Whacko fundamentalist group (and presumed Android users) the Westboro Baptist Church have announced plans to picket Apple again.
What’s the reason this time? Well, aside from the fact that Apple makes very nice computers and smartphones, apparently the church elders have just gotten around to finishing Walter Isaacson’s 2011 biography of Apple’s co-founder, because they’ve taken issue with Steve Jobs.
“Apple and many of its customers revere Steve Jobs as a creativity genius and a technology god,” the Kansas-based congregation wrote in a press release to the media handily entitled “God Hates the Media.”
They go on to claim Steve Jobs resides in hell as a result of seeking out alternative therapies for his cancer treatment.
Apparently losing that train of thought, they then (somewhat bizarrely) claim that Jobs was put on Earth to create Apple products, which are today used without complaint by the Westboro Baptist Church. To punish Apple for its user-friendliness, the loopy churchgoers are planning on picketing Apple headquarters for a rather-unimpressive half hour on Tuesday, August 12.
This isn’t the first time WBC have targeted Apple. Back in 2011, the Kansas-based congregation picketed an event dedicated to the memory of Steve Jobs. Apple fans hit with a counter protest, we’ll keep you posted on what goes down this time.
Source: Twitter
Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems … and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
24 responses to “Westboro Baptist Church plans hatefest outside Apple HQ”
Maybe if I (and everyone else) stops clicking the links related to WBC, people will stop reporting on them, and these weirdos will just go away.
People such as these make me regret the whole freedom of speech thing.
Why would we want them to go away? They’re always good for a laugh!
Nah, it’s just like Sarah Palin. She won’t go away either. It’s been slow for the Koran burner Terry Jones so he’s due to make another appearance.
I’m sure they’ll tweet their hatred from their iPhones.
They probably have android or even worse blackberry…
They actually have iPhones, which makes the irony even sweeter lol
And here I thought they were picketing because of Apple’s inclusiveness…not to mention their participation on the SF Pride Parade!
They’re doing it right after Reddit HQ actually. Sounds like they don’t want anyone to think they’re just protesting to spite the AMA that happened.
Either that or they just didn’t want to waste a trip to attempt making extra money through lawsuits.
Why picket Apple? Because picketing Microsoft is too mainstream, rofl westboro are among the lowest humanity has to offer.
Sometimes I think these are just paid people that go out to embarrass Christianity. There’s no way a christian with actual knowledge of the bible would do such embarrassing things. I don’t get this. What’s the point of getting this kind of attention? I’m a believer and no where in the bible does it mentioned Jesus protesting other people. The definition of a christian is “a follower of Christ” which this is obviously the opposite. Jesus thought love not hate, but hey, everyone is entitle to their own opinion, belief or disbelief.
“Jesus thought love not hate”
According to the bible, Jesus had love for those that followed him, but like these Westboro Baptist Church zealots, not for people of other religions or of Christian dissenters who might want to challenge his words.
Revelation 22:18-19 : “For I testify together to everyone who hears the Words of the prophecy of this Book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add on him the plagues that have been written in this Book. And if anyone takes away from the Words of the Book of this prophecy, God will take away his part out of the Book of Life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which have been written in this Book.”
I don’t know if I understood you correctly but in John 3:16 it states that he loved the world meaning everyone not just those who follow him. The text you are referring to has to do with those that add words or doctrines or take away words or doctrines to/from the book (Bible). This does not mean he hates. From a Bible perspective, anyone who does that is in violation of a law which will have an end result.
Why is this article here? The less we know about it, the more we don’t have to deal with it.
WBC wouldn’t be who they are today without people like you reporting on them. If I were editor, I would take this post down immediately and retrain my employee’s focus on shit that actually matters.
Those people hilarious, but unfortunately they are also seriously irrational.
In the photo, notice their sign “God Hates Jews”. These morons don’t even realize that Jesus was Jewish. The followers of Jesus were a Jewish sect that believed Jesus to be the Messiah prophesied in the Hebrew Bible. It wasn’t until hundreds of years later that Christianity as a separate religion came into existence.
So Christians who hate Jews must therefore hate Jesus, who is the demigod that their entire religion is based upon.
(͡° ͜ʖ°)
That’s so true. But again it just goes to show you how much they know.
They do for the reactions. They actually WANT someone to get so mad that they attack them afterwards they sue the cops, the owner’s of whatever site the attack occured, presumably whoever it was they were protesting against, and so on. It should come as no surprise that the founder of this cult of repressed whack-a-dos put many of his followers through law school. Just ignore them or smile and insult them, but don’t for any reason touch them or let them get your goat.
humans acting like God and judging others will be in hell or heaven, hopes they meet with god soon and see what the god will say about their act
“…they then (somewhat bizarrely) claim that Jobs was put on Earth to create Apple products, which are today used without complaint by the Westboro Baptist Church. To punish Apple for its user-friendliness, the loopy churchgoers are planning on picketing Apple …”
‘kay…wait – say what now?
I hearby proclaim any public gathering of the Westboro Baptist Church to be a protest against the Westboro Baptist Church.
What a bunch of brain dead racists they are. They are in effect saying that God hates Jesus, because Jesus was born a Jew, lived as a Jew and died a Jew. No wonder there’s so much gun violence in the US. Religious wars are part of natural selection. It rids the world of all the idiot zealots with no tolerance for others.
Unfortunately there are a lot innocent people that get caught in the crossfire of this natural selection. Such a shame.
How to fix the problem: Apple makes a public statement promising to donate $100 to cancer patients seeking their choice of alternative treatments for every Westboro Baptist protester that actually show up. Apple would then be committed to donate around $500 at best, because the number of protesters is sure to be in the single digits.