When the Westboro Baptist Church showed up to protest San Diego Comic-Con 2010, the SDCC con-goers showed up to protest right back – and they had much better signs.
About two weeks ago, we learned that the hateful protest-happy Westboro Baptist Church would be picketing this weekend’s San Diego Comic-Con because it equated comic-book fans loving Superman with idol worship or something like that. Well, the WBC showed up as promised – only they weren’t the only ones holding protest signs.
Comic-Con attendees were there in full force to hold a peaceful counter-protest, and according to one self-described “embedded journalist,” the Westboro Church members were “outnumbered, outgunned and police-protected.” Their signs were also significantly more boring, with the usual “God hates the USA/Gays/the Troops/Muslims/etc.”
Meanwhile, the Comic-Con crowd had some genuinely entertaining signs. The TF2 Spy proclaimed that the Almighty “[Hated] Sentries,” an anti-mutant activist exhorted Congress to “Pass the Mutant Registration Act Now,” and someone else just reassured everybody that God did, in fact, love “Gay Robin.”
And then there was Commander Shepard, endorsing this as their “favorite protest on the Citadel.”
Thanks to the creative signs and funny costumes – where else will you see a pink TF2 Pyro protesting alongside Lady Gaga? – I think it’s clear to say that in this case, good old-fashioned human compassion and peaceful-if-sarcastic humor beat out rampant hatred.
Nerds 1, Westboro Baptist 0.
(Many more pictures: BleedingCool)
