Extreme prejudice

[CHIMO]

The flat plains and big skies of Kansas serve as a reassuring backdrop to America's emotional landscape. In the national mythology Kansas (the size of Austria; the population of Latvia) is not just any state but a cultural comfort blanket. Like motherhood, apple pie, little league and homecoming, it represents all that is steady, regular, wholesome and decent in America. The state song is Home on the Range. Kansas, writes Thomas Frank in What's the Matter With Kansas? is "where Dorothy wants to return where Superman grew up". When Frank's book came out in Britain its title had been translated to: What's the Matter with America? Kansas is the state of the nation.

In this mythic terrain Fred Phelps, of Topeka (pop 122,377), Kansas, fits in and stands out. He fits in because he is a homophobe who, like most of the country, including the Bush administration, uses the Bible as the source of his bigotry. He stands out because, unlike most of the country, he pursues his agenda with a vicious zeal and animus that not even the White House could match. When Mr Phelps attended the funeral of Matthew Shephard, a young man beaten to a pulp in a homophobic attack, or those of prominent HIV sufferers, he took his "God hates fags" picket signs with him.

Phelp's granddaughter, Jael, inherited his intolerance. "The proscribed punishment for homosexuality in the Bible is death," she told the New York Times last week. "They are worthy of death, and those people who condone that action are just as guilty." Last week, Jael Phelps stood for election against the city's first and only openly gay city councilwoman, Tiffany Muller, in a primary. She also lobbied to defeat a local ordinance making it illegal to discriminate against lesbians and gays who work for the city. She lost on both counts, coming a distant last in the primary while the ordnance was passed 53% to 47%.

Those who insist that one is worse than the other should remember that this is not a competition. Sadly, there is enough misery to go around. People like the Phelpses will make sure it stays that way. They don't need our help.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1432039,00.html

[bluestateguy]

1. Under the USA Patriot Act

The federal government would be legally allowed to haul these people away in the dead of night, throw them in jail incommunicado with no access to a lawyer and to declare the Westboro Baptist Church a "terrorist organization". It would be allowed.

[1monster]

2. "where Dorothy wants to return"

Dorothy was fool to leave
She could have stayed.
She had it right in her hand
She had it made.
She could have had it all for keeps
But was afraid.
She could have stayed.

Same old bluebird flying high
Over rainbows in the Kansas sky
My oh my
Oh why

All those memories
All because
There ain't no way to stand Kansas
When you've been to Oz...

(Dorothy as sung by Judy Collins in HARD TIMES FOR LOVERS)

[kineneb]

3. Now I understand why G.grandpa left Kansas

Well, at least one of the reasons. Our branch of the family left in 1908 in a covered wagon(too poor for train tickets), and never looked back. Small mind problem even back then. Sorry, Kansas, that you should have Mr. Phelps. Better luck later.