Anti-Gay Activist Exposed Before the World

Thank heavens for the media and freedom of speech.

In 1954 Attorney Fred Phelps, who had grown up in Mississippi and been exposed to racial hatred and segregation, moved to Topeka. This was the year that segregation was legally banned in public schools.

Discrimination suits abounded and Phelps made his services available where many other lawyers didn't dare. He lost very few cases, made a fortune and many enemies. In 1979 he was disbarred for badgering a witness. His daughter believes the real reason was that he defended blacks so successfully.

Fast forward to 1998, and Attorney Phelps, now the Rev. Phelps with his own church in Topeka, is picketing a gay Wyoming college student's funeral. Phelps' signs say the student is rotting in hell.

Eight years later his campaigning has reached new heights at the funeral of an allegedly gay Marine who has been killed in Iraq. Phelps shouts that God loves dead soldiers. He is subsequently sued and the family is awarded $5.9 million altogether. The verdict is reversed on appeal, but that reversal is appealed as well.

A year later, the BBC does a documentary reflecting America's disgust at the man and his large family who mostly comprise his church. Phelps, now a virulent anti-gay activist, believes that God hates homosexuals and punishes them with death. He and his family-church have added anti-Semitism to the mix, and are planning protests in Atlanta Georgia, despite that his case before the US Supreme Court is pending.

Phelps' daughter believes he is a good man. His estranged son differs, though. He says that his father was always a bigot and a racist who insulted blacks behind their backs. Regardless of which of his children has the clearer view, what turned Phelps from serving a noble cause to promoting such an ignoble one?

The capacity for hate and self-justification has always been a part of the human dynamic, and has always appalled those who live their lives with integrity and have respect for their fellow humans. Unfortunately the hate-ful have always been loudest.

Now the media's power is added to the mix. It gives these neurotics a huge platform, and in principle allows them to reach and convert innocent, naive and vulnerable people very easily. But on the other hand, it is like a very strong magnifying glass. Everything is exposed to the public. Maybe people like Hitler got away with what they did because not enough people around the world saw them in their outrageous posturing.

That is not the case today, as the Rev. Phelps is finding out to his cost. Wherever he goes, no matter how much noise he makes, more and more people despise him. He may think he is leading a crusade, but the world is getting a very different picture of him than the one he has of himself.

Once upon a time a man like this could go on a mission and succeed in "erasing" 6 million people ( I use the term as a reflection of Hitler). That will never happen here. Thank heavens for the media.