The Phelps Story

Vince Noska

10/22/19

Professor McGuire

Composition

The Phelps Story

Hello, My name is Jonathan Phelps. I was born in Topeka Kansas, and my fathers name was Fred Phelps and my mother Margie Phelps. I was raised in the same city and I grew up with a very big close family. My family was all living and doing the same job, we all worked for my father's church. He ran an organization known as the Westboro Baptist Church. The WBC is an organization that is known to my father as an "old school primitive Baptist church", which was very popular in the 19th century. An old school primitive baptist lifestyle back then was very simple and they lived very close to the bible. However in my opinion they were no were near as vicious as I would say the WBC is. I grew up in this sort of lifestyle ever since the day I was born, and it was nothing but cruel. My early life, when I was around 4 or 5, I was taught strictly baptist ideology and values and the WBC "culture", if you can even call it that. I was able to absorb their beliefs at a very young age, I read the bible with my father every night and he home schooled me because the WBC is also a school. I never really had the chance to be with outsiders, the only times that I would be able to go out It would be when we picketed. I never felt the need to go out and look for more because I felt like there was so much to know and learn at home. My father and my brothers and sisters and cousins would always be the ones in class every morning to go to the WBC school. I started in preschool all the way to the 6th grade at the WBC school and during that time I mainly learned about our religion, our ethics and values, and what difference we can make in the world. We also learned about math and English and other basics that they felt we needed to know. They wanted to teach us because my mom said that other schools and churches teach rebellion to the standards of god.

Other then schooling I would be subject to going to picket events every Sunday and special event. Every Sunday we go to the local churches and we picketed against there churches because they were not teaching religion correctly, and they were not preaching homophobia, or sexism or standards of our Baptist values. I started going picketing at the age of 5 and I did it until I was 15 years old. Me and my father would always make them together, he taught me how to make them when I was 5 and I mastered it by the time I was 7. I would help him make the signs and we would write signs that said "God hates fags", " Its a bible thing", " Bush killed them", and " God hates your tears", horrible right? That would be the consistency of my life, I would always be surrounded by family and my life revolves around going to the WBC school, perfecting the ideology that my father has, and to picket. Now as everyone knows, kids have a very sponge like brain, everything you tell a kid or teach a kid they will believe. When we are young we are vulnerable to certain lifestyles and we think that its normal because we are surrounded by it for our whole young life. My father knew this, and that was the reason that my entire young family was going to one school, living in the same little neighborhood and learning the ideology. So of course when I was younger I believed everything my father said, being gay isn't OK, everyone who isn't like us will burn in hell, and that living a life of what god wants is the only way to salvation. So when I was growing up in junior high school I was set on all of my values, and my morals and what I believed in.

For almost 9 years my family has taught me the ways of the primitive baptist, and I embraced every idea they had. I had nothing but hate in my heart, I hated the outside world because they were all sinners and they all were fornicators. So I spent all my time learning because that's what we were brought up to do, be the next generation for the WBC and their ideology. However in high school this all changed, I couldn't stay at home anymore and I had to go to the local public school. I was not happy at all about this, i didn't want to be subject to any of those people. By law however I had to go and my parents had to send me, so I went to my first day of high school and stepped into the outside world for the first time. The kids didn't talk to me and I didn't want to talk to them and that's how I liked it. However, I was surprised that the school didn't have a theology course, this enraged me, and I thought it was wrong this school didn't teach the kids about god. So I went up to the office and I went to talk to the principle and I yelled and screamed at him about how he was a sick man for not teaching students about god and how he is teaching them that being atheist and gay was OK. He was more surprised by what I said then anything and he had to call security on me and I got suspended on my first day of school for promoting hate speech. My family was proud of me however, they were happy to hear that they have such a good young man. After my suspension I lived without my daily theology class and went on with my days at the high school.

My senior year came around and I saw a sign for a religious club for students. I joined immediately and hoping to go over exactly what my family taught me and I wanted to help those other kids by sharing the words of my father to help them. However ,when I joined the club, the students did not discuss what me and my family did, they just talked about themselves and who everyone was. We went around the room telling our names but when I was up and I said my last name was Phelps they all gasped and looked at each other, I was confused. They whispered and I eventually said " what, why are you all so surprised". They were all surprised by my last name and they knew exactly where I came from. They all asked if I was apart of the WBC and I said yes, but when I said that half of them stood up and they all started shouting at me saying how I was an asshole, and that I was a sexist, and a homophobic asshole. I was getting upset so I left, I didn't understand what they were talking about but when I told my dad he told me that they were all sinners that are going to burn in hell. I was approached the next day by one of the girls that was in the club and she asked if she could talk to me after school and I agreed. This is where I realized why Everyone was so mad at me and I also learned about the outside world. I met her after school and her name was Katie, she asked me if I was raised in the WBC and when I said yes she told me she felt bad for me and that I was subjected to all kinds of horrible ideas and values. I was very upset and told her she didn't know what she was talking about, but then she introduced me to her friends, the same people from the club. They all came up to me and said their names and hugged me and they all seemed very happy to see me and then they asked if we could all go to the mall together. I had to be home but they were insistent so I went and we spent the day on the outside, I was a lot of fun going to arcades and to stores and to get to know these people. When the nigh ended I was told that half of them were gay and that 3 were Jewish and that they were all catholic or Christian. I was shocked and I didn't know what to think, I spent all my time with them and I did enjoy myself, I just didn't know what to think. They all explained to me that they aren't different, that they are normal people who aren't weird or different and they wanted to show me this by showing me a fun time with people that my father said were horrible people. They explained to me how god doesn't hate anyone and that he created us to be sinners and that we cant take the bible literally because it was written so long ago. They explained to me a more peaceful and relaxing lifestyle full of love and not hate.

That was the night I questioned everything my father told me and I also realized that I have a mind of my own because I was willing to listen to different people and learn from them because I want to have more love and peace instead of hate. So that night when we all left I walked home to a furious family. It was 11:30 and they had no idea where I was and I just took the yelling and I was grounded. However I wouldn't stay long That night I snuck out of bed around 2 am and I went on my father's laptop. I researched what the WBC looked like from an outsider's view and I Couldn't believe what I was reading, everyone hated us, and every article described what we did and how sad and wrong our ideas were. After hours of research I went to sleep and I decided that I was leaving for the summer, my family has supplied me with money that I worked for my whole life that they were saving for my future. I would leave for college and I walked away with the money, and went to college in Iowa and I would answer every call my family gave me only to tell them who I was and they were perfectly fine with me leaving after I told them I don't like their hateful lifestyle.

AUTHORS NOTE: Writing about a character that was born into a hate group and had to experience that lifestyle was hard. I picked my character because I feel like I have a connection with some of what my character went through. He had to be born into the Phelps family and had been raised not knowing that hate was wrong and that everyone should be excepted and loved rather then hated and rejected. I was born into a similar situation, I was born into a family that was very roman catholic and I was told from a young age that there are people out there that are sinners and their lifestyle is bad and I shouldn't associate with them. I was raised to think a similar way that Johnathan felt when he was raised. Didn't know any better and had fully trusted the ones that had raised us. I do not in any case agree with any of the ideology that I was raised to believe or the disgusting remarks that come from the WBC. The WBC was an organization that I had researched in high school, and I couldn't help but relate to the people that were born into the WBC and left. I chose the WBC because of my relation and also because I wanted to show everyone how it would be to grow up in a home and raised on hate. Like Johnathan said in the story, isn't it so easy to brainwash children? Kids brains are like sponges and they will believe almost what everyone says because they dont know any better. That is the biggest reason that I do not like the WBC, because in my mind it is so cruel to raise children believing in such nasty, hateful things. The WBC is known to be a family organization, and I know that every member in that family was raised to believe the same hateful ideology as Johnathan. To brainwash kids at such a young age and revolve their lives around hate and misguidance is just disgusting and the kids dont know any better and because of this they will have to struggle in life because now they dont want to associate with anyone out side of the WBC. I was glad I was able to point this out in my story, because I was trying to get my audience to see how horrible being grown up brainwashed really is.

Works Cited

1. https://www.apa.org/monitor/nov01/hatecrimes

2. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/exmjqw/westboro-baptist-church-interview

3.https://observer.com/2019/04/megan-phelps-roper-westboro-baptist-church-activist-profile/

4. https://www.npr.org/2011/03/02/134198937/a-peek-inside-the-westboro-baptist-church