The religious right is poisoning our minds.

The kings of shock value, we as citizens of the United States are subject to their disgusting posters, nauseating billboards, indecent protests and disregard for morality on a daily basis. And worst of all, nobody gets the blame.

Recent anti-gay demonstrations at the funerals of Iraq soldiers have sparked a lot of media interest. Another demonstration also took place at the funeral of Coretta Scott King, yet everyone is too busy worrying about what Jimmy Carter said to pay any attention to that one.

What many do not know is that these same protests have been taking place at the funerals of AIDS victims for 15 years.

According to Frank Morris of KCUR radio, Fred Phelps, leader of the Westboro Baptist Church, has organized some 25,000 protests throughout the 15 years taking place everywhere from Topeka to Ground Zero after Sept. 11.

When interviewed, Phelps gave his reasoning for these protests stating, “That’s my job man. To cause this evil country to know her abominations”and show my people their transgressions.”

The transgressions he speaks of are the acceptance of homosexuals.

Morris states, “[Phelps] preaches that God is furious and will destroy the U.S. unless sodomy is made a capital offense.”

We’ve all witnessed the infamous abortion billboards and posters depicting dismembered fetuses that fill our campus and surrounding town with the buzz of disgust as these demonstrations take place during political rallies and election days.

They have taken away what some, including myself, consider the best days of the year, making it about their blasphemous rants instead of political change.

Now it’s time to wake up!

These are the conservatives, people! They may be right and I mean far right in their ideology, but they vote for Bush just like your next-door neighbor does. Yet for some reason we put them in a group all their own, outside the everyday conservative babble.

Why the double standard? Why is it that the immorality that is taking place is ignored when it is the funeral of a homosexual, yet when it is the funeral of a fallen soldier, you can’t get away from the news coverage? In either case, a person has died and respect is deserved.

Words spoken by individuals such as Jimmy Carter on the war in Iraq and the Bush administration at the funeral of Coretta Scott King have been tagged as liberal “rhetoric,” and once again, we have been grouped together and received the shaking of the finger in our face. We have been spoken down to and told that we, as liberals, “[have] lost all tact.”

I beg your pardon, but I believe that an anti-gay demonstration at a place where the utmost respect is deserved, such as the funeral of such a beautiful woman as Coretta Scott King is a little more noteworthy.

I certainly can’t speak for her, but I doubt she would have minded what former President Carter said.

Now it’s time to make the connection. And I don’t just mean today, I mean everyday.

The extreme right speaks to us everyday through acts like these and everyday we ignore and justify them by placing them in their own little crazy group.

Meanwhile, when the left speaks out, people go nuts.

If you’re going to believe (even if you’re not) the people who tell you honoring a liberal American figure by giving a liberal speech is wrong then you need to believe that protesting during funerals altogether is wrong. Protesting during the funerals of AIDS victims is wrong. Protesting abortion by making children hold signs that are not even appropriate for them to view is wrong. And it’s your conservatives that are doing it.

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