There is no short supply of the insane stories surrounding Westboro Baptist Church (due back in Denver supposedly in time for Pride Fest in a few weeks). In fact, it's nearly impossible to find a story about this organization that sounds like it remotely could be coming from this reality.
Look: We're all about free speech, and the right for folks to say whatever they damn well please. But after hearing the church's "re-writing" of Lady Gaga's "Telephone," and their rendering of "Poker Face" earlier this year, we're all for muzzling these nut jobs.
As it turns out, Westboro Baptist isn't new or innovative in their blatant theft of pop-culture to propagandize their teachings. This shit has been happening for centuries, and we've collected ten of our favorites below.
10. Fire by Nite's Star Trek Parody Fire By Nite was a children's show from the '90s broadcast by TBN. It apparently had no idea what kids were into, so it decided to try to utilize Star Trek as a means to advertise the message of Christ. The result is as inflammatory as it is racist.
9. Guitar PraiseConsidering Guitar Hero and Rock Band are already just clones of themselves at this point -- it's sort of amazing this existed. Actually, what's more amazing is the fact Activision didn't sue the pants off these guys, listening to the how-to guide at the end of the video makes it sound like an exact clone. It probably has something to do with the fact that nobody actually gave a shit about Guitar Praise.
8. I'm a Christ Follower This is certainly the most subdued of the religious parodies -- but that doesn't make it any less stupid. The Mac vs. PC commercials were good for one reason and one reason only: John Hodgeman, and we don't see him here.
7. "The Signs of Jesus" Have you ever seen Jesus rap? How about Jesus rapping with a Justin Timberlake impersonator? Well, now you can. We're pretty sure Jesus is playing the role of Snoop Dogg in this song, too. We actually tossed this one aside as a joke until we got to the end credits and noticed who owned the copyright (to a parody song?).
6. "I Kissed a Girl" Parody We have no idea where Cape Coral Christian School is, but if this video is any indication of the kind of talent they supply, then you can be absolutely certain you'll be hearing from these guys before Armageddon. Or not. (The irony of this one, BTW -- reworking a song by Katy Perry into a Christian ode -- is off the charts.)
05. Bible Adventures Have you played Super Mario Bros. 2? Yeah it was kind of a weird game in the series -- but a hell of a lot more fun than this clone could ever be. It's like they watched a kid playing Super Mario Bros. 2, saw that you picked up vegetables and then made a game based on that one mechanic.
04. The parody T-shirts Okay, we'll accept that many people do this, from pot-heads to rock bands, but these religious parody T-shirts using corporate branding for their marketing are a bit weird if you ask us -- but what the hell do we know about copyright law? Either way, the Call of Duty one matches the font of the original game perfectly, so we'd be hard pressed not to say it goes a little too far.
03. The Beaudettes You know what's funny in the Christian comedy world? After watching this clip we don't know either -- but we did laugh a few times for all the wrong reasons. Don't worry though -- they do a heck of a lot more -- check out this razzle-dazzle if the above clip wasn't enough for you, and if that doesn't work, maybe this BeeGees clip will.
02. Westboro Church - "I'll Be There" We feel very, very sorry for these kids. Remember the kid that got the record contract from doing a Lady Gaga cover? Well, these mini-America haters aren't getting shit for a contract, we can guarantee that much. At least when God smacks them after hearing this song there will be someone there to console them.
01. Super Noah's Ark 3D (Super 3D Noah's Ark?) One of our favorite games as kids was Wolfenstein 3D. If you've ever been curious about how to make that game awful then look no further than this re-skinned crap-fest where you shoot fruit at animals. How the hell does this have anything to do with the Bible, and why did they think this would pry our sinful eyes away from Wolfenstein? In Wolfenstein, we were afforded the opportunity to single handedly take down the Nazi regime and kill a robot-Hitler -- how much more positive can you get than that?
