stranger and stranger

[hnpcc]

You know how sometimes you feel like you've seen it all and then you see/hear something that just makes you wonder what freaking planet some people come from? Well here are two links that have made me feel like that today.

The first link - stolen from jamaisneutral - concerns marriage. To quote The Smoking Gun:

This country, as you know, is filled with the deranged. And then there's Travis Frey, a 33-year-old Iowa man who is facing charges that he tried to kidnap his own wife (not to mention a separate child pornography rap). Frey, prosecutors contend, apparently is a rather demanding guy. In fact, he actually drew up a bizarre four-page marriage document--a "Contract of Wifely Expectations"--that sought to establish guidelines for his spouse in terms of hygiene, clothing, and sexual activities.

This makes me shake my head in complete and utter incomprehension. On the slightly positive side, at least he did the contract in a pretty font. On the very positive side, at least he's now off to jail where he belongs and where - with any luck - he'll stay. Because God knows, if I were his wife I'd be going in to hiding now - he seems like the kind of nice bloke who'd rock up with a shotgun if she dared leave him. *shudder* I can't see him being less so after a stint in jail either.

The second link - from This Is Not Over - concerns Fred Phelps, who really should have a sub-category of species designated for him. Somewhere under 'human' but potentially above 'slime mould'. Actually, that's an insult to slime mould.

Why? He's back protesting at funerals again. Phelps originally sprang into international notice when he picketed the funeral of Matthew Shepard, who was tortured and left to die on a fence in Wyoming in 1998. Shepard was murdered because he was gay. Phelps has a very unhealthy obsession with homosexuality, which he blames for all sorts of things including Hurricane Katrina.

This has now carried over into his current protests, which are at the funerals of US soldiers who were killed in Iraq. Can you guess the link between homosexuality and the Iraq war? Because that's what he's protesting about.

To quote some of the article:

Phelps believes American deaths in Iraq are divine punishment for a country that he says harbors homosexuals. His protesters carry signs thanking God for so-called IEDs -- explosives that are a major killer of soldiers in Iraq.

Now leaving aside the whole question of protesting at a funeral for a second, is it just me (and Dean) or is pissing off a group of returned soldiers, who may not be in the most stable phase of their lives and who are probably in a heightened emotional state not the most sane thing to do? Then again, that's Phelpsy.

It really would serve them right if someone put an IED - God's apparent weapon of choice - oh, I don't know, in their car, their church, their house..

"The scriptures are crystal clear that when God sets out to punish a nation, it is with the sword. An IED is just a broken-up sword," Phelps-Roper said. "Since that is his weapon of choice, our forum of choice has got to be a dead soldier's funeral."

The fuck?!? No, the logic just isn't happening for me. Why not outside the Senate? Congress? The local MPs office? Someone with the power to do something?

Apparently several states are considering legislation limiting protests at funerals. I have no problem with this: I just don't see funerals as legitimate places to voice dissent with the Iraq war. At the end of the day, the family and friends are there because someone they loved has died. Getting up and saying "they died purposelessly" isn't helpful in that setting, leaving aside whether you believe it's true or not. I wouldn't say it at the funeral of a teenager who wrapped their ute around a tree either, and it's equally true there.

To be honest, I wish they'd just consider legislation limiting Fred Phelps.

Comments

[ang-grrr.livejournal.com]

There's been some discussion on a community I frequent that the marriage contract is like a classis dom/sub contract. I can imagine it's true but if so the sub has NOT been consensual.

[dalmeny]

Phelps is just mad. Just... a nutter.

[hnpcc]

Dean and I were discussing that last night. The contract does fall into the sub/dom/story of O kind of thing, but it still creeps me out. Not just because the sub is obviously not consenting to it, but also the whole pain thing - to me there has to be some get out clause if it is causing pain and that's not made specific, if in fact there was one.

Oh and because I separate fantasy and real life quite rigorously, not feeling the need to live according to any particular sexual fetish, I also find it harder to understand. Still, people are strange. And it was a nice font. :-)

(Actually I'm very bad at fantasy. If you've ever seen me playing role playing games you'd understand. I think I lasted two minutes in Paranoia and that was with double the usual number of starting lives.)

[hnpcc]

After reading his mini-bio on Wikipedia, I'm beginning to think he's actually a candidate for sectioning. Oh and the unnatural obsession with homosexuality may be explained by an arrest in the 1950s for Indecent Exposure with another man. But, yeah, the guy's a fruitcake. Fortunately he should drop off the twig soon.