Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Canada Denies Entry to Phelps

Cananda is no place for hate, proving to me more and more each day that Canadians seem to understand the spirit of living democratically as equals better than Americans. I've never felt wrong in protecting those who need protection, especially from haters like Fred Phelps. The two boys in the picture shown below have the right idea of just how serious people like Phelps should be taken.

From Advocate.com

The Canadian government has notified border patrol guards to prevent extremist antigay church leader Fred Phelps from entering the country, the Canadian Press reported Friday. Phelps, leader of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., was scheduled to take church members to Winnipeg to protest a funeral for a man who was killed by a fellow passenger on a Greyhound bus. The cause of death, Phelps says, was God's response to Canada's laws allowing abortion and gay marriage.

According to the report, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day alerted border patrol about people with signs and pamphlets that fit the church's hateful messages, urging them to keep them out of the country. A group of church members was stopped at the border on Tuesday and turned away.

Shirley Phelps-Roper, Phelps's daughter, said that a smaller group of protesters will cross into Canada at a different point of entry.

"They’ll have to strip-search everyone who crosses that border, or they won’t know who we are," she told the Canadian Press. "They’ll have to see the WBC tattoo on our butts."

Tim McLean, 22, was on the bus bound for Winnipeg when he was stabbed and decapitated by a man in the seat next to him on July 30. Vince Weiguang Li, 40, has been charged with second-degree murder.

The church is known for protesting funerals of fallen U.S. soldiers and those lost to HIV/AIDS as a means to disseminate its belief that God hates gays.


As anybody knows there are limits to the right of free speech. We do not, for example have the right to say in a crowded theater, "Fire! Fire! Everybody run for your lives!". In fact we are held by law not to incite riots in any way shape or form. Stare Decisis dictates that first Amendment rights may be limited on the basis of "time, place, and manner." If any of the three creates "injury" then the first amendment right does not apply and must not be allowed or "mitigated".

Clearly as the link provided below details, Phelps has had his day in court and been found to cause injury. Now that this precedent has been set all the Canadian officials have to do is look at his clan's rap sheet (or simply surf the internet for godhatesfags.com) and say, "No thank you!". Canada is well within both it's rights and our own laws to deny Phelp's hate group access to treat Canadians the way we have allowed them to treat Americans.

John here on LLL has covered a story about the Limits of Free Speech which people may want to re-read.

For further reading:

Helping Spread the Word of Rev. Phelps
Phelps loses civil suit
Phelp's Daughter Raving on Video

Leviticus 19:18 "You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the LORD."

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sometimes we legitimize these people because they can put on a good show. It's a shame we have to give these people attention, but we have to know who they are too.

Quriltai said...

Oh...Fred Phelps. I was wondering what Canada would have against the most successful Olympic athlete ever...this makes more sense.

Mind you, Stephen Harper is anything but a friend of free speech in Canada.

John said...

Haha, quriltai, I was thinking the same thing.

I also think the other Phelps is a hunk.