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I have been kinda obsessed with them for several years. I've watched several documentaries on them includin the fantastic "the most hated family in america." I have searched every corner of their website, and even listened to a few a Fred Phelps' hilarious sermons. I have studied some of their court cases, and read a ton of them. I have watched several interviews of them on Cspan, and insternet interviews. I find them to be a fascinating group.
SO to say I don't know what I'm talking about is BS. Yes, they are a church. Their doctrine is the king james version of the bible. Their are versus in the bible that promote their cause such as Leviticus 20:13, which calls for the death penalty for homosexuals, which are some of the reasons I'm not a christian. The westboro cult has never been involved in violence. All of their protests have been non violent at least on their end. They are using their constitutional right to protest, as perverted as it may seem. Yes, they preach hatred, but we have no hate speech laws in this country, those would be unconstitutional. But they do not preach violence.
Yes they are a church. They believe as much fruity nonsense as any other church I know. So in my opinion, they have a right to exist. They have that right granted to them by the 1st and 14th amendment. So yes, just ignore them. The more attention you give them, the bigger a threat they become.
But I do not want to say that taking legal action against them wouldn't be entirlly unjustified, just not in the area of religion, which they are perfectly within their right. Fred Phelps is a very well known child abuser, and I believe that a better course of action would be to call the Kansas CHild protection services on him. Religion is not a justifable excuse for child abuse.
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