LGBT activists -- and their signs -- clash with Westboro Baptist advocates
Four anti-gay advocates from the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., engaged Tuesday in a heated exchange and brief verbal altercation with LGBT supporters forming what they called a "Great Wall of Love" to protect transgender patients entering and leaving the Mazzoni Center at 809 Locust Street.
Four anti-gay advocates from the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kan., engaged Tuesday in a heated exchange and brief verbal altercation with LGBT supporters forming what they called a "Great Wall of Love" to protect transgender patients entering and leaving the Mazzoni Center at 809 Locust Street.
The Westboro quartet was singing and dancing to Christian music and preaching their beliefs when a couple of LGBT supporters among the large crowd apparently took exception. Police quickly formed a bicycle barricade and fenced off the Westboro group. As many as 15 to 20 officers then formed a barricade and walked the Westboro group north on Eighth Street while other LGBT supporters continued to shout obscenities.
The "Great Wall of Love" was organized after officials of the Mazzoni Center, which provides healthcare services to the LGBT community, said they wanted their patients to be able to enter and leave the facility without incident.
Some of the signs created for the wall parodied Westboro's strategy of inflammatory signage:
@steve_bohnel