Viewpoint: U.S. must turn from sexual immorality to avoid suffering God's Wrath

The second sentence of your above remark ("Judging on its own terms...") is appallingly un-self-aware. Even worse than merely starting with what you want to believe and then seeing it reflected in the mirror scripture, because there's a no true Scotsman fallacy thrown in. You've been entrapped by an even worse conceptual tarpit than I'd realized. My sympathies.

Your insults reveal that you have run out of logical bullets. Are you a troll, or is it just this particular topic that brings this out in you?

There's no troll blood in my family, nor have I insulted you. It's a pretty standard defense mechanism of these sorts of closed meme-sets, that when the meme-set detects a possible threat, it causes its victims to think they are being insulted.

I'll accept that if you give me a straight answer to these questions:

(1) Do you agree that WBC's message is a call to turn away from queer sex combined with a warning that bad things will happen if we do not? If no, what do you say their message is?

(2) Do you agree with the statement, "I disagree with what he says, but I will defend his right to say it." IOW, do you share my commitment to the freedom to speak and to hear all that would be spoken? Please answer this both in the general case and as applied to WBC.

(3) Are you willing to explore what you and I have in common in terms of world view, values, and beliefs, with the goal of laying a foundation for friendship and friendly debate? (Just a "yes" or "no" will do.)

You have raised several interesting points that I have felt would be off topic for us to explore here. If we can establish some common ground, it might be possible to enjoy doing that privately or on another thread.

The WBC's message is that if you are not a part of our church, god hates you and you are going to hell. The homosexual thing on their part is because it gets noticed. They've acually made statements to this effect more than once. They just another one of those cultish hate groups that spring up every once and awhile, they'll die off soon enough as members leave.

I do defend their right to say whatever they want, however if they also have the right to take the consequences of their words. Other people can say what they want as well, are you going to breach their rights to protect the WBC? No laws ban them from protesting, the only backlash is social. If they are going to continue to piss people off, then they can deal whith those people who have lost patience.

Thanks. I'd have to go back to the factual narratives in Snyder v. Phelps (2011) to evaluate your claim. If you're right, then they are spending a lot of money to gain a handful more attendees at their services in Westboro. And if they really are motivated by hate, you are surely correct that any true Christian will stop attending their services. ("Hate the sin, not the sinner.")

Your last point is where the role of the People's Law is critical. Speakers must not be subjected to violence or to any unlawful disruption of their speech. (See, for example, California Penal Code 403 as interpreted in Kay (1970).) The appropriate response during a speech event is heckler speech, which is also protected. A well planned picket or other heckling action can co-opt the event and capture media attention for the opposing view. Rather than silencing web sites, I would like to see pro-queer Anonymous activists putting together a brilliantly creative and effective, and entirely legal, heckle response to WBC.