The Hard-Won Wisdom of a Former Bigot

Is there anyone who
Ever remembers changing their mind from
The paint on a sign?

Everyone believes
In how they think it ought to be
Everyone believes
And they’re not going easily —John Mayer

Megan Phelps-Roper was five when her parents first put a picket sign in her hands. Westboro Baptist Church (WBC), founded by her grandfather Fred Phelps, was protesting what members believed was an unacceptable number of gay men in their town’s park. She couldn’t read yet, but she held the sign jubilantly, the way other kids her age might hold cotton candy. It read: GAYS ARE WORTHY OF DEATH.¹

This, WBC’s first picket, inaugurated the church’s favored tactic of spewing contempt at those whom its influential members decided that God hates. Since then, the church has become infamous for picketing the funerals of gay men who die of AIDS and of fallen soldiers, whose deaths WBC members believe are God’s punishment for America’s increasing acceptance of homosexuality. . . .

About Jon Hersey

Jon Hersey (@revivingreason) is managing editor of The Objective Standard and holds fellowships at Foundation for Economic Education, where he writes in defense of freedom, and at Objective Standard Institute, where he teaches courses and hosts the podcast “Philosophy for Flourishing.”

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