Westboro Baptist Church

So I watched Louis Theroux do his documentary thing and go back to the Westboro Baptist Church.

These are the guys who picket funerals for soldiers killed in war. Regardless of whether or not you agree with (the?) war, I think all reasonable people think it to be in poor taste to picket a funeral purely by dint of its being a funeral.

I can't see passed this church as anything but institutionalised child abuse. According to Louis, the only contact the younger children have with the "outside world" is the journalists who come to ask questions at their pickets. Couple this with the active depression of various emotions (including sexual ones, for those who are getting to that age) and I worry for the children who are a part of this group. Specifically with reference to the young males in the group, I can see them ending up one of four ways. The first is relatively harmless and involves the collapse of the group. The second involves the collapse of the group and isn't all that harmful, relatively speaking. The third and fourth are anything but harmless.

First: The group collapses fairly soon, before much lasting damage can be done the the children. They can go into the wider world, have the opportunity to make friends and develop social skills which may go some way towards making them happier, more adaptable adults.

Second: The group collapses and the children have suffered lasting damage, making them cynical adults who don't contribute much to their friends, family or wider society. They may not have friends and may live sadder, less adaptable lives because of it.

Third: The group does not collapse before the children grow up. The children then grow up with the attitudes of the group, namely; ultra-patriarchal attitudes to family and relationships, plus repressed sexual attitudes. I'm not a criminal psychologist but this at least seems like the kind of attitude-set which would lead an adult to committing violent crimes of a sexual nature.

Fourth: The group does not collapse at all. The children grow up but because of a lack of genetic and social diversity are forced to find a partner to marry within their own family, in the belief it the only viable option for the survival of their group. If the group did continue to have children at this point the law could finally step in, but not before more people are created to suffer in the Westboro God's name.

Let's all hope it collapses tomorrow.