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December 23, 2004
Somethings VERY wrong here.
Ok, first off let me make a couple of things perfectly clear. First, I am an atheist. Fully, and without qualms or doubt, I am an atheist. I also have no problems with homosexuality. I feel that a person's sexual orientation is their business, PERIOD.
What I'm INFURIATED about is what I see in THIS VIDEO. (10 Megs / 7 min.)
What I see here is a peaceful protest by members of an organization with a message, the message is a religious one. I see them exercising their constitutionally protected right to assembly and speech. The event in the video is a festival called OutFest held in Philadelphia. The festival is a gay pride celebration and a Christian group called Repent Now staged a protest during the festival which occurred over 15 city blocks, and did not charge admission.
What I also see in this video is a group of people DENYING those constitutional rights. The group doing the denying happens to be a homosexual advocacy group called the "Pink Angels". What I see in this video is one group of people denying another group of people access to public streets and thoroughfares. I see them surrounding them and denying them their right to move freely and speak freely.
This is VERY disturbing, but it gets better. The activity of the "Pink Angels", denying others their constitutional rights was announced in advance.
But it gets better. The police wind up arresting the Christian group. YES. They sure as heck do, and it's all right there in the video. The police watch as the "Pink Angels" surround the Christians, the police whatch as the "Pink Angels" harrass the Christians. The police also watch as the "Pink Angels" impede the Christians on public thoroughfares, and deny them their right to assembly and speech. Then the POLICE arrest the Christians.
Ok if you haven't watched the video yet, HERE IT IS again.
This is HIGHLY HIGHLY disturbing to me. I could care less if one group wants to parade their gay pride around in a street festival, and I could care less if a group of Christians want to preach gospel at the same festival in protest. That is the CONSTITUTIONALLY PROTECTED right of BOTH parties. What I DO CARE ABOUT is that the Constitutionally protected rights of one group was denied to them repeatedly by another group of people in PLAIN view of the police.
You'll see in THE VIDEO, that the POLICE even acknowledge briefly that the Christians are being impeded and harrassed. But when the Christians finally put their foot down and exercise their CONSTITUTIONALLY PROTECTED RIGHTS. They are arrested.
This is an OUTRAGE. But it's not over yet. The Christians that were arrested are now in danger of being sentenced to 47 years in prison for the activities shown in THE VIDEO. Please, I implore you, my readers, few that you may be to please watch THE VIDEO and then decide for yourselves. I'll put up more about this OUTRAGE as I investigate it further. Here are a few links about the incident so you can start investigating yourself. As I learn more about this I'll be updating this, as well as commenting on the larger implications of what's going on. PLEASE view THE VIDEO and read the links below to learn more.
Link 1 - Bill of Rights/Amendments to the US Constitution
Link 2 - Announcement of the intent of the "Pink Angels" published in advance of the event. NOTE: DEAD LINK, either this site has been getting hammered with hits in the last 24 hours or it has been removed by the owners. Below is a relevant quote from festival organizer Chuck Volz. I will try to find another source for the advance anouncement of the groups plans.
"We'll have a moving pink wall around them [protesters]," Volz continued. "Hopefully, they [protesters] will be so frustrated, they won't come again. Talking to a piece of Styrofoam is not the same as talking to a crowd of people."
Link 3 - Press Release from the AFA
Link 4 - Press Releases from the arrested group [ONE] [TWO]
Link 5 - Coverage of the incident by Ex-Gay Watch
Link 6 - WorldNetDaily Coverage - [ONE], [TWO], [THREE]
Link 7 - Philadelphia Inquirer coverage of the recent court decision.
I'll be adding more to this tomorrow when I've learned more about it, please check back and a special hat-tip to Geek Blonde Girl. Please feel free to save the video (right-click and "save target as. . .") and email it to concerned parties or direct them here to view the video.
The permanent link for this post is:
http://www.jasoncoleman.com/BlogArchives/2004/12/somethings_very.html
--Jason
UPDATE: Unrelated but equally egregious is this item from California
Posted by JasonColeman at December 23, 2004 12:10 AM
