The College Fix

In an interview with the GW Patriot on Wednesday night, WBC organizer Shirley Phelps-Roper lashed out at homosexuals, taunted George Washington University students, and commented on the recent announcement of Kye Allums, the student athlete who became the first transgender athlete on a Division I basketball team.

Responding to questions about her church, Phelps said that the Westboro Baptist Church, led by Phelps-Roper’s father, Pastor Fred Phelps, is “the church of the Lord Jesus Christ that has plunked down in the middle of doomed America in the last hours of the last days of all.”

When asked about the possible turnout of hundreds of students, including the nearly 1,800 students that registered in some way for the counter protest early Thursday morning, Phelps-Roper said that she was disappointed.

“How many students go to that school,” she said, “10,000 and you only got 1,800? Come on! What’s up with that?”

She said she was aware that students from multiple schools were going to be in attendance. Early estimates of attendance were lower than previously expected.

“I have it on a good authority that there’s going to be some students from American University up there joining you … Between those two schools the most you can muster is 1,800?” she said. “That’s a sad darn showing, and it’s a little disappointing but we’re going to be up there anyway.”

Phelps-Roper was clear in her message against homosexuality, but often digressed into the bizarre.  At one point in the interview, when questioned about her feelings towards those whom she offends, she said, “OK, listen carefully –”  She then sang a short verse apparently to the tune of Ozzy Osbourne’s single ‘Crazy Train.’ “Crying about your feelings for your sin — no shame,” she sang, “you’re going straight to hell on your crazy train.”Her feelings, she said, are based on the Bible, which she said states clearly that homosexuality will lead to, as she said, spending “eternity in hell because you cried about your feelings instead of obeying your God.”

When asked about the recent news story featuring Kye Allums, a shooting guard on the George Washington University basketball team, Phelps-Roper said she heard the story in San Francisco and was eager to write about Allums.

“I wrote an editorial,” she said, “I didn’t write about [Allums].  I had a limit of words that I could write.”

During the interview she made references to Aerosmith’s hit song, ‘Dude (Looks like a Lady)’ while describing Allums as a “mutilation” and “a grotesque freak show.”  After stating her amazement at the announcement, Phelps-Roper offered a pointed attack.

“Her chromosomes don’t change and neither does her DNA,” she said, “she isn’t fooling God.”

After brief questioning, Phelps-Roper ended the phone call with a message to the GW student body.

“Your time is extremely short,” she said, “Put away your idols, put away your false gods, [and] put away your filthy, perverse manner of life.  Shut your mouths, get a Bible, read the words and obey your God. Your destruction is imminent.”

Phelps-Roper is also an attorney for the Westboro Baptist Church, which is currently involved in a Supreme Court case revolving around the picketing of military funerals.  Kye Allums is a junior at GW who recently announced that he identifies himself as a male, despite being biologically female.  Allums will continue to play on the women’s basketball team this year.

Check out audio excerpts from the interview at the GW Patriot.

Zachary Gorelick blogs at the GW Patriot. He is a contributor to the Student Free Press Association.

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