• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

Westboro Baptist Church Threatens To Picket Swartz's Funeral. Anonymous Takes Action.

Geoist

DP Veteran
Joined
Aug 14, 2012
Messages
34,914
Reaction score
26,666
Gender
Male
Political Leaning
Libertarian - Left
I don't support everything Anonymous does, but I give them kudos on this one:

Westboro Baptist Church Drops Aaron Swartz Funeral Protest After Anonymous Vows Action

After the tragic suicide of Reddit co-founder and Internet activist Aaron Swartz, hacktivist group Anonymous vowed to derail picketing efforts by the hate-mongering members of the Westboro Baptist Church, who threatened to protest Swartz's funeral on Tuesday. When members of Anonymous and supporters showed up to block the WBC's picket line, the quasi-religious group was nowhere to be seen.

Westboro Baptist Church on Sunday announced plans to protest Swarz's open funeral in a press release titled "GOD H8S Cyber Criminal THUGS."

"Cyber criminals are the latest face of this nation's and this world's raging at God and His Servants at WBC," reads the Westboro press release, via Twitter account @WBCSays. "Now the gloves are off, cyber rebels! ... We will picket the funeral, the LORD willing, so that in that Great Day of His Wrath, your blood is not on our hands."

A crowd showed up to the funeral home in Highland Park, Ill., on Tuesday, willing to stand in the way of Westboro members to prevent them from getting close to the procession, according to a tweet sent from Anon-affiliated account @Anon2World. According to a tweet from Anonymous mouthpiece account @YourAnonNews, the WBC's lawyer contacted police to say that WBC would not be attending the funeral.

Police comfirm #WBC's lawyer contacted them and said the would not be protesting #opvigil #AaronSwartz #YAN twitter.com/anon2world/sta…
— Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) January 15, 2013

On Monday, a video was uploaded to YouTube by user ChannelZeroYT11, an apparently Anonymous-controlled account, announcing that hacktivists would block any attempt by Westboro to picket Swartz's funeral.

"Before discussing the operation, there is something that needs to be said to Aaron's family and his friends: We're sorry," says the Anonymous statement (see in the video above). "It is likely that our continuous condemnation and attacks against this cult is the very reason Aaron is being targeted by them. We would do anything to stop them from attending Aaron's services. Aaron deserves peace and we will not allow this cult to overpower what should be the media's focus, the monsters at DOJ who ruthlessly targeted your son."

Swartz committed suicide in New York City on Jan. 11. In July 2011, the 26-year-old was charged with felony hacking. He was accused of stealing nearly 5 million academic articles from JSTOR, a popular online research outlet. He pled not guilty in September 2012 but was still facing a possible prison sentence, according to ZDNet.

This is not the first time Anonymous has pushed back against controversial protest attempts made by the WBC. In December, Anonymous revealed the personal information of various alleged WBC members and called for supporters to head to Connecticut to block WBC members from the funerals of the Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting victims, whom WBC targeted because Connecticut supports gay marriage.

Westboro Baptist Church Drops Aaron Swartz Funeral Protest After Anonymous Vows Action (VIDEO)
 
Re: Westboro Baptist Church Threatens To Picket Swartz's Funeral. Anonymous Takes Act

This may be wrong, but I can't wait for that old bastard that heads the WBC to die so I can go picket his funeral and proclaim his eternal hellfire.

I also don't support much of what Anonymous does but this seems good.
 
Re: Westboro Baptist Church Threatens To Picket Swartz's Funeral. Anonymous Takes Act

This may be wrong, but I can't wait for that old bastard that heads the WBC to die so I can go picket his funeral and proclaim his eternal hellfire.

See now I have a completely different take on this.

It's unlikely they'll have the funeral outside the family compound...

But let's say that they did... here's what I think would be the most poignant course of action.

Turn up and do and say nothing.

No signs, no yelling, no clothing saying anything against them.

Show those tools you're not like them and I'm telling you it'll be 1000x more powerful than simply doing back to them what they did to others.
 
Re: Westboro Baptist Church Threatens To Picket Swartz's Funeral. Anonymous Takes Act

It would be interesting to see how turning the tables on WBC would play out. Sadly, though, I think those people are so far gone and closed-minded it would have almost no effect.
 
Back
Top Bottom