Way to go, Mississippi!

I understand what you are saying but believe it or not there are actually people on this board who have been in fights. The percentage might be low but there are a few.

 

Way fewer than the escapades claimed here, though. Not that it's necessarily a bad thing, except for the exaggerating.

 

I'm starting to think the same thing myself. I've just seen that one link but nothing else.

 

probably accurate.

 

Which is why I put that until they had generated enough attention, they were right outside the funerals and screaming loud enough for the people to see them and hear them. While that's not literally in their face, I consider it just as bad. It took them enough times before the Patriot Guard got involved, and towns took them seriously enough to make them protest elsewhere.

And yes, throughout history, there was violence against protestors because some group thought that their free speech was offensive. The difference though, is that although the violent group took the protestors' speech personally, it really wasn't. But in the Westboro case, it is flat-out personal when they try to tell grieving family members that their loved one is in hell.

Maybe the next time they think of protesting, this incident will be in the back of their minds, and they'll tone down their rhetoric a little bit.

 

Yay Mississippi! You don't have to say Thank God for Arkansas anymore.

 

Never let the facts get in the way of a good story.

 

Yea, I mentioned this a page ago. As usual, no one is interested in reality.

 

But we still cling like grim death to the idea that we are somehow above the citizen journalists/rumormongers we mock.

 

I've thought a lot about the free speech issue in this case, and I'm really wondering if it is free speech anymore. How close are these guys to shouting fire in a crowded theater?

Someone used the word incite before, and I think that's the right word. It's not picketing, it's inciting.

 

The idea behind restricting speech for incitement is that you have to set up clear, narrowly tailored boundaries. You can't just say "don't do that, that's incitement," you have to put up strict, clearly defined rules. And most states have done that. They are generally prevented from picketing within a certain number of feet (300?) of the funeral.

Wherever you draw the line to prevent incitement and still respect free speech, these guys will retreat to just on the legal side of the line while still being as annoying as possible.

 

You can't picket in a funeral home or within a football field of a gravesite service.

You can shout fire 300 feet away from the theater.

Seems like reasonable boundaries.