Yesterday, I posted a video of a group of Chick-fil-A “Kiss-In” protesters mocking an elderly homeless street preacher in Chicago on Friday evening. Many commenters have asked for additional information about the man and the scene.
In walking around the small protest area, I saw the homeless man reading the Bible out loud. He was not shouting or confronting people when I saw him. It was so ordinary that I didn’t think to film him at that time. A little later, I saw people begin to gather around him, including someone writing in chalk on the ground right near where the man was sitting on a fence with his Bible in hand.
As I mentioned in my prior post, initially I saw people interacting with the homeless man civilly about theological issues, and have posted that video here.
But at some point I noticed that a crowd had surrounded the homeless man and was taunting him. I turned on my camera, and what you saw in the original video was unedited save for a few seconds at the end panning the crowd, including one person in the crowd high-fiving another as the confrontation ended; I have uploaded the entire unedited clip here.
Although the video I posted presents events in context, it could not possibly fully capture what it felt like to see the homeless man surrounded by people mocking him. It was hard not to jump in and defend him, but I wanted to keep filming. In all of the exchanges I witnessed, he remained calm, as he is in the video, even as people were in his face, literally.
There was chalk all around the man, but I didn’t videotape it all. You can see in the prior clip that there is a reference to the Bible, but I can’t read the rest.
Soon after the confrontation was over and people had left, I asked the homeless man what he thought of one specific chalking, an arrow pointed to where he was seated, “He’s Really Gay Deep Down.” Here is what he said:
Off-camera I asked the man if he was okay, and let him know I was sorry about what happened. He was unfazed for the most part, but thanked me for my concern. He asked me what church I go to, and after I told him, he said that he used to go there too.
A few minutes later, I thought to ask him if he would like anything to eat. He said he wouldn’t mind a chicken sandwich and a coke with no ice; I asked him if he wanted to try the peach milkshake and he thought that sounded nice too.
He asked for my name, and thanked me heartily. When I returned with the food, we figured out a way to wedge the milkshake into his shopping basket that was full of his clothes and other items, so that the shake wouldn’t tip over.
One big question has been the identity of the lead protester (in a plaid shirt) in the video confronting the homeless man.
It wasn’t something we planned to investigate.
But it turns out that the person voluntarily identified himself in the comments section as “Spencer Thayer” using that person’s verifiable email address (warning: profanity):
spencerthayer | August 5, 2012 at 1:44 pm
The preacher was equating Gay people to pigs and Satan. He was being loud and rude while using his Bible to interupt the event with the intent of shaming peoples life styles. He has his right to free speech, just as I had every right to call him out on his bullshit. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that ass hat Christian’s can’t be called out for being dick heads by other dick heads.
Besides the video is biased and edits out the shit he was saying to make him look like a victim. This “preacher” was nothing but a bigot. I asked and he agreed that Deuteronomy 22:24, which states raped women who do not scream loud enough should be stone, should be followed. He also said “lazy sons” should be stoned to death as well.
Fuck that guy and fuck any of you who agree with him.
The person in the video certainly looks like the Spencer “Thunderball” Thayer who was a longtime Chicago-area activist, most recently with the Occupy Chicago movement leading a crowd in October 2011 in a chant of “We are the 99%.” Thayer also was a member of a group “Chicago Cop Watch” whose goal, ironically enough, was to videotape police. Thayer also was an advocate of the “Chicago Principles” during the NATO summit, a set of defining principles for all of the groups protesting NATO to keep dissent from getting out. Thayer’s Twitter account has an Occupy graphic as his profile picture and many anti-capitalist tweets.
Who Thayer is is interesting and says a lot about how the Occupy movement occupies many protest movements, but that’s not what I took away from this whole episode.
I will always remember that street preacher holding his Bible as the crowd taunted him. I am grateful to have witnessed this man’s quiet strength and dignity.
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Comments
I think you did an awesome job. It was very nice of you to get that man some food.
The antics of the OWS and Gay marriage advocates are horrible. I think in their heart of hearts they think they are doing the right thing, but I don’t know what the heck they are thinking doing things like that. Couple that with the Prof in Tucson that taunted the young woman at the Chick-Fil-A drive thru and you know what kind of people they really are.
It just goes to show that we must be vigilant and have our phones out at all times to make sure everything is recorded accurately. There is no doubt that the Media is biased and will never show all the hate and anger coming from the OWS and GM advocates.
“I think in their heart of hearts they think they are doing the right thing….”
I’m sorry, but I must respectfully disagree. It is a frequent thing for those of us whose faith gives us grounding, comfort, balance, and self-respect to be utterly at a loss as to why those who oppose us and our faith are so terribly angry — even apoplectic — much of the time. I believe strongly that the answer to that conundrum lies in the fact that, like the Sadducees and Pharisees of Christ’s time, they are better at fooling others than they are at fooling themselves.
Deep down, in their heart of hearts, they *know* that the lives they have chosen for themselves fall largely outside the bounds of what is right. This sense of wrongdoing, of constantly walking down incorrect paths, saturates them with guilt and self-loathing. This inner shame most often takes the outward forms of hatred and anger.
I am equally convinced that this self-loathing is much of what drives the “gay rights” movement (among others). They seek legal, governmental, and societal acknowledgement as a means of shoring up their insistent but failing personal affirmations that what they are doing is “okay”. Unfortunately for them, their campaign is doomed for failure: even if tomorrow they received everything for which they have agitated so loudly, societal acceptance would do nothing to assuage the pain and conflict in their hearts.
I am far from perfect. I have a long way to go, much more of the refiner’s fire to experience. But I face that difficult journey in the sure knowledge that I am on the right road, and that my burdens of weakness, wrongdoing, and guilt will be swallowed up time and again in my Savior’s grace and love. This is the true way to happiness, peace, and self-acceptance.
When I watch the videos showing the foulness heaped upon that humble yet dignified man, I think of Christ in the palace of Caiaphas: “Then did they spit in his face, and buffeted him; and others smote him with the palms of their hands.” In so doing, his attackers reveal much more about themselves and their motives than they would ever knowingly wish us to see.
I touched on this below. They are unwitting pawns of Satan. It’s sad, because little do they know is that all he wants to do is destroy them and make them hurt others. You can’t hate them though because that is exactly what Satan wants us to do to cause discord. I’ve been guilty of this but I recognize it is wrong when I do it and apologize. It feels really good to not be so angry. I wish more people would realize there is an answer.
Jesus saved me when I was 22 and I’m 23 now, and I feel completely alien compared to my generation…but that’s the point. I gotta a looooottt of souls to help save.
I agree with you completely as to the motivations and inner turmoil of the homosexual militants. God is the enemy of the evil that possesses them to behave as they do toward those who don’t accept their militancy.
Little has changed in 2000 years.
And Adam Smith in Tucson claims he was doing the right thing too while he abused young Rachel.
These progressive thugs wouldn’t recognize the right thing if it hit them on the forehead…
How did you know I named my baseball bat “The Right Thing”? 🙂
I think that guy nailed it.
His name is ‘Spencer’?
/Trust fund kiddie
Oh — and as Justin already said and I neglected to — good job Anne.
Thank you.
Nothing made me angrier than this incident with the elderly, well mannered man. The disrespect is despicable. And that guy Spencer, just a punk. A Bill Ayers wanna be punk.
What these gay activists refuse to accept is that they are a very, very small minority of less than 1%. If they have any chance at all of being accepted as “normal”, they need to start acting “normal”. They hate it when us normals point out how degenerate and rude their public behavior is but then they insist on staging their obscenely pornographic gay pride parades for all to see their degenerate, rude and obscenely pornographic behavior.
In every state where gay marriage was placed on the ballot, and we are up to 32 states so far, voters have voted it down. To have the courts manufacture constitutional law that in effect calls those voters bigots doesn’t help. It angers us further.
So go ahead and keep it up. It’s like listening to the jihad apologists telling us that when the Religion of Perpetual Outrage shouts “Death to infidels”, it is just harmless rhetoric. That their words and actions do not reflect what they are about. That the problem lies within US for not having the proper sensitivity and nuance to understand us as they try to butcher us.
They can’t win. Eventually, they have to face the people they hate and we outnumber them by maybe 200 to 1.
“God bless them,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said of Occupy Wall Street
She also said “Fly my pretties, fly” to taunt that homeless street preacher holding his Bible.
“Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that ass hat Christian’s can’t be called out for being dick heads by other dick heads.”
Now really, who can quibble with THAT irreproachable logic? It raises such a find Constitutional point of law, does it not?
(Do I need a sarc tag…?)
I am grateful that the jury system allows for the concept of “fighting words”, and it is applied with common sense here in Texas.
As the author of “Conan The Barbarian” observed, (and I paraphrase) civilized people are much less civilized than barbarians.
“…I asked and he agreed that Deuteronomy 22:24, which states raped women who do not scream loud enough should be stone,…”
Nice of him to have bothered himself to learn a Bible reference, but he should have spent less effort committing it to memory, and more time reading it. It says no such thing about “raped women”, the next paragraph addresses rape, and clearly states that, (DEUT. XXII:25) “…But if a man find a betrothed damsel in the field, and the man force her, and lie with her: then the man only that lay with her shall die; …”
[K.J.V., Oxford University Press for t
The British and Foreign Bible Society, M.DCCC.LXXVII.]
What is it about ignorance, that it has become so fashionable to put it on public display?
Sorry, it is about rape, and the text makes the distinction between what happens to the woman raped in the city as opposed to the one raped in the countryside. You cannot ignore the wider context which is Deut. 22.22-27, nor the beginning of the if-then construct in 22.23. So, while 22.24, the then part, is silent on rape, 22.23 makes the subject quite clear.
The point of the verse is to try to separate consensual immorality from rape. The ‘calling out’ part is about the woman consenting vs. not consenting.
It’s so interesting that the commenter brought this verse up. Once I was surrounded by devout Muslims, yelling about that verse to me, a Christian, saying my Bible was bad because of it. (I guess they were trying somehow to convince me that I, a bareheaded Christian woman, had less rights than a Muslim woman).
But there is a massive degree of Bible illiteracy among young people, since it’s not read in school as even an artifact of the last several millenia of human thought. Christians believe that God made a new covenant with His people via Jesus – we don’t follow OT laws in the least. They were civil laws meant for a time when God had a covenant with the physical nation of Israel.
I should add that I don’t find fault with God’s laws that He made for Israel in Deuteronomy. As I said about the rape law, it makes perfect sense and seems to protect women.
We don’t follow the ceremonial law, but we do observe the Decalogue, through Christ, of course.
As for the other, yes, there is that distinction, that implication that the woman is party to what sounds like a rough one night stand. Her failing to cry out signals consent to her rape.
The gist I got from it was that “in the city” part assumes a woman committing adultery and then later claiming rape – hence why she did not cry out for help during the actual act.
The latter “in the country” part assumes innocence, period, given that she may have called out and simply not been heard.
It’s hardly up to modern standards, but it still gives the woman more leeway than Islam’s bizarre “four male witnesses” requirement.
Of course, I can’t think of anywhere in the Western world where Jews and Christians still stone people for adultery. In fact, even fourteen centuries ago, in and around what is now Medina, the Jews who had settled there had put an end to the practice of killing adulterers, resorting instead to public humiliation.
That was, of course, before Muhammad showed up and insisted they stone a pair of adulterers, in a bit of theater aimed at proving how much greater a holy authority he was:
http://www.searchtruth.com/book_display.php?book=60&translator=1&start=79&number=79
For the record, Juba, I’m not one of the ones who gave your comment a negative. I give you credit for looking up the passage and speaking out according to what you perceived and your individual judgement.
That guy is not that old to be called elderly & he speaks very well.
Years ago there used to be a city park where people used to bring their soapboxes & stand up & give lectures. It was great entertainment to wander around & listen to all sorts of viewpoints.
At 14 I used to catch the train on Sundays wondering who would be there & what they would say. It did not hurt that it also attracted some boys with long hair lazing around on the grass.
I would listen to this wise man today. It is just a shame the standard of boys has fallen.
The country where I was born has a Square like that. They call it the University of XX Square.
turd blossom – scraggly weed with flowering top which thrives in fecal matter
Agreed that those guys were assholes… but why label the street preacher as ‘homeless’ 10 times in this short post? That seems to diminish this man, and seems like something a lib would try and hammer home for the shame factor.
It points out not just the guy’s status in society but also his vulnerability that was out there for all of them to see. Seeing it, they hated what he represents so much that they lacked compassion for him and would not entertain him. Be careful how you treat strangers cuz sometimes you entertain angels.
Anne, you entertained the homeless stranger like they should have but didn’t.
So, constantly referring to this man as, “homeless” is not demeaning to him? In a two minute face-to-face conversation with him, you would call him homeless ten times?
We are supposed to be the ones who are tolerant and don’t label others. Leave that to the Progs.
If he’s homeless, he’s homeless. What do you want us to call him? I haven’t heard people use another term for someone who lives on the street in maybe forever.
I guess Streetwalker is taken.
I think you’re nitpicking now. Homeless is homeless, Is is is!
Mentioning the man’s homelessness in overkill mode is an important technique to drive home these Regime Soldiers present themselves as Occupiers and All the other good-cause protests they are involved, as advocate of the poor. They present themselves as champion of the poor. They use the poor, like the homeless, as their reason for righteous violence and law-breaking.
I agree 100% with the poster who pointed out that these protesters consider themselves champions of the poor, so if they were going to walk their talk they would never launch an assault like this. What struck me even more about him being homeless was that the guy had no safe place to go in order to escape these attackers. In my mind that makes their actions even more despicable, he was their truly helpless captive audience and they exploited that to the fullest.
Spencer Thayer is this and that and this and that … but really … he’s just the typical perpetual adolescent giving himself goosebumps by his “radical,” “edgy,” “revolutionary” kiddy playacting.
His type are the most boring, most predictable, most tedious little insecure tweerps and hipsters with chronic self-esteem issues.
Complete dorks, for short.
or self righteous bullies
With potty mouths!
There is a tremendous amount of hate out there. And it is almost all coming from Spencer and his left-wing, anarchist OWS friends…
Poor Spencer. He couldn’t get Deut. 22.24 right (he would have freaked totally if the man had been reading Deut 23.17). It’s about intentionality. It’s not whether the young woman cried out loud enough but about whether, being in a city where she can be heard, she cries out at all for help that is close at hand. But that is small potatoes besides feeling “He was being loud and rude while using his Bible to interupt the event with the intent of shaming peoples life styles.” That there is the crux of the matter. That’s why orthodox Judaeo-Christians must be silenced. It’s not about what the homeless man was doing. It’s about the Bible, its Author, and what the Bible says about sin in general, and homosexuality in particular in this instance, and how it makes us feel. Our sin shames us. In spite of decades of “we’re here, we’re queer, we’re in your face, get used to it!”, Spencer has told us that what the Bible said is true. The Word condemns our sin, convicts us, makes us aware of our need to repent. In this case, though, that feeling of shame and the need to repent is angrily rejected and the person reminding of it must be publicly scorned. Oh, yes. The battle is indeed not against us. It is against God.
Great job, Anne.
I’m not interested in condemning the gay crowd as sinners, though it would be hard to say their style is exactly “natural”. Breaking social norms can be good and “empowering”, but it seems to become addictive for some to be outlandish and confrontational.
The left is much the same, even without the gaiety. They just seem to get off on going on their tirades, and are even worse in gangs. Maybe it is rebellion against God, or maybe they just still have issues with all those rules their parents laid on them?
The cult of the PC left demands obedience. Their leftist theology sets them apart as chosen ones (in their ego driven world), and condemns to hell the “ignorant” that are too blind to see their (perceived) supremacy.
The radical left and the radical gay/lesbian gang are both at odds with “composite America”, which is conservative leaning and more accepting of age old tradition, even if they don’t believe those traditions came down from God.
There may be a very few “Bible thumpers” that become a little overbearing, but when it comes to venom and hate, the left dominates. The rules for radicals even seems to encourage it. Being an Alinsky liberal is an anti-social disease, as evidenced by Obama.
http://politicalarena.org/saul-alinsky%E2%80%99s-rules-for-radicals/
” Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
The courage on display here is quite moving, and I’m not talking about the self-righteously satisfied young men. The fact they needed a herd of fellow true-believers around them to verbally abuse a single elderly man explains a lot, such as why they don’t speak their “truth” to the religion that actually, you know, kills homosexuals. Cowards.
I hope Anne attends these events with a big can of pepper spray and several burly friends.
These OWS/Pink Mafia types are certainly not to be taken lightly and they don’t exactly hold to the same view of “non-violent protests” often attributed to Gandhi…
Only a gutless puke would call himself thunderball. Nice job living up to the name. Oh wait he picked a fight with an old homeless guy with all his buddies around. What an F-ing coward.
[…] Insurrection: Occupy Chicago activist claims to be person taunting homeless man at Chick-fil-A protest Posted in Delusional Lefties, Drama Queens, Gay Mafia, Just plain disgusting, Uncivil and […]
Wow… I’m in complete awe.
While I agree with Spencer’s actions being indefensible and juvenile, remember that he is being used as one of Satan’s pawns. Satan hates Christianity because he know those of us who are true, born-again, spirit filled Believers will stand up for God’s Word with our lives, and he intends to make us do just that. If anything, we are trying to protect gay people because homosexual men have a 20 to 25 years less life expectancy and many more mental disorders.
http://www.godandscience.org/doctrine/homosexuality.html
http://www.godandscience.org/evolution/genetics_of_homosexuality.html
(studies are in the links at the bottom)
It’s not okay for Spencer and his cohorts to do what they did, but it isn’t okay for us to return the vitriol. His actions speak loud enough – he does have a problem with God but God still wants him to be saved if he can detach his emotions from things that offend him. For some people it is just not possible and they will pay for it. Honestly, before I was born again I always knew in the back of my mind that the Bible was real and that any of it’s ‘contradictions’, etc. probably had a pretty good explanation. God could not allow the Israeli’s to harbor evil people because they were His nation and he wanted them to be strong and therefore they had to purge evil.
Let Spencer be angry. It is through our sins that we are convicted to repent. I was angry and depressed for years and hurt people I really loved. Jesus fixed it all in a matter of seconds about a year ago. It was incredible and I will never, ever give up my faith because it is tangible and incredible.
God is working to redeem this country because we will be needed to destroy those who seek to destroy Israel. Hopefully Spencer can become one of the redeemed – but first he needs to acknowledge the folly of his ways.
What are the odds that “Thunderball” would recognize a wrench, hammer, bank statement, or a past due notice? Slim to none, I’d guess. He is likely a trust fund baby subsidized by some sort of community organizing arm of a John Podesta/Van Jones front group.
Thanks for doing this, Ann. It is very illustrative of what we are facing.
It isn’t going to get better for awhile but it will. We just all need to make sure we show up and vote. Most of these people are too attached to their beliefs and don’t care what the truth is – but not all. And for those that aren’t, conservatives need to be able to recognize them so they can be converting. We will win, we will. Evil will be destroyed. It’s just going to take time and a ton of effort and sacrifice.
Interesting how “Spencer” (if that really is his name) pointedly cited the “lazy sons” passage. I wonder if that hits a little close to home with him.
But as is typical of the Christophobic left, they merely parrot what someone else told them about their political and social enemies. He doesn’t even understand there is a separation between the period before Christ which fell under the Law, and the time of Christ which replaces the Law with faith. He just assumes that Christians live under the Old Testament system.
Funny… how those on our side make a concerted effort to study and understand those we disagree with, but the vile left makes no such effort and simply lives by arrogant assumption.
And by funny, I mean…
[…] […]
One day, Spencer Thayer [if that is his real name] will confront someone with his vile mouth and he will have to pick up his teeth with a broken arm.
Well, I am inspired. Wonder what will happen when I just sit amongst protesters with a Bible in plain view, reading it at a mumble level or even silently?? Even more interesting would be to have someone sitting nearby quietly reading the Koran? Interesting exercise for us to document. I don’t think it is even necessary to read aloud. I don’t think I will even engage in Bible questions. Just be friendly with, “Well, hello, (extend hand) I am XXXX, and you are?” Nice to meet you?” It drives these types of people crazy (ok crazier) when you are just plain nice and cheerful. They go ballistic quicker and will be sure to get videoed before the batteries run out! Also, “And?” as a response sends them into a tailspin. As doe, “Oh, (with a smile of comraderie)We have some common ground. This is soooo encouraging to make new likeminded friends.” This last drives them nuts because they are upset you misunderstood and now think they are like you. Sort of Play ChattyCathy, so to speak. Yep, this could be a good exercise.
[…] Legal Insurrection: Occupy Chicago activist claims to be person taunting homeless man at Chick-fil-A protest […]
Would not Christ’s prevention of the mob from stoning the aldulterous woman with the admonishment “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone” COMPLETELY NULLIFY the passage from Deuteronomy?
I have no problem with people who choose this lifestyle. Most who choose it DO NOT act in this manner. Granted I was spoiled, having been exposed to people like this since I was young and my family being fine with them.
What I have issue is, the forcing of acceptance. There are some you cannot make to accept your lifestyle, there are some you can. To go down the path of the Black Panthers (except with help from liberal-minded government) rather than Martin Luther King Jr, that is the most stupid thing you can do and shoots you in the foot.
Good on the homeless man for keeping calm. The Occupier was just another greedy sonnovabitch who wanted the world handed to him on a silver platter and didn’t.
[…] […]
Dear Anne, You are my kind of pal – it was gracious of you to provide meat and drink to the heroic gent.
The daffy little jerk, “Thunderball?,” just may be a nephew of Chicago’s pan-pest and utility jerque Andy Thayer.
I wrote about the little hump when he was taping police officers doing their work.
Wee Spencer is a darb, ain’t he just?
IF the preacher was making comments about gay people in a negative way then he most certainly deserved what was shown. Lacking mental illness, his presence there was clearly to agitate and irritate the protesters. He has the right to do that but they have the same right to respond. I hate OWS but anybody filming cops is doing good work if they release unedited version. The cops are out of control and the video is there to prove what so many had tried so hard to deny.
[…] mocker of the black man who was reading his bible near the Chick-fil-A franchise in Chicago is also part of OWS. Indeed he seems a participant in demonstrations for a great many far left causes. Of course he he […]
[…] in Chicago. The most obnoxious of the gay brownshirts was evidently a moonbat named Spencer Thayer. Legal Insurrection has details: The person in the video certainly looks like the Spencer “Thunderball” Thayer who […]