NEWS STORY: Jailed Anti-Gay Protesters Become Causes Celebres for Conservative Groups

c. 2005 Religion News Service (UNDATED) On Oct. 10, 2004, as Philadelphia police were hauling off to jail a group of Christian protesters at a gay pride rally, organizers of the event applauded what seemed to be a big victory. But after four months, the case is instead providing Christian conservatives with a rallying cry, […]

c. 2005 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) On Oct. 10, 2004, as Philadelphia police were hauling off to jail a group of Christian protesters at a gay pride rally, organizers of the event applauded what seemed to be a big victory.

But after four months, the case is instead providing Christian conservatives with a rallying cry, a fund-raising cause and a rare ally in the American Civil Liberties Union. Meanwhile, the gay advocacy camp is astir with questions as to whether a zealous prosecutor may have done their cause more harm than good.


At issue are three felony charges brought against Michael Marcavage, a 25-year-old activist who arrived with at least 10 followers and a bullhorn at Outfest, a celebration of homosexuality on the city’s streets. For ethnic intimidation, criminal conspiracy, and inciting a riot as well as five misdemeanor charges, Marcavage could theoretically face years in prison, although the prosecutor calls probation the likely outcome.

To the Mississippi-based American Family Association and other conservative Christian organizations, Marcavage and four charged cohorts are now revered as “The Philadelphia Five.” Among them, a minor also faces three felony charges; three other adults are charged only with misdemeanors. More than anything else, supporters see them as champions of the right to speak a religious viewpoint _ however unpopular _ in a public setting.

“That city is absolutely out of control,” said Brian Fahling, senior trial attorney with the AFA Center for Law & Policy, “and if we don’t (fight back), it will come to every city in America.”

Philadelphia District Attorney Lynne Abraham sees a different picture. She stands by her decision to prosecute Marcavage under a state statutory provision added in 2002 to include sexual orientation among a list of potential motives in hate crimes.

“This case is about conduct by specific people, not speech,” said Cathie Abookire, a spokesperson for the district attorney’s office. “You are allowed to be offensive. … It’s mind-boggling to think the DA would arrest people on speech charges.”

Abookire declined to explain how protesters had crossed the line demarcating free speech from illegal conduct, saying only, “We’ll present our arguments in the courtroom.”

Philly Pride, organizers of Outfest, say it’s clear the protesters acted illegally. On its Web site, Philly Pride says Marcavage and another protester entered the parade and “taunted both the onlookers and parade participants” until they were forced out by police.


“We use the term `illegally’ advisedly,” says the Web site’s explanation, “as the United States Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendment does not guarantee participation in a privately run and produced parade.”

On the Repent America Web site, Marcavage argues that because the parade was on a public street, protesters had a right to be there.

The outcome of a court conference Feb. 17 for the adults in the case will determine whether the case gets quashed, as the defense has requested, or if it advances to trial. At a preliminary hearing in December, a judge ruled there was sufficient evidence for the case to proceed.

Between the two poles in this case, debate centers on implications of trying to use a hate crime law to prosecute what may be offensive or potentially riot-inducing speech.

Members of Philadelphia-based Repent America provoked strong reactions at Outfest by wearing T-shirts and carrying signage conveying God’s displeasure with homosexuality. Outfest volunteers surrounded protesters with 8-foot-high pink poster boards and whistles to keep the group’s message from being seen or heard.

With the First Amendment of the Constitution on the front burner for both sides, this case is creating some strange bedfellows. David Tseng, a Washington lawyer and former executive director of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG), supports hate crime laws as “absolutely vital” to protect gays from acts of violence. But he joins Christian conservatives in worrying that this criminal case could usher in a dangerous precedent.


“One has to ask, `Are we swatting flies with a sledgehammer?”’ Tseng said. “Overuse or misuse of these kinds of laws certainly raises the specter of that. Their importance and effectiveness will ultimately be diminished, whether they are erased from the books or not.”

More concerns have come from the American Civil Liberties Union, which generally takes a wary view of hate crime bills for their potential to crimp freedoms. If a hate crime law is to be applied, the litmus test must center on deeds, not words, according to Mary Catherine Roper, staff attorney with the ACLU in Philadelphia.

“The idea that expressing an unpopular view is somehow inciting a riot _ that’s terrifying to me,” Roper said. “To say that expressing a minority view becomes an invitation to violence … that’s a slope we can’t step one foot down.”

(OPTIONAL TRIM FOLLOWS)

As the case gains attention, Christian conservatives and religious liberty watchdogs are warning the United States may be party to a troubling international trend. Ake Green, a Pentecostal preacher in Sweden, served a month in jail for allegedly fomenting hate against gays when he called homosexuality an abnormality and a sin in a 2003 sermon. In Canada, conservative Christians protested in April 2004 as the nation criminalized the dissemination of certain propaganda deemed to direct hatred against others on the basis of their sexual orientation.

“Christian speech is the disfavored speech of the moment,” Fahling said. To restrict it, especially in the United States, marks “a profound abuse of power.”

Supporters sympathetic with the Philadelphia Five’s message for homosexuals to repent are sending thank you notes, giving money for a countersuit in federal court and buying $15 videotapes that tell the story of what the AFA is calling “the clearest example of anti-Christian bigotry by city officials in the last century.”


“Christian conservative organizations have always done best when they’ve had a cause celebre,” said Dr. James Guth, professor of political science at Furman University and an expert on grass-roots Christian movements.

“What has often given stimulation to the action of Christian activists has often been some encroaching act of government.”

With a White House sympathetic to conservative Christian causes, he added, fund-raisers on the right are looking increasingly to municipal and foreign governments to provide the examples of state encroachment that help fill coffers.

Even so, less ideological voices say the Philadelphia case represents more than sensitivity on the part of conservatives who see homosexuality as a changeable condition and are willing to fight for the right to say so.

“I think it’s a growing issue around the country and around the world,” said Charles Haynes, senior scholar at the First Amendment Center in Arlington, Va. “It’s a tension between providing for tolerance and (providing for) free speech. … In my view, there shouldn’t be legislation that protects people from speech they don’t want to hear. … If we try to stop all speech that offends somebody, there wouldn’t be much left.”

MO/PH RNS END

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