As horrible as the Connecticut shootings were, I don't think even WBC would be stupid enough to walk into a riot turned beatdown turned death-by-active-act-of-stupidity-and-moral-indecency.

Clearly, you don't know WBC. They are EXACTLY that stupid! ;)

[quote name='BCullis' timestamp='1355760761' post='5011753']
Part of me wonders if someone's just ginning up attention by throwing the threat out there via twitter.

As horrible as the Connecticut shootings were, I don't think even WBC would be stupid enough to walk into a riot turned beatdown turned death-by-active-act-of-stupidity-and-moral-indecency.
[/quote]
If they hadn't previously done almost exactly this on multiple occassions, I might agree with you. They protested a memorial service at my university when some students died in a fire the weekend previous.

According to KnightSec's twitter feed (link in the first post), WBC is already in Newtown.

[quote name='JTippetts' timestamp='1355721745' post='5011546']
Free speech is free speech, and if we aren't willing to defend free speech, regardless of our personal beliefs regarding the speaker, then we all will eventually lose our right to free speech.

Free speech is an extremely important principle, and there's a very good reason why it is included as a "universal human right." However, free speech should not give anyone the right to say whatever they want whenever they want.[/quote]That is why in a sane legislation, there is no unlimited free speech. Free speech is only free within limits. You're not allowed to say "bomb" at an airport or "fire" in a theater.

Of course, in reality, there is no such thing as free speech anyway. If you make use of your civil rights and your opinion is unopportune enough, you'll soon find out that your civil rights are worth a crap (and no, not only in China, in every country).

By the way, there is a bomb at the airport.

All in all, the many so-called freedoms that we have usually cause at least as much trouble as they are worth. For most people, "freedom" is not worth a lot, and they can hardly ever exercise it, but it always opens backdoors for criminals, religious fanatics, and other vicious and unscrupolous people. But that's true for most things, I guess...

I can't wait for more people to realize that they have all rights and that the ones listed by governments are just the ones people agreed were the most important / were on their minds at the time. Stuff like this'd run a whole lot smoother, and WBC wouldn't have lasted this long in the first place.
I wonder how many people in Anonymous have caught on to this...

Anyhow, at the risk of spreading rumors, I'm fairly certain I've read/watched something before that explained how the WBC keeps one foot ahead of all potential legal snares: the large majority of their "family" and church are in legal professions. So in the spirit of furthering their church's success and infamy, they're always on the cutting edge of legal counsel.

What I don't get (well, I don't get any of it, they're f**king nutjobs with no ethical standards) is what the point of their actions really is. I want to say "free publicity", which is obviously working, but what would they do with it? I can't imagine that kind of attention brings new members to their church. It's not making them any money. And I refuse to believe that such an organized, practiced, and educated group would be after the real-life equivalent of a trolling session. At least, I refuse to believe that about any sane human. So maybe that's my problem.

According to this, its basically a con:
http://kanewj.com/wbc/

I suppose legal muscle, combined with tax-free status and donations, you can play the system pretty good.

With that in mind, while all of this may be entertaining (and I have to say, it is rather entertaining), I doubt all this so-called hactivism will do any real good against them. Hopefully it doesn't result in more money going toward WBC from lawsuits or something.