“You are heading straight to hell,” they said. Well, maybe not straight. Either way, BuzzFeed News rang him afterwards to find out more.
Riyadh Khalaf, a YouTube star and radio journalist from Dublin, phoned Shirley Phelps, the head of the infamous "God Hates Fags" Westboro Baptist Church, for a nice chat. It didn't end well.
Riyadh Khalaf ringing Shirley Phelps, who likes to hold up GOD HATES FAGS placards.
Members of the Westboro Baptist Church spend much of their time picketing funerals, protesting pop concerts, and generally saying nasty things about gay people. Or "fags", as they like to call them. They love a placard. And Khalaf just wanted to say hi. After all, Phelps had left a comment under his last YouTube video, where he got his mum to read his Grindr messages. But Phelps wasn't as friendly as he'd hoped.
In fact, her first words were a bit mean: “Yikes. You are heading straight to hell. God. Hates. Fags."
YouTube
"You cannot change that standard," she said. "Doesn't matter if you can get this entire goofy disobedient nation. … Read the words and obey your god."
Khalaf decided that maybe it was better to call back and leave a voicemail.
