Westboro Baptist Church Petition Gains Support To Label Them A 'Hate Group'
A petition on the White House's website to list the Westboro Baptist Church a hate group is quickly gaining support.
The digital petition was submitted to the We the People Web page on Dec. 14, the same day as the tragic shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
The controversial religious group picketed the funerals of the victims of the shooting, which led to counter protests from people who wanted to block the Westboro Baptist Church members from disrupting the memorials.
The church picketed the funerals saying that shooter Adam Lanza was sent by God to kill the 26 victims of the incident because Connecticut legalized same-sex marriage, according to The Daily Mail.
Users flooded the petition's Web page, though the document originally needed 250,000 signatures in order to be reviewed by the administration. As of Dec. 27, there were over 267,000 signatures by users who want the church labeled as a hate group, making it the biggest petition ever submitted to the Web page, according to The Huffington Post.
The online petition states the following: "This group has been recognized as a hate group by organizations, such as The Southern Poverty Law Center, and has repeatedly displayed the actions typical of hate groups. Their actions have been directed at many groups, including homosexuals, military, Jewish people and even other Christians. They pose a threat to the welfare and treatment of others and will not improve without some form of imposed regulation."
The petition officially closes Jan. 13, and will likely be reviewed by the White House as the needed signatures have already been met.
The Westboro Baptist Church routinely protests at the funerals of deceased military members and are present whenever a tragedy strikes to picket the events, saying that God is punishing the world for not following the church's beliefs. After the church's recent decision to picket the memorial services in Newtown, the hacking group Anonymous cyber-attacked the Westboro Baptist Church by publishing personal information of the some of the church's members online.
