophy has grown the US/Canada until WW I. You government worshipping socialists are going to kill everything that was good about North America. It is your Marxist philosophy and practice that will usher in Sovietism.
History shows that libertarian philosophy and practice are a solid way of growing a country.
Posted by: Opinion | 2008-08-09 4:45:22 PM
Epsi adds nothing of any value or significance to this discussion. If you don't understand, epsi, don't comment.
For example, "practicality before philosophy" is a philosophy. Look up Dewey.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-09 6:20:35 PM
Dr. Dawg,
You will, of course, support the deportation of American military deserters should they show the slightest inclination to use dead Canadian soldiers for their own political purposes.
You will, of course, support the deportation of anti-American muslim extremists should they show the slightest inclination to use dead American soldiers for their own political purposes.
Just checkin' for consistency.
Posted by: h2o273kk9 | 2008-08-09 6:33:50 PM
"Therefore, only a very narrow band of morality should actually be enforced through the politico-legal system."
I'm in complete agreement. The crux, of course, is as always where the line should be drawn.
"Some "backward" societies are not ready for libertarian-like freedom, yet, and giving it to them would only cause dislikes and hatreds to flare up that would damage the level of mutually advantageous cooperation that already exists....For societies like our own, however, pandering to these primitive sensibilities is positively dysfunctional. As I have said elsewhere on this blog recently, societies like ours constantly NEED the kind of therapy that unpleasant speech entails. We want people to grow up without such exquisite sensibilities so that we don't have to be walking on eggshells all the time."
This is where we get into choppy waters. "Backward societies?" Suppose, hypothetically, we were to describe Country X as one in which a) a majority of its people rejected the theory of evolution; b) one-quarter of its population thought God would take them up into Heaven last year, and waited breathlessly for the end-times; c) where current political discourse on the conservative side emphasizes the elimination, even the physical elimination, of its political opponents; and d) the highest court in the land has made it legal for anyone to carry a concealed handgun, something readily available at local stores or on the street.
Ready for libertarian freedom? You tell me.
"Primitive sensibilities?" You mean like not having a funeral for a loved one disrupted by hateful in-bred American yokels? Count me as primitive, then. And hopefully there would be more than slaps involved.
Posted by: Dr.Dawg | 2008-08-10 10:18:57 AM
What a bunch of kooks you are. Legalize drugs, allow fundamentalist morons to disrupt the dignity of a funeral. And apologize for an endless list of moronic "freedoms". You guys are extremist creeps who deserve to occupy the whacko periphery.
Epsi
Posted by: epsilon | 2008-08-10 11:26:06 AM
Once again (is anyone surprised?) epsi adds nothing of any value or significance to this discussion. If you are incapable of presenting an argument, epsi, keep quiet. Because nobody cares about your emotional outbursts.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-10 11:38:30 AM
I think you're trying to compare this to the KKK rally in Skokie a few years back. I understand the perceived dilemma, but I think there are extenuating circumstances with the MacLean case.
These crazies plan to physically disrupt a religious ceremony that's part of our culture and heritage. I'm not a practising Christian, but I totally believe in the necessity of these ceremonies. They bring closure to the life of a member of the community, and because of that they cannot be disrupted without damaging the community. The emotional, and possible physical damage this could cause are not possible to predict, therefore the action constitutes criminal negligence. With intent to cause harm.
They can be kept out, and they should also qualify for a terrorist watchlist.
Posted by: dp | 2008-08-10 1:05:03 PM
Jaws hates it when a REAL conservative girl hits the mark close to home. And that is that Llibertarians are marginalized goofs rejected by normal Canadians.
Llibertarians, with their mealy mouthed "freedom" logic present nothing but anarchy. I would like to see just one Llibertarian state and watch it turn into a dystopian nightmare.
Epsi
Posted by: epsilon | 2008-08-10 3:42:34 PM
epsilon really hates it when she's asked for an argument. So much better and easier to emote.
Do you have an argument, epsilon, or just a random assortment of insults?
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-10 3:49:17 PM
Uh, epsi or to be more accurate "dipsy."
How about 18th century America? Have you heard how liberty made it an economic juggernaut until the dopes took over. Have you saw the rise of China when they began deregulating?
How in the world can you be ignore reality when you are surrounded by actions and consequences that are so easily demonstrated? The benefits of freedom are self-evident to anyone other than maybe Helen Keller and you. Helen had an excuse. Maybe you do too. How did you do in the special olympics?
Posted by: Sarcasm | 2008-08-10 3:51:58 PM
Dr.Dawg:
You say, "This is where we get into choppy waters." Well, of course. Were you expecting a simplistic answer? -- you know, an answer you could then attack as being, er, "simplistic"?
By 'backward society' in this context I didn't have in mind 'scientifically backward', primarily -- although there may be some correlation. I had in mind more of a psychological / emotional backwardness. Maybe 'immaturity' would have been better, as suggested by my other phrase, 'primitive sensibilities'.
There are certainly some immature Americans, with primitive sensibilities; but as a whole I would count the U.S.A. as among a handful of the most mature when it comes to being able to tolerate opposing ideologies, without resort to violence. The point is that, in a libertarian world, the relatively few, isolated primitivists like Phelps would be squeezed out of operation by the restrictive covenants I spoke about above that would run with titles to private property. It's only where you have a fairly large critical mass of primitives where libertarian freedom might not work so well.
Dr.Dawg, enough about my theories; not it's time for YOU to pick up the gauntlet that I threw down some time ago:
In fact, the reason we have "public disorder" is that we have public spaces. The real problem is for the defenders of public space.
Epsilon semi-moron:
Don't allow your righteous indigantion to impair your reading comprehension. I was arguing AGAINST the "fundamentalist morons," in case you missed it.
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-08-10 4:37:32 PM
Grant Brown How dare you call Epsi a semi-anything. "Semi" she is not!!
She came in 9th in the special olympics and has a participation medal to prove it. Give her the respect she deserves.
Posted by: Sarcasm | 2008-08-10 4:42:32 PM
As explained previously, the Epsilon was a mid-level, mass-produced breed of humans in Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World." They called it the Epsilon Semi-Moron. If the shoe fits...
Posted by: Grant Brown | 2008-08-10 4:50:39 PM
These latest intellectually barren comments by my critics reflect me in the brightest of light.
Bring it on social misfits.
Epsi
Posted by: epsilon | 2008-08-10 10:00:57 PM
The Libertarians seem to think it's okay that people organize through the
internet in order to neutralize this church, but that it's not good they
have organized to form national government and then to use the powers of the
government.
Funny how this paper jumped to the 'cause' of Guy Earle but are not quite so enthusiastic about the Phelps. Hey, why are you guys not having interviews with the Phelps and writing articles supporting them? When are you going to have a benefit show and a rally in support of the freedoms of the Westboro Baptist Church?
Posted by: Nina | 2008-08-11 7:52:20 AM
Why do you call these people "fundamentalist"? They're wild heretics, not even on the same page as a Christian fundamentalist.
Posted by: ebt | 2008-08-11 3:01:55 PM
We're not enthusiastic about the Phelps' because, for one, we're a Canadian news source, and they're Americans. Two, they are absolutely vile. Three, we'd be happy to interview them, now go and try to get them for an interview please. Once you're done doing that, could you please get John Edwards to have a chat with us as well? Okay, thanks!
And, look, my post defends their freedom of expression.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-11 5:00:11 PM
Jaws,
I TOLD you we should try to get Fred Phelps to come on Political Animals :-)
Terrence
Posted by: Terrence Watson | 2008-08-11 5:09:51 PM
Yes they are American but Stockwell Day took action to prevent them from protesting in Canada. Freedom of speech is freedom of speech, right? Why is what Guy Earle said considered to be any less vile than what the Westboro Baptist Church espouses? Anyway, my point is that the Libertarians are not so enthusiastic to support the civil liberties of this group. And I doubt, even if they were Canadian, that you would be vehement in your support of them (although you did post ONE supportive thing). Come on, there has to be some limit to free speech, especially when it is clear that you are inciting hate. Not only that, this church has their children involved in their sick protests. They always protest 100 feet away from the funeral, but still, they are inflicting pain and suffering on people.
Posted by: Nina | 2008-08-12 8:05:22 AM
Another question I have is that would you guys support the Westboro Baptist Church to protest 100 feet away from the funeral of your child if he/she was killed in some horrific way? So it's okay if they carry signs saying that your child died because Canada supports "fags" and "God hates your tears."? These crazies do obey laws and respect property rights but hurt people with their sick 'freedom of speech.'
Posted by: Nina | 2008-08-12 8:31:23 AM
Nina,
I think you'll find that all the libertarians here reject the idea of keeping Fred Phelps out of Canada on the basis of his speech. We're principled that way.
Canada has a law that prohibits disrupting religious services. Perhaps Phelps could be kept out of Canada on that basis -- or thrown out, once he violates it.
Finally, if Phelps was protesting at my kid's funeral, I think my mind would be just a little too occupied to worry much about him and his merry band of sign-holders.
On the other hand, if I lived in Maryland, maybe I'd sue him for 11 million dollars.
Best,
Terrence
Posted by: Terrence C. Watson | 2008-08-12 2:29:48 PM
I must not have been clear.
I *don't* support what Phelps and his crew of scumbags have to say. If he showed up anywhere near me, I would give him a piece of my mind. I would do my best to intentionally inflict severe emotional distress on him and his bag of shit "church" of hate and stupidity.
What I grudgingly argued, however, is that Phelps and his gang have a right to protest on public spaces. If freedom of expression is to mean anything at all, it cannot be defended merely when we like or approve of what someone is saying. The test is in the fire--when it turns our stomach, and makes us sick. Voltaire had it right, "I disagree with what you say, sir, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it."
But throughout my post I expressly applauded those civil actors who showed up en masse at the funeral to counter-protest in case the Phelps-vermin did show up.
My ultimate point was that state action was unnecessary. Civil society worked in this case, as I think it would in just about all cases, and we needn't turn to the state to resolve *every* *single* *thing*.
To be honest with you, if Phelps showed up at my son's or daughter's funeral, I'd probably try and knock his teeth out. I'm not proud of that, but I realize that, under those circumstances, it would probably end up that way.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 2008-08-12 3:43:58 PM
I'm not proud of that, but I realize that, under those circumstances, it would probably end up that way.
Posted by: P.M. Jaworski | 12-Aug-08 3:43:58 PM
You see, this is a sincere, honest reaction. It sort of proves my point that ceremonies like this are a special case that need special protection. The reaction to this harassment is far too hard to predict.
Public places are different, and I agree that good taste is not a requirement of free speech.
Posted by: dp | 2008-08-12 4:07:50 PM
The Libertarians seem to think it's okay that people organize through the
internet in order to neutralize this church, but that it's not good they
have organized to form national government and then to use the powers of the
government.
I think it's okay for the government to step in sometimes, especially in extreme cases like this. I wouldn't want my child's funeral to be some sort of spectacle of the Westboro Baptist Church vs. the counter-protesters. I'm not crazy about Stockwell Day but I'm glad he did what he did.
Freedom of speech is fine-but there is a time and a place for it-and there should be restrictions on it when it comes to inciting hate and harassing individuals. Even Johnathan Kaye from the National Post agrees that they should have been kept out. I think even the most adamant advocate of freedom of expression has his or her limit of what is acceptable. It's one thing to say "God hates fags" on the internet and another to show up at someone's funeral (even if you keep a legal distance) and blame the death on God's hatred of homosexuality.
Posted by: Nina | 2008-08-13 5:36:44 AM
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