Anti-Gay Preacher Charged for Noisy Pride Protest

An anti-gay preacher in North Carolina says that a law limiting the noise level of public proclamations constitutes an infringement on his First Amendment rights of expression and religion.

Phillip "Flip" Benham was charged with exceeding the permissible decibel level as he harangued Pride revelers in Charlotte, NC, on Aug. 27. Benham was using a microphone and speaker as he condemned gays and read from the Bible. Police warned him once, and then, when the preacher exceeded the allowable noise limit once more, arrested him, local newspaper the Charlotte Observer reported on Aug. 29.

The incident was not the first occasion on which Benham was apprehended, according to the newspaper account. Last November, Benham was convicted in a stalking case involving a doctor who provided abortions.

"Benham and his group, Operation Save America, are best known for making Old-West style 'wanted' posters of doctors" who provide abortions, reported National Public Radio in a Nov. 9. 2010, article.

"Some of the posters included the personal contact information and encouraged people to contact the doctors," the article added.

Benham claimed at that time that he was suffering anti-Christian persecution, but one doctor who offered testimony at the trial professed a fear for his life, telling the court that the posters put up by Benham were "a call for his murder."

Fringe-right Christians frequently claim that their rights are automatically infringed upon when certain groups -- gays in particular -- are safeguarded. One Mormon-affiliated anti-gay group, the National Organization for Marriage, has resisted following election laws in at least two states, arguing that unless they are granted a special exemption from donor disclosure requirements, gay thugs will terrorize and possibly harm donors to anti-gay causes.

Benham and his followers also target GLBTs. Their action at the Aug. 27 Pride event in Charlotte was attended by "dozens of protesters," the Observer article said, wearing "red shirts that said 'Repent or Perish.' "

Benham slammed the noise ordinance, claiming that it was a weapon against his Christian speech.

"It's the way the city controls us," Benham told the press. "It controls the message that we speak. The city can control the content of a message if they can control the volume."

The paper noted that over the course of the last twenty months, Benham has been arrested a total of four times. He was found guilty of stalking abortion doctors once more just last month.

"The city of Charlotte really wants me to shut up before the Democratic National Convention gets here," Benham told the press.. "We're not worried about that. This is our city, and we have a responsibility to her."

The four arrests cited by the Charlotte Observer may be a serious undercount. Benham, who succeeded Randall Terry as national leader of Operation Rescue and renamed it Operation Save America, has said himself that he had been arrested more than fifty times, according to a Wikipedia posting.

Street preachers in the United States and in Britain alike have a penchant for breaking the law but invoking a higher law in their defense. In 2009, fundamentalist preacher Billy Ball and others associated with Faith Baptist Church, a Primrose, GA house of worship, took to the sidewalks of Manchester, GA with signs bearing various slogans, including "Three Gay Rights: AIDS / Hell / Salvation" and "Repent or Burn."

When police informed Rev. Billy Ball and Chris Pettigrew that they would need a permit for their street preaching action, the Baptist church members protested that they did not need permits to assemble and publicly declare their religious opposition to gays and lesbians.

Pettigrew told the police, "It's our constitutional right to free speech. We're not impeding any kind of traffic. We're peaceably assembled, so we're going to do what we came to do."

The police insisted; so did the Baptist demonstrators. Pettigrew and Ball were placed under arrest, but upon their release they headed right back to the same spot to resume their street preaching.

Said Pettigrew, "We weren't going to let them bully us into going home."

The Primrose contingent cried foul when they were arrested, citing their Constitutional rights to free expression and peaceable assembly.

At the time, the Faith Baptist Church Web site boasted of the "Sons of Thundr" and declares, "The War is On."

"It is said that 86% of Americans believe in God," text at the site read. "Therefore, it is very hard to understand why there is such a mess about having the Ten Commandments on display or 'In God We Trust' on our money and having God in the Pledge of Allegiance.

"Why don't we just tell the other 14% to Sit Down and SHUT UP!!!" the text went on to say.

From time to time, GLBT equality advocates have sided with anti-gay street preachers, finding common cause in cases where the preachers' rights did seem to have been unjustly constrained.

Last year, standing on the principle that "Freedom of speech must be defended, even for homophobes," U.K. equality activist Peter Tatchell offered his testimony in defense of anti-gay street preacher Dale Mcalpine.

In May of 2010, Mcalpine was arrested in a shopping district where he had been handing out leaflets and proselytizing to passers-by about the "sinfulness" of homosexuality, among other subjects. Police said that Mcalpine was voicing anti-gay views in a loud voice; Mcalpine said that he had a quiet and respectful one-to-one conversation with a female passerby about homosexuality.

The case generated international headlines in the blogging community, with anti-gay religious pundits pointing to Mcalpine's arrest as proof that anti-discrimination laws erode religious liberties and freedom of expression.

But in America, the guarantees of free speech and freedom of religion offer those who cling to anti-gay religious faiths extraordinarily broad protections for speech that not only recites scripture, but also goes out of its way to offend. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of Westboro Baptist Church, whose anti-gay congregation is known for picketing the funerals of U.S. military personnel killed in action.

The church was taken to court by the grieving father of a fallen Marine whose funeral the congregation picketed, declaring that God was punishing America for tolerating homosexuality by allowing troops to die. Though the church lost in lower courts and was ordered to pay $5million, the Supreme Court found that Westboro's right to free speech covered the offensive slogans the group used while picketing the young soldier's funeral.

"Asked why anyone would bring signs reading 'God Hates Fags' and 'You're Going to Hell' to a funeral for U.S. military personnel, church leader Rev. Fred Phelps said last year, 'When the whole country is given over to sodomy and sodomite enablers ... the country needs this preaching,' " a March 2 NPR article on the Supreme Court ruling reported.