The Westboro Baptist Church Comes to Brooklyn

This morning Rob and I left the house early to attend a counter-protest of the Westboro Baptist Church (you know them better as the “God Hates Fags” people, led by Fred Phelps). They were protesting at the Jewish temple a few blocks away, and we joined the throngs of Park Slopers just as disgusted with their message as we were. They were there to protest the Bar Mitzvahing of Jewish children, I think, but then there was something else about eating babies with a sign that said “bitch burger”…? (that video was shot at this morning’s protest) I couldn’t tell. Basically they take various lines from the Christian Bible that promote hatred and use it to protest everyone that isn’t them.

The rabbi came out with his shofar under his arm, which made me really happy. He blew that a few times, led everyone in a “nana nana boo boo” finger waving, ala Groucho Marx, and then everyone sang Oseh Shalom, followed by Hava Nagilla. If there is a hora, I WILL BE THERE and Fucked in Park Slope managed to snap a photo of me and Rob dancing with everyone. Woo!

I’d never seen them up close before, so I was pretty intrigued. As a completely non-religious person, watching people get lathered up about what deities think or don’t think is pretty amusing, but I did go to stand in solidarity with our Jewish neighbors. I didn’t bother yelling back at them, either. There was no point; it felt effective to just stand around meeting neighbors and being one of many to outnumber them. In this case, the best defense was just showing up. And dancing.

photo used via CC license, from flickr user Aviloud