During this trip, so far, it\u00a0has been significantly less challenging to understand the emotions of several members of the Westboro Baptist Church. It also seems that some of the members feel more comfortable sharing their stories with us! While interviewing Kathy and Rebekah,\u00a0the latter’s passion for Domestic law stuck out to me. Here, I was able to relate to Rebekah’s desire to fight for those who don’t have a louder voice in our society.<\/p>\n
Domestic law encompasses many different cases including divorce, child support, domestic violence, employment law, paternity, and many more. As the Phelps’ law firm transitioned from primarily civil rights law to family law, Rebekah didn’t lose the passion to help those who needed it the most. She went on to elaborate upon a particular story in which she had worked to defend clients from a version of Child Protective Services. As she recalled the details, you could see the pain in her eyes, hear it in her tone of voice, and the rhetoric she utilized. She went on to say that “[Because of the peculiar circumstances] They went on to make a life-altering mistake… Separating a screaming [crying] child from their guardians… The only ones to show them love\u00a0and kindness… These people desperately\u00a0need help and no one will help them. We’re dealing with peoples’ lives.” Following the unfortunate ruling of this particular case, Rebekah goes on to say that she wrote a 15-page letter to try to overturn the decision.<\/p>\n
The specifics\u00a0of the story reminded me of struggles that both my own family has faced as well as friends in the community in which I grew up. Upon recalling some of my own memories, during the interview, I kept generating thoughts along the lines of “I wish [insert name here] would have had a Rebekah to fight for them then. To fight for them now.” I never met the late Fred Phelps Sr, however, some of his vehement passion certainly lives on through his family, in both their personal and professional lives. With each interview, I believe that we are challenged to pull out and perceive the story of the individual, and not that of the church member. As I go on to further my education in the field and practice of social work, I know that I will have to work through many demanding situations with difficult circumstances. One thing, going into this interview, that I had not anticipated was that I would leave feeling not only better about my passions, but a connection with a member of the Westboro Baptist Church. I want to fight for my clients as passionately as Rebekah does and also be an admirable force in the professional world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
During this trip, so far, it\u00a0has been significantly less challenging to understand the emotions of several members of the Westboro Baptist Church. It also seems that some of the members feel more comfortable sharing their stories with us! While interviewing Kathy and Rebekah,\u00a0the latter’s passion for Domestic law stuck out to me. Here, I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2442,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-252","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-student-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2442"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.miamioh.edu\/critical-distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}