phelps &westboro baptist church.

[Mike70]

It is the proper way to dispose of old flags in a flag retirement ceremony. you can burn a flag the right way but you have to cut the union out of it and burn the two pieces. as for assholes who burn flags as some sort of shitty political "protest": flag burners are ALL scum. every single one of them without a single fucking exception. first off, they ought to be damned ashamed of themselves for acting like fools in public. second, they might as well throw themselves in the fire (if they are americans). i hope they all land in the circle of hell that hands out oozing genital warts for eternity.

[Publius]

http://www.whtm.com/news/stories/0310/721261.html This is going to the Supreme Court. The SC doesn't take many cases, so this means they're going to send a message with this one. It's hard to predict how SCOTUS will come down on this one. They took it because it raises interesting legal issues regarding the relationship between constitutional rights and lawsuits between private parties. Constitutional rights are normally seen as protecting against government action not private action (that's the "state action doctrine"). So, for example, the government could not put you in jail for saying you hate (insert ethnic slur here), but your boss could fire you for it. But there are some cases saying that the state action doctrine can be implicated in a dispute between private parties when a court is asked to award damages against one party for action that would be constitutionally protected if the government tried to restrict it directly. The textbook case on this is Shelley v. Kraemer, which dealt with racially restrictive covenants in private housing. A racially restrictive covenant is a provision in the deed of a house saying that the house can only be sold to members of certain ethnic groups or cannot be sold to members of certain ethnic groups. The traditional view was that these covenants were private contract matters, and were therefore legal because no state action was involved (although if the state tried to pass a law with the same content as the covenant it would violate the 14th Amendment). But in Shelley v. Kraemer, SCOTUS held that if you try to go to court to enforce a racially restrictive covenant, the enforcement itself is state action that violates the 14th Amendment. So the bottom line is that you can have all the racially restrictive covenants you want (at least as a constitutional matter), but the courts will just ignore you if you try to legally enforce them. Here, Snyder (the Marine's father) sued Phelps for intentional infliction of emotional distress. Legal scholars pretty much agree that the government could not outlaw the statements that are the basis of the lawsuit. So the question is whether Snyder can ask a court to make Phelps pay him damages for those statements without violating the state action doctrine.

[Danny]

you can burn a flag the right way but you have to cut the union out of it and burn the two pieces. as for assholes who burn flags as some sort of shitty political "protest": flag burners are ALL scum. every single one of them without a single fucking exception. first off, they ought to be damned ashamed of themselves for acting like fools in public. second, they might as well throw themselves in the fire (if they are americans). i hope they all land in the circle of hell that hands out oozing genital warts for eternity. Its really fascinating that this a really american centric outlook that, from outside is madness bordering on sparta. Guess it just shows, no matter how similar out cultures are theres some major differences. The union jack has always been one thing for the english. We use it to announce we ave claimed something for ourselves, a fight, a sporting event, land. its just the traditional "PWNED!" whereas Americans seem to see it as something more akin to a religious reliquary. Like i said, im seeing it from an outside perspective and its genuinely bizaare, not in a bad way, its just like nothing i can compare outside of religious behavior. i genuinely cant think of another comparison. Even medieval sovereignty did not garner such a severe blind tenacity in an object which you imbue with what you wish but is just colored cloth. Not even a flag of historical significance, then i could understand, but any flag? thats something very american and very alien to most people in the uk. Maybe it has something to do with the nature of americas foundations in history? you always hear us troops on about fighting for the red white and blue, and the british on about fighting for the crown, queen and country. Maybe its a lack of royalty thing? something about the more isolationist nature that carried over form frontier times.

[SymphonicX]

Its really fascinating that this a really american centric outlook that, from outside is madness bordering on sparta. Guess it just shows, no matter how similar out cultures are theres some major differences. The union jack has always been one thing for the english. We use it to announce we ave claimed something for ourselves, a fight, a sporting event, land. its just the traditional "PWNED!" whereas Americans seem to see it as something more akin to a religious reliquary. Like i said, im seeing it from an outside perspective and its genuinely bizaare, not in a bad way, its just like nothing i can compare outside of religious behavior. i genuinely cant think of another comparison. Even medieval sovereignty did not garner such a severe blind tenacity in an object which you imbue with what you wish but is just colored cloth. Not even a flag of historical significance, then i could understand, but any flag? thats something very american and very alien to most people in the uk. Maybe it has something to do with the nature of americas foundations in history? you always hear us troops on about fighting for the red white and blue, and the british on about fighting for the crown, queen and country. Maybe its a lack of royalty thing? something about the more isolationist nature that carried over form frontier times. Yeah I'm with you on that one, it'll never make sense to me. But then nationalism or patriotism doesn't make sense to me at all...and that's something both the UK and US and basically every other country in the world hold close to them. Over the last decade, since 9/11, I've grown weary of the use of nationalism and patriotism as a means to separate ourselves from each other - it seems to have gotten to the level of one side beating their chest about who's best, and in response the other side beats their chests louder and more violently to prove the point over and over. The whole thing falls apart when you realise that if there was an alien attack, all those things would be forgotten and we'd all stand there beating our chests at the aliens proclaiming that we're better than them....and we would be, who are they to come here to propogate our land because their's is dying? Pah.

[Danny]

Oiy aint avvin mah lund taykin by sam fookin praown!

[SymphonicX]

Exactly! And very poignant how the whole of that movie was a blatant metaphor for the white/black divide in South Africa...

[EvilNed]

If someone burns a flag, I really don't care as long as their argument is good enough.

[JDFP]

Its really fascinating that this a really american centric outlook that, from outside is madness bordering on sparta. Guess it just shows, no matter how similar out cultures are theres some major differences. The union jack has always been one thing for the english. We use it to announce we ave claimed something for ourselves, a fight, a sporting event, land. its just the traditional "PWNED!" whereas Americans seem to see it as something more akin to a religious reliquary. Like i said, im seeing it from an outside perspective and its genuinely bizaare, not in a bad way, its just like nothing i can compare outside of religious behavior. i genuinely cant think of another comparison. Even medieval sovereignty did not garner such a severe blind tenacity in an object which you imbue with what you wish but is just colored cloth. Not even a flag of historical significance, then i could understand, but any flag? thats something very american and very alien to most people in the uk. Maybe it has something to do with the nature of americas foundations in history? you always hear us troops on about fighting for the red white and blue, and the british on about fighting for the crown, queen and country. Maybe its a lack of royalty thing? something about the more isolationist nature that carried over form frontier times. Old Stars and Stripes is a hell of alot more than just "dyed cloth" to the majority of Americans. I can understand that you are saying about the differences in cultures though, your post is actually really interesting and brings out some good points. I think the easiest way to try to compare Stars and Stripes to anything else out there is to look at the crucifix. To the outsider the crucifix is just wood/metal put together in a specific shape, but to a Christian the crucifix is something much more profound and meaningful as a symbol than wood/metal. Symbols have meaning, and some symbols have profound meaning to them -- such as the Stars and Stripes to most Americans. What our flag represents as a symbol is liberty, those self-evident truths of each and every person, a symbolic gesture of those inalienable rights to each individual. It's also a symbol of all the brave men and women who have given their lives in combat and in cause for that dear lady Stars and Stripes to continue flying high for freedom, justice, and liberty. The Stars and Stripes is not the only flag that emits this type of "symbolic power" though -- the Nazi swatstika and the Russian red sickle/hammer are both also extremely powerful symbols with great meaning to them. I, like Mike, take it extremely personally when I see someone disrespecting the flag in any way. The people that have given their lives to ensure we have the right for her to fly freely deserve better. Everything good our country represents deserves better. If I saw someone around me doing this I would become extremely upset and, at the least, I would make my feelings known to said individual and it probably would not end well for either myself (if there are a group of them) or for them if it's just one or two people. You don't disrespect the Stars and Stripes -- you just don't do it. j.p.

[AcesandEights]

Very good point, Hellsing. The flag, along with several other iconic pieces, have become the vestments of a civil religion in the U.S. It's not too surprising given the origin of the country and how it differs from other, older nations whose source of national bonds were often a shared culture, hereditary and racial bonds that go back for untold generations. Along with people just looking for a new start, there were religious dissenters (some zealots) who came here, some of them progressive ‘levelers’ and others whose combined vision, often re-expressed and reinforced throughout the difficult times of the nation’s history, lent an air of purpose and moral certitude to the country. This is the myth and truth of American Exceptionalism. It wasn’t always a foregone conclusion, this idea of wrapping the flag about the country and putting it so close to the forefront of the citizen’s ideals, and the idea that the Union was being put ahead or over God was a rallying cry sometimes used during the Civil War. But it is part of the glue that binds the country, as dangerous as it is powerful. In any event, while I’ve never been too bothered by the idea of burning a flag and don’t see it as something worth outlawing, I do find it insulting and distasteful. It’s just unnecessary for a citizen to burn it in protest, no matter how you look at it. I’m pretty leery of the idea that a soldier dies for a flag, but it is a symbol of what some soldiers have died for and represents the right and wrong of the country and--more to the point--what the country means to each individual citizen, what it is, what it can and should be.

[darth los]

burning an easily replaceable flag is nothing compared to showing up at a soldiers funeral and marching around proclaiming he's a faggot whos burning in hell. You can argue good ol' boy sacrilege of a flag if you choose, but it is just a material dyed a certain colour, you imbibe it with whatever meanings you wish. if its burned its insulting, but not the end of the world. You only bury your loved ones once. would you rather it be this way you say goodbye if it saved a precious flag? Isn't it hilarious how touching freedom of speech/expression is off limits until it's something that YOU don't like? Gotta love it.

[krakenslayer]

Isn't it hilarious how touching freedom of speech/expression is off limits until it's something that YOU don't like? Gotta love it. There is free speech and there is slander. There is also harassment and invasion of privacy. I agree that these people should be allowed to protest, although I disagree with them obviously, but disrupting a funeral is cruel on an individual, personal level.

[Danny]

There is free speech and there is slander. There is also harassment and invasion of privacy. I agree that these people should be allowed to protest, although I disagree with them obviously, but disrupting a funeral is cruel on an individual, personal level. ditto, that and its not self expression, these people are the indoctrinated sheep with one specific goal yelling abuse nothing more. They are warped and molded by papa phelps into telling people there children, parents and friends are all scum that are going to burn forever. There is no self, barely any expression, certainly none of it truly there own.

[darth los]

There is free speech and there is slander. There is also harassment and invasion of privacy. Perfectly put as a matter of fact. I was struggling to come up with a reason why these people's freedom of speech should be curtailed and you put it into words perfectly. As always, another person's freedom stops where mine begins.

[BillyRay]

God Hates Fred Phelps.

[Danny]

God Hates Fred Phelps. Id say odds are good that if any religion gets it right, the god/s hate this guy. 'cept maybe cthulu, he seems like a dick.