Westboro Baptist Church founder Fred Phelps is dead

The thing is, how many fundamentalist Christians actually believed what he said? I imagine quite a lot. Was he simply the most vocal, outspoken, recognizable face of a huge segment of society? Fundamentalist Christianity has a very large following in the U.S, and has made many in-roads into secular society. These dangerous lunatics are beginning to hold more and more sway in society.

Read on:

http://www.democracynow.org/2007/2/19/chris_hedges_on_american_fascists_the

...A new book by Chris Hedges called "American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America" investigates the highly organized and well-funded "dominionist movement." The book investigates their agenda, examines the movement’s origins and motivations and uncovers its ideological underpinnings. "American Fascists" argues that dominionism seeks absolute power in a Christian state. According to Hedges, the movement bears a strong resemblance to the young fascist movements in Italy and Germany in the 1920s and ’30s.

Chris Hedges: This is a new movement, as embodied by people like James Dobson or Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell, who call for the creation of a Christian state, who talk about attaining secular power. And they are more properly called dominionists or Christian reconstructionists, although it’s not a widespread term, but they’re certainly not traditional fundamentalists and not traditional evangelicals. They fused the language and iconography of the Christian religion with the worst forms of American nationalism and then created this sort of radical mutation, which has built alliances with powerful rightwing interests, including corporate interests, and made tremendous inroads over the last two decades into the corridors of power.

...AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to Chris Hedges. His latest book called American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America. We were just talking about Pat Robertson. I wanted to go back to that famous quote of his. This had to do with foreign policy and the Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

...CHRIS HEDGES: That’s a deeply Christian message, calling for assassination. You know, I covered the war in Central America, and Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell came down to support the murderous rampages of Rios Montt in Guatemala, the military dictatorship that were running death squads that were killing 800 to 1,000 people a month in El Salvador, and, of course, the Contras, whose main contribution in Nicaragua was walking into towns drunk out of their mind, raping the women and killing the men and burning the villages. And they describe these battles as essentially a war against Satan, against Satanic forces, godless communism that had to be defeated. There are no international boundaries in Satan’s kingdom, if you look at it from their ideology. I think that the kinds of the wholehearted support for genocidal killers in Central America, which Pat Robertson was one of the stalwarts, is a tip-off as to, you know, without legal restraints, what they would like to do within our own borders.

And I think that the quote or the clip that you just played is a perfect illustration of how dark the intentions of this movement is and how, if we don’t begin to stand up and fight back, if we believe that these people can be domesticated and brought into the political arena where they will act responsibly, we’re very, very naive. And we should all sit down, and as unpalatable as it is, and listen to Christian — so-called Christian radio and television to see the kinds of messages of hate and exclusion that they are spewing out over the airwaves.

AMY GOODMAN: The quote of Jerry Falwell right after September 11th that became quite famous: "I really believe that the pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America, I point the finger in their face and say, 'You helped this happen.'" He was speaking on September 13, 2001, on Pat Robertson’s 700 Club program.

CHRIS HEDGES: That’s right. And, you know, this is — I mean, essentially, when you follow the logical conclusion of the ideology they preach, there really are only two options for people who do not submit to their authority. And it’s about submission, because these people claim to speak for God and not only understand the will of God, but be able to carry it out. Either you convert, or you’re exterminated. That’s what the obsession with the End Times with the Rapture, which, by the way, is not in the Bible, is about. It is about instilling — it’s, of course, a fear-based movement, and it’s about saying, ultimately, if you do not give up control to us, you will be physically eradicated by a vengeful God. And that lust for violence, I think that sort of — you know, the notion, that final aesthetic being violence is very common to totalitarian movements, the belief that massive catastrophic violence can be used as a cleansing agent to purge the world. And that’s, you know, something that this movement bears in common with other despotic and frightening radical movements that we’ve seen over the past — throughout the past century.

...CHRIS HEDGES: Well, that’s a really important point, because none of these movements can take power unless there is a period of prolonged instability or a crisis. They can make creeping gains, and they have made tremendous gains, including taking hundreds of millions of dollars of American taxpayer money through the faith-based initiative program. But I think, as weak as our democracy is, we can hold them off, unless we enter a period of instability.

AMY GOODMAN: Christian Zionist Movement, how does it fit into this?

CHRIS HEDGES: Well, the relationship between this radical movement and the radical right in Israel is one that really brings together Messianic Jews and Messianic Christians who believe that they have been given a divine or a moral right to control one-fifth of the world’s population who are Muslim. It’s a really repugnant ideology. The radical Christian right in this country is deeply anti-Semitic. I mean, look at what they — you know, when the end times come, except for this 144,000 Jews who flee to Petra and are converted — I think this was a creation of Tim LaHaye — Jews will be destroyed, along with all other nonbelievers, including people like myself who are nominal Christians, in their eyes. You know, there is no respect for Judaism in and of itself. It’s an abstraction. It’s, you know, Jews have to control Israel, because that is one more step towards Armageddon. And I find that alliance strange and very shortsighted on the part of many rightwing Israelis and rightwing Jews in the United States.

...CHRIS HEDGES: And there’s a bill now in the Texas state legislature that will abolish all mention of evolution in school textbooks and make Bible study mandatory in public schools. And the role of creationism is extremely important in this movement. It’s not just wacky pseudoscience. It is really a war against truth. It is not about presenting an alternative. It’s about saying facts are interchangeable with opinions, that lies are true, that we can believe whatever we want. And once they successfully elevate creationism, which, of course, is a myth — I mean, teaching creation out of the Book of Genesis is an absurdity. The writers of the Book of Genesis thought the earth was flat with rivers of above and below us. But what it does is destroy the possibility or sanctity of honest, dispassionate, intellectual and scientific inquiry. And when they do that, they have made a huge step towards creating a totalitarian state.

wolfamongwolves said:

Great article, Byrnzie, and I tend to agree too. It's also the attitude most gay people I know seem to be adopting. Just a pathetic, hate-filled man more deserving of pity than opprobrium. What he deserves is not to have his death celebrated, but to simply be forgotten.

Couldn't agree more. He thrived on seeking attention desperately. The greatest kick in the face would be a quiet and forgetful fate. (Don't have time to read the link, I will later).

Continuing to be cynical and filled with hate towards a guy who thrived on negative attention? Exactly what he's looking for, in life and I wouldn't doubt, in death.

Energy is everywhere. And energy concentrated with negativity toward never being forgotten is still negative energy that still serves him and still has an effect on those who are filled with said energy… in a completely unhealthy way. Let it go.