Controversy is surrounding the Snyder v. Phelps ruling, which upheld freedom of speech for Kansas’ Westboro Baptist Church. The root of the matter was that the publicity-crazed church has taken to picketing at funerals held for soldiers killed in the line of duty, invoking that the cause of these deaths is the United States’ tolerance of homosexuality.
Although their behavior is outrageous and rude, anything that upholds First Amendment rights is for the greater good of this nation. I do believe that the members of Westboro shouldn’t be allowed to picket these military funerals, but there shouldn’t be any government intervention due to the Church’s hate speech.
Westboro shouldn’t be picketing U.S. military funerals because we shouldn’t be hosting military funerals so frequently in the first place. It’s been over nine years since we initially invaded Afghanistan and about eight years since we took military action in Iraq. “Operation Iraqi Freedom” has ended, although about 50,000 troops are still present to maintain order.
As the timeline for these conflicts nears the decade mark, there’s a sense of resignation throughout the nation when it comes to military action. We invaded these nations in the early 2000s under the pretense of driving out governments that supported terrorist activity. Much of the information that prompted action has since been proven false. A more patient approach and a review of the history of conflicts in Afghanistan and our previous war in Iraq could have deterred us from taking sweeping action.
Since we can’t change the past or cool the jets of our vitriolic patriotism that emerged after Sept. 11, then we have to focus on the present. What are our troops still doing in Afghanistan and Iraq? News broadcasts have shied away from reporting on the matter, and the stories seem to be stuck in a perpetual cycle of turmoil and casualties. Instead of maintaining our seemingly endless military actions and complacent attitudes about it, why aren’t we more outraged that U.S. soldiers are still dying every day for a war that was based on false pretenses?
It’s time to end these conflicts and bring our troops home. Instead of trying to justify the number of fatalities with a fleeting resolution, why don’t we put a cap on the number of fatalities? This way we can stop the pickets of military funerals without being hypocritical about freedom of speech rights when we call the Westboro Baptist Church a group of “lunatic, attention-whoring assholes.”
Mike Taylor is a senior journalism major and assistant news editor for the Daily 49er.
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