They showed up to picket the Cambridge City Hall celebration of the legalization of gay marriage I attended back in 2004. There was this pathetic little knot of mean-spirited, brainwashed idiots holding their horrible signs. The Cambridge police marched out of their station a block away, immaculately dressed in riot gear, marched up onto Massachusetts Avenue, marched across in front of the Phelpsians, and did a precise face-left to face the Phelpsians, turning their backs on the teeming mobs of celebrants in front of City Hall.

It was, obviously, a memorable message. I wonder sometimes if the Phelpsians understood it.

I'm sure they were spewing their hate loudly, but I couldn't hear it over the impromptu brass band and the crowds singing, "Goin' to the Chapel." I doubt much of anyone else could either.