I’ve noticed that the Westboro Baptist Church has had a substantial amount of time swimming under the media’s spotlight recently. And, well, I finally found an interview that I think portrays the best message in demonstrating how we should treat people of their particular sort.
I’m a little bit biased, because I’m somewhat of a Russell Brand fanatic. I love everything that he does. And there’s not much that he can really do wrong in my eyes. Though, and having said this, I’ve been waiting for someone to illustrate exactly how people who claim to be loving and kind and generally benevolent, should treat those are quite openly homophobic or xenophobic or bigoted or hate clowns. And that illustration is …
To treat hate with love. Exactly how Russell Brand has in this interview.
It’s very easy to see someone whose opinions differ from yours, so fundamentally, and apparently so narrow-mindedly, get on your high unicorn, and play the blame game. People who are loudly and proudly against equal rights, or, even worse, think that the act of bumming will drag your soul down to hell once your flesh and bones body passes onto the next life make an easy target.
You uneducated clown. You bastard. You hater of cats. You unenlightened hillbilly. You dumb poop head. You’re not God, you didn’t choose his Will. Notions of love and compassion and respect trump a bit of bumming. You fuck-tard.
The kids know no better. And neither do the adults. Instead of condemning, why not try to love them like ourselves?
Yes, it is indeed easy and extremely tempting to stoop to this level of blind hate.
However, what good does it accomplish?
Immediately before the two are even on stage, Russell Brand tells his audience to welcome the two preachers with love and applause and to refrain from making catcalls. Then, when the two sit down and people get a bit rowdy, he reiterates to his audience how difficult it must be to come onto a show where people are obviously not going to agree with your views. He did his best in encouraging the crowd to let the preachers have their voice.
He kept this attitude all throughout the entire interview, and, at least by my subjective standards, didn’t deviate from this loving and all encompassing stance once. Granted, yes, he’s a comedian, so he made a few funnies. But never, I really don’t think, did he directly intend to belittle the two preachers, whom Russell referred to as being courageous for coming to his show, knowing that they’d face such adversity.
He even tried to give them a hug at the end. And one of them even obliged. In a manly, I’ll lean in and pat your shoulder but ensure that our genitals are too remote to make any sort of rubbing contact, sort of way.
Wow!
Jesus? On another note, I’m happy to report that R B will be in Melbourne next month, and I have tickets. If I said I wasn’t excited, I’d go to hell.
If you watch the interview, you’ll notice that they really are doing what they think is good. They truly believe that by condemning faggots to hell, they are saving people’s souls. By spreading their biblical word, as interpreted by their own selves, they are doing God’s work, and thus, sparing “the sinners” from an eternity in hell.
Though we may not at all agree with them, they truly do believe, I think, that their actions are benevolent. And kind. And compassionate. Through their own lens, by allowing “sinners” to keep flamboyantly skipping down hell lane, arm in arm, willy in bum, they are no different from, I don’t know, a family parent watching their child smoke crystal meth every day and ruin his life, without doing anything to prevent it.
Something like that. I guess? I don’t know. Whatever.
The point is:
Fighting hate with hate is only going to encourage more hate.
If we all adopted an attitude akin to Russell Brand’s and treated people who’s opinions and views we so essentially stand in contrast to, with love and compassion, like how we would treat those we care about and love – well, without the sexing or the touching or the kissing or the bumming, of course – then what a world this could be.
I’ve said this before but I’ll say it again:
Discriminating against discrimination is still discrimination.
No matter what angle you look at it from, you’re left with a big ball of nasty. Treating hate with love is somewhat of a morass, and probably something that may cause internal conflict within for some, though, haranguing those full of contempt merely paints another picture using hateful colours.
Let us all do our best to use water to unburden fire. As opposed to gasoline.
Humans-are-self-righteous-creatures. And often, incapable of seeing otherwise.
I agree that Russel did a good job with it in his natural humorous way. The one man closest to him seemed to be less hateful… is that sad? Thanks for posting.
Yes, yes he seemed a lot more logical and less spiteful. I, umm, I don’t know how that works, really, but I got that impression, too. thanks for stopping by.
Loved that interview! Glad you’re a Russell Brand fan too.
A fan is almost an understatement. I’m in love with the man. And I’m as heterosexual as a tree lamp.
I’m as gay as a hatrack
I got caught up clicking the following links to watching him on the Graham Norton show, thank you for the extra entertainment!
When you point out about how they think they are helping people, you’re right, I was watching a documentary on this church a while back and a young girl in the church was saying, “Why do they hate us so bad? Why are they so mean? We’re just trying to help them save their souls.” or some shiz. Still, be good if they could wrap their heads around that ‘why’.
Awesome post
Isn’t he just delightful? I can’t remember where you live, but you should definitely buy tickets to his show; he’s touring across Australia, so no excuses. Unless you don’t want to; who am I to boss you around? No one. Well, I’m apparently someone, but not the boss of you. Fuck, too many coffees. And yeah, it’s weird to think that they really mean well. Though, unless you’re a clinical psychopath and thus totally devoid of human emotion, most people do mean well deep down. It’s just a shame that we don’t always act like it.
Th only men who hate homosexuals are repressed homosexuals themselves.
I’m not sure that it’s that cut and dry, though, I’m quite sure that there’s a lot of truth to that point. Granted, I don’t really believe sexuality is that simple, generally. The words gay, straight and bi mean nothing to me personally. They’re oversimplifications made for people to relate to one another but that inadvertently serve to mislead us. We’re all kind of “bi,” in a way, it’s just that for some their own shade of grey is darker or lighter. Though it is always (most often) some form of grey, I’d say, hey.
Thanks for the reply, I agree with every word.
It’s not cut and dry by any means but if you look at the words ‘men who hate’ then my intent may be clearer. The Westbro Church hates homosexuality, it doesn’t dislike/ ignore/repulses/ etc – it ‘hates’. Their performances at the burials of American servicemen is an indication of the depth of their hatred as well as being a disgrace to the American flag.
Freud 101 would indicate that such hatred springs from a deep fear of being ‘one of them’ – if i had a dollar for every man who had said to me ‘I’d kill any man that touched me’ I’d be rich. The fear isn’t grounded on any deep philosophical of religious grounds, it’s the fear that you might find the touch of another man arousing. Then where would you be?
ps
Russell should have asked if they were wearing clothes made from more than one fibre – the punishment in the Bible for that is death by stoning. Shouldn’t this (as well as growing 2 crops in the same field) be highlighted and railed against at the same volume as homosexuality?
See, aside from Freud’s analysis, which I do agree would play a huge part in it, I would also assume that social conditioning has a large part to play in “gay hate.” To draw an unparalleled parallel, it’s almost like when people get apprehensive when someone looks different from them. I paint in my nails with black and golden glittery nail polish; even if I’m with my girlfriend, I’ll still get very strange stares. No one has straight out said that they hate me for it, but the principle’s somewhat similar … very loosely, at least, in that we’re conditioned to hate certain things and love others, or, in other words, love those the same as us, hate those that are different. Mix that with the Freudian inclinations you mentioned, and that’s how violence happens. Or lewd, poorly written signs.
As for the stoning question, I’m not sure that logic sits well with fundamentalists. Which is essentially why I love Russell’s approach; it doesn’t question their beliefs directly, it just tries to shower them with love.
Again, I agree.
Russell’s approach was perfect. Plus, if they are allowed to actually express their beliefs then people can see they’re not monsters, just poorly educated bigots.
At the next funeral of a Westboro adherent we should all turn up and scream that they’re going straight to hell in those poly-cotton shrouds.
And, black/ glittery nail polish? Beyond cool.
I cheat. It’s black nail polish. With an extra coat of gold glitter hah.
tart!
I like Brand’s sentiment, he seems like a genuinely nice dude. He’s not my favorite comedian and I really haven’t liked what I’ve seen of his show but this was an exception.
He is setting a wonderful example of how people should deal with each other. Being civil is so important to having a successful dialogue. I would much rather see him host a serious show dealing with serious issues cleverly than host what is going on with Brand X. That show requires him to be jokey and kind of goofy while semi-addressing serious issues. But I’ve heard him discuss drug abuse before and he did a phenomenal job. He’s clearly very intelligent and seems to want to use his celebrity status to improve the world. I want to see more of that.
It’s funny you say that, a lot of people I’ve spoken to share this sentiment. Hell, before I saw the movie Arthur, I dismissed him as being an obnoxious comedian whom I gave no thought whatever toward.
He actually does a lot of work like this; he’s done a documentary on kids in Africa, using his celebrity to raise money for them. And even before he became famous, his work, though layered with comedy, was often to do with similar issues; there’s a short doco showing him dealing with similar sorts of bigoted attitudes in England; this is going, I think, about 15 years back.
As someone who lives by the phrase, “life’s too important to be taken seriously,” I enjoy humour being used to diffuse the sting of tough topics. If you do a bit more research on him, you’ll probably fall in love like I have. Maybe not. But, well, it’ll further heighten your opinion of the recalcitrant, handsome fella. He reminds me of a British, more eccentric Bill hicks. Who was, funnily or not funnily enough, one of his idols.
I can see that connection. Using comedy as a platform to discuss serious issues is admirable and something I wish more people aspired to. I hope Brand continues in that vein.
‘Fighting hate with hate is only going to encourage more hate.’
- ahh no better words to say it.