Essays

Funeral Protesting

       Westboro Baptist Church has picketed and protested in all 50 states and sometimes pickets up to 6 times a day (Mann). The church started out protesting funerals of AIDS victims but later switched to military funerals, presumably to gain more attention. All though controversial, states are beginning to put laws and bills into place to limit protests such as these. Protesting funerals, military or just a normal funeral, should be banned because it's disrespectful to families and friends, violates privacy, and causes distress.
      Protesting military funerals is disrespectful to families and friends of the victim who are trying to mourn for a lost friend and loved one. "... from shouting the message of hateful nonsense they've been bringing to military funerals across the country: that American troops' deaths in Iraq are God's punishment for the nation's tolerance of homosexuals." (Bauder) It's disrespectful to the families of the fallen to invade on their private matter to protest something that the nation decided on and that they had no control over. "... groups of patriotic motorcycle riders have taken to shadowing Phelps and his followers, inserting themselves between the "God hates fags" sign-wavers and the mourners so the latter won't have to look at the former." (Bauder) While the motorcyclists mean well they are also adding to the disruption of the ceremony the protesters originally began. This can also add to the disruption of privacy mourning families are entitled to.
        Families mourning deserve their privacy and protesting violates the mourner's right to have a peaceful service. As St. Charles chairmen Joe Brazil says," Families deserve privacy and the right to grieve the loss of their loved one without having hateful and disrespectful protest activities nearby." (Wing) When protesters disrupt funerals it's making it more difficult for grieving families to have a peaceful ceremony and properly say goodbye. "House Bill 484 doesn't ban speech, rude or otherwise, but it sets up reasonable boundaries for groups that haven't been reasonable on their own." (Bauder) House Bill 484 and the boundaries it entails helps to protect family's privacy by constricting protests and putting limits on them. Without the limits placed on these protests it can cause great distress and it's something that makes an already terrible day even worse.
     A funeral is already a very stressful situation for people to deal with and protests at events such as these adds unnecessary distress to funeral goers. "It also could be dangerous. In the emotionally charged atmosphere of a funeral, rhetoric such as the Phelps family's could spark violence." (Bauder) People tend to get offended easier when their angry and sad and someone who just lost a close one could easily get distressed by protests and start a fight, physical or verbal. "Limiting the time and place of protests doesn't violate the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech. Often, such limitations are necessary to ensure public safety." (Bauder) Sometimes in order to prevent further distress to families there are certain limitations that may need to be put into place. Most people believe that laws should be put into place to limit protests at military funerals but some would disagree.
      Others would argue that putting laws on military funeral protests limits the free speech promised by the First Amendment and that it's the people's right to protest. As stated in the article "Protests at Funerals Should Not Be Banned" "...by larding the list of legally proscribed behavior, we run the risk of infantilizing the entire populace, of convincing ourselves that the state is responsible for shielding us from any and all unpleasantness." (Cottle) To further elaborate on this quote, people believe that if the government restricts every little thing that we aren't particularly fond of then we will lose the ability to stand up for ourselves and rely too heavily on our government and legal system. For this reason and many others people do not want laws banning this because it would limit our freedom of speech and it goes against the first amendment. On the other hand, already distressed families are getting their privacy violated by hateful protesters trying to prove a message that may not even relate to the deceased being targeted.
​        Funerals are supposed to be a private event for family members and friends to grieve and mourn for a lost one, not for protesters to spew hateful nonsense that causes even more unwanted distress. Protesting funerals should be banned or at least limited in order to prevent being disrespectful to families and friends, violate the privacy their entitled to, and cause unneeded distress to the families. People need to stand up and try to stop or block protesters peacefully without causing disruption to the family or adding to the disruption.
​








Works Cited

Cottle, Michelle. "Protests at Funerals Should Not Be Banned." Censorship. Ed. Julia Bauder.
Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2007. Current Controversies. Rpt. from "Grave Danger." The
New Republic Online. 2006. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 24 Sept. 2015.
Mann, Fred. "Theology Thursdays: Road to Westboro- What Led Fred Phelps to His Beliefs and
Actions?" :: BlackElectorate.com ::. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Nov. 2016.
"Protests at Funerals Should Be Banned." Censorship. Ed. Julia Bauder. Detroit: Greenhaven
Press, 2007. Current Controversies. Rpt. from "Defending Decency: Bill Would Set
Reasonable Restraints on Protests at Funerals, Maintaining Decorum." Columbus Dispatch 30 May 2006. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web. 24 Sept. 2015.
Wing, Nick. "Westboro Baptist Church Smacked Down By Federal Judge In Lawsuit Against
Missouri County." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, n.d. Web. 15 Nov.
2016.