U.S. Supreme Court Rules on Anti-Gay Funeral Protesters

[c.d.]

What about the Ku Klux Klan? Are their positions moral and/or ethical? Do they have the right to march and distribute literature?

c.d.

[mariab]

Hello Norma/Natalie,
it's nice that we seem to agree on so much in this thread. We also agree on Visconti, and I even partly agree with you on Sir Robert Anderson, but let's not highjack this thread to tragic proportions. (Thought of playing with fire a little bit, just for the hell of it.) ;-)

[DVV]

Aaaarff....that old debate about freedom of speech...or not.

[Robert]

Hi Maria

I remember the crimes against humanity thing. You were talking about the legal concept, which exists in court rooms on bits of paper. But a lawyer could draw a picture of a pink elephant, without there being any.

CD, if the KKK are saying "kill the blacks," then they should be banned. Ditto if they turn up at black funerals. But I wouldn't ban them for writing books of psedo Darwinism or whatever it is they write. It's a load of blokes with pointed heads, isn't it?

[Ally]

What about the Ku Klux Klan? Are their positions moral and/or ethical? Do they have the right to march and distribute literature?

c.d.

That is why I don't get into morality. They no doubt believe that their position is the moral one, just as the Westboro loons do. As for ethical....well that's a whole 'nother ball of wax isn't it? It depends what precisely they are doing.

I firmly believe that the Supreme Court erred here, not because of any free speech issues, but because they failed to draw a distinction between public and private behaviors. This sort of behavior would not be tolerated if aimed at a private individual at their private residence, so I don't see why their privacy isn't protected in an act that is required by law to take place in a public venue. You cannot legally bury your son in your backyard, so the law forces them into a public setting and then leaves them unshielded, which I think is wrong. If they were doing this outside people's homes, it would be considered harassment and they would be banned from doing it.

I think the principle that it is being fought under is the wrong principle. This is not about free speech, it is about the right of private citizens not to be harassed as they go about their private lives.

If the Westboro church or the KKK were demonstrating in the town square, then they would be behaving ethically. Picketing private individuals is not behaving ethically.

[c.d.]

Hi Maria

I remember the crimes against humanity thing. You were talking about the legal concept, which exists in court rooms on bits of paper. But a lawyer could draw a picture of a pink elephant, without there being any.

CD, if the KKK are saying "kill the blacks," then they should be banned. Ditto if they turn up at black funerals. But I wouldn't ban them for writing books of psedo Darwinism or whatever it is they write. It's a load of blokes with pointed heads, isn't it?

Pointed heads and pointed hats. They wear white robes with masks over their heads to hide their identity.

c.d.

[Robert]

Surgeons do something similar. If the operation goes wrong, nobody knows who's responsible.

[Errata]

This whole thing is a puzzle. And as students of history you would think we could nail down why...

Clearly it's not what they say. They've been saying it for a long time. Nobody cared. Other people say it everyday and we still don't care. And to an extent, it's not even about protesting at funerals, because that has happened for an even longer time. There were protesters at Lincoln's funeral. And there were protesters at soldier's funerals during the Vietnam War. There is something about these soldier's funerals. And a lot of people have noticed it, and I haven't heard any explanation as to why. Something about this war. They are not more protected by society. WWII soldiers were the most venerated by our society. Still are. We aren't more protective, we aren't more patriotic. I think we are far more invested in being seen to be supporting the troops than a: during other wars and b: than we actually are. Its possible that as a society we are embarrassed by the entire situation and would much rather legislate it away than deal with the real problem. Maybe we spent way too long knowing who the enemy was. Maybe after the fall of communism we were ill equipped to deal with internal security and an enemy we can't point to on a map. Maybe we crapped our national pants. I honestly don't know.

I do know that American's are less socially active than we used to be. I know we are less interested in current events. I know we are more isolationist. I know that we have entered an age of a massive game of passing the blame. Far fewer people vote. Far fewer people watch the news. More people are more selfish. Only 39% of us believe in evolution. This is not a society that should care in the slightest what is happening at these soldier's funerals. They demonstrably did not give a crap about what was happening at pre-war funerals. So why do they care? Now, when they didn't before and won't again. Why do they care now?

[mariab]

Hello Robert,
I hope not to have sounded “disrespectful“ with my joke about you and legal terms, it was not my intention at all.

But a lawyer could draw a picture of a pink elephant, without there being any.

Precisely, and that's one of the fascinating aspects of the job.

As long as we agree it was a male neanderthal who invented the wheel and fire.

Now I get it, Tom seems to be emphasizing the word “male“ here! LOL. Truth be said, we can never know if it was a male or a female who discovered fire and invented the wheel. My guess is that it was a mixed group of Neanderthals who discovered fire, most probably after a storm, when thunder hit trees. And possibly a male who invented the wheel, maybe after playing with spherical fruit, or after watching round plant material flying in the wind. Still, I couldn't care less about who came up with these discoveries gender-wise. Unless it was a joke, Tom seems to have some deep-routed gender issues here.
Personally I'm quite tired of all gender-specific points-counting. Don't care too much about when and how exactly my female ancestors let men subjugate them, but just intend to make myself useful and leave a tiny legacy to the human civilization by restauring some music masterpieces to their authentic state and by preparing a couple critical editions of a couple different scores. How many, depending on how long I'll live.
Additionally, I also wouldn't mind locating some new sources pertaining to Ripperology. (Modest wants.)
And God bless the Neanderthals (figuratively speaking).

[DVV]

Surgeons do something similar. If the operation goes wrong, nobody knows who's responsible.

Robert, you're the ultimate reason to be a casebooker.

[c.d.]

Hi Robert,

I think it is because this is such a slap in the face to common decency that makes people so upset about all of this. These soldiers (who are heterosexual and not gay) died to protect the rights of Americans including the crazies from the church. No one other than these crazies can see any connection between dieing in war and homosexuality. It is the absurdity of the whole situation that gets people so upset and that these crazies choose a location when people are in mourning and most vulnerable emotionally as the venue to get their point across.

c.d.

[Ally]

I just want to say that we don't know if all the soldiers were hetero and not gay. Many gay people proudly serve and die for us. A minor niggle, but a niggle with the above just the same. It should be said their sexual orientation is irrelevant.

Makes me long for the good old days where you could just call out bastards like this in a good old fashioned duel of honor.

[DVV]

What does the majority of Americans thinks of that ?

[Abby Normal]

Hi Abby,

Wouldn't it have been a lot easier and a lot more popular to rule against the church?

c.d.

Easier-no. Popular-I don't know. Alot of people/groups have there own agendas and fall on the different sides. The point is they could and should have ruled against westboro, but they didn't. Do you beleive what Westboro is doing is wrong? I do. And if I had the power like a supreme court justice to stop it -I would. no question.

And if they did rule against Westboro, they would not have ruled in any way contrary to the Constitution or the first amendment for free speech.

[c.d.]

I just want to say that we don't know if all the soldiers were hetero and not gay. Many gay people proudly serve and die for us. A minor niggle, but a niggle with the above just the same. It should be said their sexual orientation is irrelevant.

Makes me long for the good old days where you could just call out bastards like this in a good old fashioned duel of honor.

Yes, you're right. We don't know their sexual preference. The church members don't care they are equal opportunity haters.

c.d.