Free Speech // Current

California Sunset

Smokey haze and the smell of burnt trees... Please post your sunset!

CISCO6060
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Freedom of Sexual Expression?

Sounds good to me! This description comes from their Web site: The Woodhull Freedom Foundation and Federation (WFF) work... more

ladyjayne
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Clown Rings Opening Bell at NYSE

We're all starting to look like Bozos after the free ride Wall Street, the credit card companies, and the bailout the top... more

ladyjayne
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Please Don't Bring Your Teen-ager To Nebraska!

"Please don't bring your teenager to Nebraska," Gov. Dave Heineman told CNN. "Think of what you are saying.... more

CISCO6060
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Too Much, Too Young!

kids with pumps... CHEERS

CISCO6060
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The Summum of all fears: mummies, free speech, and the Supreme Court

Can a fringe religious sect that believes in mummifying pets and their owners force a landmark Supreme Court decision on free speech?

Reverend Fred Phelps, the infamous head of the Westboro Baptist Church in Kansas, runs a website called www.godhatesfags.com and wants to erect a monument in Casper, Wyoming's Historical Monument Plaza depicting Matthew Shepard, the gay University of Wyoming student who was murdered in 1998. The caption would read, "Matthew Shepard entered Hell October 12, 1998, in defiance of God's warning 'thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind; it is abomination.'"

The city of Casper has declined to host Phelps' monument. But whether the city can keep it out hinges on how the US Supreme Court decides a major free speech case involving a fringe religious sect that specializes in mummification of its adherents and, occasionally, their pets. If the court comes to the rescue of the religious group, whose cause civil libertarians would normally support, cities and towns across the country might have no choice but to showcase all manner of bizarre or hateful monuments, like the one proposed by Phelps.

On Wednesday, the court heard oral arguments in Pleasant Grove City v. Summum, a case that is essentially forcing the justices to decide which is worse: letting the likes of Phelps fill public plazas with a parade of horrors, or allowing governments like Pleasant Grove to discriminate against religious minorities when it comes to adorning public space. The case got its start in Utah, a perennial hotbed of church/state separation litigation, and centers on a Ten Commandments monument in Pleasant Grove's Pioneer Park. The monument is one of many erected around the country by the Fraternal Order of Eagles in the 1960s and '70s with backing from Cecile B. DeMille, who was promoting his Charlton Heston movie. The monuments have generated a host of litigation in the past few years, and at least one previous Supreme Court decision.

Summum is a small religious sect founded in 1975 by the late Summum Bonum Amon Ra (who also went by Corky). The group operates out of a pyramid in Salt Lake City and is most famous for carrying on the Egyptian tradition of mummification, a practice that is also the sect's primary source of income. Over the past 15 years, the group has become a thorn in the side of Mormon Utah towns that have public displays of the Ten Commandments. Summum first sued several towns to have the monuments removed in the mid-1990s. When those efforts failed, the group sought to erect monuments of its own, displaying its "Seven Aphorisms." Summum believe that God gave Moses the Aphorisms before he handed down the Ten Commandments, but that Moses destroyed the original tablets because the people weren't ready for the received wisdom. The Aphorisms, in the shortened version, are "Psychokinesis, Correspondence, Vibration, Opposition, Rhythm, Cause and Effect, and Gender."

Stephanie MencimerCan a fringe religious sect that believes in mummifying pets and their owners force a landmark Supreme Court decision on free... more

Brendan_M
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3 days ago

Atheist billboards to debut during holidays

A controversial billboard will likely be popping up in a neighborhood near you, just in time for the holidays.

The billboard is paid for by a Colorado atheist group. The message sits against a blue sky backdrop and says, "Don't believe in God? You're not alone."

Ten billboards will pepper metro Denver, while one will be put up in Colorado Springs."And we're putting them up in November and December because of the holidays, when church and state issues tend to come up a lot," said Joel Guttormson, with Metro State Atheists. "To let non-believers, free-thinkers and atheists know that they are not alone, especially in a country like ours that is predominantly Christian."

Pastor Willard Johnson of Denver's Macedonia Baptist Church called the billboards a desperate effort to discredit Christianity.

"The Bible is being fulfilled. It says that in latter days, you have all these kinds of things coming up, trying to disrupt the validity of Christianity," Johnson said. "If they don't believe in God, how do they believe they came about? We denounce what they are doing. But we do it with love, with gentleness, with decency and with compassion."

Bob Enyart, a Christian radio host and spokesman for American Right to Life, said it's hard to ignore the evidence.

"The Bible says that faith is the evidence of things not seen. Evidence. If we ignore the evidence for gravity or the Creator, that's really dangerous," said Enyart. "Income tax doesn't not exist because somebody doesn't believe in it. And the same is true with our Creator."

The billboards will go up Nov. 17. The atheist group, called Colorado Coalition of Reason or COCORE, also wanted to put up signs in Fort Collins and Greeley, but a billboard company there refused to carry the message.

Johnson said atheism is a rebellion against Biblical principals and the billboard will likely offend many Christians.

COCORE said this is about rights.First Amendment

"And I've read the First Amendment up and down and nowhere does it say that I have to care about your feelings. We're either 10 to 16 percent of the population, and the reason we don't really know is because people are scared to come out because they're ostracized by the people around them," said Guttormson.A controversial billboard will likely be popping up in a neighborhood near you, just in time for the holidays. The billboard is... more