When I was a kid, one of the best of all come-backs was to say ‘Well, it’s a free country.’ It sounds sort of wimpy now but it carried some clout as a kid to utter those words, at least in kid-dom. It packed some clout if for no other reason, there really was no good come back. It also made it incumbent upon the challenger to stop you from whatever it was you were doing. Most people didn’t want to elevate the issue to the physical level. Playground 101.
Reading the New York Times, In Topeka, the Price of Free Speech made me think of this taunt many decades later. It’s a free country. The Phelps family aka Westboro Baptist Church, of military funeral harassment fame, are pushing this free country crap to a new limit. The Phelps, who comprise most of Westboro Baptist Church, have a home base in Topeka, Kansas. They invade parks, cities, burial grounds, etc with their horrible message that God is doling out his wrath because America somehow accepts homosexuality. Their favorite target is military funerals. The mayor of Topeka, William W. Bunten, has a few remarks on the subject of this unholy alliance of right wing extremists:
“They believe free speech tops everything,” said Mayor William W. Bunten, sitting at his desk in City Hall last week. “We do with some exceptions, and one of them would be taking signs and standing outside a funeral home and associating someone’s death with God’s hate for homosexuality. I believe it should be banned. I see it as bullying.”
