Hundreds of students lined the walkway near the University Chapel Friday night in a candlelight protest of the Westboro Baptist Church’s planned picketing of “The Laramie Project,” a performance sponsored by Queer and Allied Activism as part of Proud to Be Out Week.
The WBC — a group based in Topeka, Kan. whose slogan is “God hates Fags” — sparked plans for a counterprotest when it announced it would be picketing “The Laramie Project,” a play based on the death of University of Wyoming freshman Matthew Shepard in a 1998 gay-hate crime.
In a statement released Nov. 8, the WBC announced its plans to picket at the University, writing, “Matt Shepard has been in Hell now for 6 years ... All else about Matt is trivial and irrelevant. You may join him soon. Deal with it.”
Members of the WBC, however, did not show up Friday evening.
When asked why the WBC did not follow through on plans to picket the performance at the University, WBC spokesperson Shirley Phelps-Roper stated in an e-mail, “We had the opportunity to turn aside from that and go picket Obama’s grand mama’s funeral. Now if you were us, which would you pick?”
QuAA President Heather Welborn said the University administration notified her last Monday that the WBC might be coming, and QuAA planned a counterprotest.
“We wanted to have something that would be empowering and show solidarity to show we don’t support the hateful rhetoric of the Westboro Baptist Church,” Welborn said, adding that QuAA planned to build a human wall to protect those who were coming to see the Laramie Project.
Welborn said about 500 people came to the counterprotest, where participants passed out candles and sang the “Good Ol’ Song.” Welborn said she suspected WBC was not going to show up when members of the organization had not arrived by their planned start time of 6:30 p.m.
“I think it was just so empowering that many people came out, and they didn’t leave [when the WBC didn’t come],” Welborn said. “They wanted to show that they were supportive of the show ... it was even more empowering without the Westboro Baptist Church there.”
Welborn said in the past there have been protests against other QuAA-sponsored programs, and most of these protests have come from groups outside of the University. Welborn added that she is grateful for all the support the University community showed by going to the show Friday night.
“It will be one of the things I walk away remembering U.Va. for,” Welborn said. “There is support within the U.Va. community ... I felt like everyone that came out and stayed shows how committed the community is to erasing hate.”
Others, however, were disappointed by WBC’s absence.
“I was disappointed that the Westboro Baptist Church didn’t actually show up,” protest participant Alex Wilkerson said. “However, I was very excited to see the overwhelming community support.”
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