This is a re-post of my MSIG ARMY blog from Monday April 17, 2006.
When a 24 year old Marine dies in Iraq and the Chicago Sun-Times runs an article about people who will go to the funeral waving signs like "Thank God For Dead Soldiers," it is easy to imagine something about ghoulish punk rockers finally going too far beyond redemption. But the people who decided to publicly scorn the Christian burial of John Philip Martini are not punkers, hippies, nor communists. While it may sound like a story from the satirical Landover Baptist Church, it is real people who actually pass themselves off as United States citizens from Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, Kansas that decided to make the journey to South Holland to disrespect the memory of a fallen Marine and issue the following statement: "He died in shame, not honor--- for a fag nation cursed by God." Always ready to throw the first stone, this is following the logic of a previously offered argument from the American Taliban that God lifted his shield of protection from America because we aren't doing enough to persecute gays. Enslaving Africans and wiping out Native Americans didn't make a stain upon our grace, apparently, but letting gay people out of the closet is a deal breaker. That is why the funeral protesters from Westboro Baptist plan to discredit the Baptist Church and free expression together by waving signs and shouting slogans at the mourners. Further twisting the dying myth over who is the backbone in this nation and who is the threat to society, a motorcycle club---the Patriot Guard Riders---are offering comfort to the mourners by volunteering as a human buffer between them and the Taliban wannabe fuckos. The Illinois Legislature is considering a measure called the Let Them Rest In Peace Bill. It would prohibit disruptive protests within 200 feet of funerals. The W.B.'s, are citing the US Constitution to protest the bill despite their apparent contempt for the secular document (which, among other things, was intended to prevent our nation from suffering the bloody religious wars drenching Europe in centuries prior to the Revolution). I have heard that Heaven's Streets are guarded by the United States Marines and that does not bode well for these holy rollers. Perhaps these are just bored assholes who don't have the brains to find anything better to do back in Topeka. Maybe someday they will receive G-d's mercy, the kind of tender mercy that characterizes other Christians, as well as the righteous among Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims, Pagans, Jews, and Atheists... the tender mercy they cannot find in their own hearts, the kind that is in ever-shrinking supply in my own. Whatever eternal judgment awaits their sin of vanity, I can only hope that drunk, obnoxious lesbians play Bikini Kill at their funerals and gay men have anal sex on their graves.