I don't need to tell you about Westboro Baptist Church, but in case you live under a rock, go to Wikipedia(I won't link you to their website because it may give your computer something nasty).
All good people find WBC horrific and objectionable; at every WBC demonstration, throngs of counter-demonstrators sing "Give Peace a Chance" while waving clever signs. I know how good it feels, I've been there.
It's in our nature to fight the hateful WBC morans; their practice of "protesting" high-profile funerals in the most heinous ways demands a righteous response.
Maybe the best thing we can do is just stop paying attention to them.
WBC sent out a press release that they intended to invade the funeral for Elizabeth Edwards, to rally against her for issues relating to her personal life they deemed offensive. As it turned out, the five idiots who showed up were kept blocks away and left quickly. But why did anyone give credence to what a little bunch of kooks says?
We're generating incredible coverage in the media and innumerable blogs, as outrage pours in from everywhere -- and probably just like WBC planned. This little group of teh stoopid -- you've got to give them credit for a fabulous publicity department.
We're proselytizing for them, too. Supposedly they've gained 5,000 new online members since their press release on Elizabeth Edwards was distributed.
We, and the media, need to ignore WBC as not newsworthy. WBC's press releases should go straight to the shredders, along with those of all the other cult kooks who may be doing something stoopid that day. We have to stop drooling every time they ring their bell.
The Edwards solution -- to keep those fools blocks away -- was a good one. It's been used on protesters lots of times, since it allows them their First Amendment rights but doesn't allow those rights to impose on the rights of others. [This has been used to bad purposes, I know, but since it's already being used for political purposes, why not make it applicable here?]
When they don't have a high-profile funeral to glom onto, they target schools and religious centers with their preachy damnations. During the slow funeral season last year, my daughter's high school was targeted. Local news was saturated with their threat, But within 15 minutes of facing 400 Love and Tolerance demonstrators, WBC tucked tail and ran. After lathering everyone up with a press release, WBC's "demonstration" was only newsworthy beforehand; that they folded so quickly was boring, not worth covering. In our case, the only media coverage of the end of the event came from the high school newspaper and blogs.
Organizations like the Catholic League declare that saying "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas" is particularly more heinous because it dirties their Christmas season. Certainly the behavior of the WSB so close to Christmas should offend them as anti-Christian, too.
So let's declare a war on stupidity, stop getting riled up, and ignore WBC, rather than making it big news whenever that handful of simpletons decides to show up somewhere.
Update:
I'd like to highlight a comment made below by PvtJarHead, in response to those who want to attack the Phelps Family Cult:
Wrong answer....
They fund themselves by suing people for infringing their 1st Amendment rights like that.