Sean Penn wants Fred Phelps and family to "turn in their hate cards"
By Justin Kendall in Entertainment, Follow That Story
Mon., Feb. 23 2009 @ 10:14AM
I didn't watch the Academy Awards last night. OK, I did for like five minutes (too long). I tuned in just in time to see the "commie, homo-loving sons-of-guns" hand Sean Penn the best actor award for his role in Milk. I was too busy texting "bullshit" to Peter Rugg -- I mean, did you see The Wrestler? -- to listen to Penn's acceptance speech. I should have. He gave a shout-out to America's most hated family, the members of Fred Phelps' Westboro Baptist Church, who were picketing the Academy Awards.
"For those who saw the signs of hatred as our cars drove in tonight, I think that it is a good time for those who voted for the ban against gay marriage to sit and reflect and anticipate their great shame and the shame in their grandchildren's eyes if they continue that way of support," Penn said as he accepted the award. "We've got to have equal rights for everyone."
None of the stories about the show mentioned the Phelps family by name. Neither did Penn. But he kept talking about them in the post show Q&A.
"For those who saw the signs of hatred as our cars drove in tonight, I think that it is a good time for those who voted for the ban against gay marriage to sit and reflect and anticipate their great shame and the shame in their grandchildren's eyes if they continue that way of support," Penn said as he accepted the award. "We've got to have equal rights for everyone."
None of the stories about the show mentioned the Phelps family by name. Neither did Penn. But he kept talking about them in the post show Q&A.
What would you say to those people who were holding those [anti-gay protest] signs tonight?Sean, you're taking the Phelps family way, way too seriously. But I know they love the attention.I'd tell them to turn in their hate card and find their better self, you know. I think that these are largely taught limitations and ignorances ... and it's very sad in a way, because it's a demonstration of such emotional cowardice to be so afraid to be extending the same rights to a fellow man as you would want for yourself. I would ask them not to tempt those of us who see something more deeply than they are looking at it, as angry as they tend to be in a void.
One of the signs of the protesters out there said, "Heath [Ledger] is in hell." Can you comment on that?
I don't know what that means ... I think if we get used to dismissing these kinds of comments, rather than commenting on them, we'll be better off. It's meaningless jibberish. We've got to focus on people who are clear enough about what they mean.
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