I think folks are getting so used to the WBC that they’re going back to their roots, the early 90’s.
Back then they were shocking, and kept ramping it up as each level got tame. Then they got into the funeral picketing business.
But gradually they just started standing there with their signs, being quiet. They used to sing, should vulgar insults, and so on.
I live in Topeka, the home of the WBC. I was on many a counter picket line, and once heard Fred tell a cop we should be arrested for disturbinb the peace. Our offense? We laughed loudly and flipped our hair at him when we were told we were “crop headed whores” The WBC women all have long hair because, according to them, short hair on women is unBiblical.
Oh, and one Pentecost Sunday I was outside a church, with a little old lady going in. She had one of those four pronged canes, and was wearing a bright red skirt(it’s the festival color for Pentecost) One young Phelps man yelled at her “You’re wearing that skirt to hide the blood pouring from your rectum!”
Two weeks ago, Sunday August 2, they were outside my own church, across the street, the whole crew. And they were yelling and being vulgar again, with a sign saying “Your pastor is a whore!” That’s a surprise to the dean I’ll bet, and his wife too!
With this Jew sign they’re going someplace new. In the early 90’s it was hard to get support against him, because I think folks thought that would mark them as gay. And they never had “Blacks are worthy of death” signs. As an earlier poster in this thread, nobody was insulted who might fight back. (Although they never did go back to Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, after the Hispanics ran them