Owner and manager of a factory which caught fire on Saturday night killing at least 43 people fire department officials and the police say nearly 60 people were rescued but they don't expect to find any more bodies far far to say the building had no fire safety equipment and no safety certificates many of the dead were migrant laborers using sleeping quarters in the factory survivors said they heard people screaming in terror as the blaze took hold after 6 months of pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong the dolphin descended into violence a March by hundreds of thousands of people on Sunday ended peacefully tensions increased during the evening in a faceoff between police amassed demonstrators but the protesters eventually dispersed Hong Kong has been relatively calm since pro-democracy candidates won a landslide victory in local council elections pledges Albrecht's it made by the British prime minister Boris Johnson of again being called into question as the last week of general election campaigning got underway Mr Johnson insisted that under his draft deal there would be no checks in other directional goods between Northern Ireland and Great Britain but the b.b.c. Reality check correspondent says that according to late government documents good will be subject to declaration forms and in some cases tariffs on a number of people unaccounted for after a volcanic eruption in New Zealand and as many as 20 or ported to being injured the prime minister said about 100 people are believed to have been on White Island off the country's north island b.b.c. News. Welcome to hold Talk of the b.b.c. World Service with be sure Les they gave America to the fines they came home with body bags that's typical of the crude hate filled rhetoric propagated by Fred Phelps and his Westboro Baptist Church Meghan Fred's granddaughter enthusiastically joy his picket lines and carry placards plastered with these hate having to defend the church will social media though she began to doubt and eventually left she hates its message but can't bring yourself to blame those she loved the most Can't they can really still regard those who abused her blood torture to pray for more deaths taught her to hate as my wonderful beloved mom and dad make unfolds Roeper welcome to hard talk from the age of 5 until it's believed she won you were involved in your family's demonstrations later taking part in Pickett's of the funerals of dead soldiers in the United States can you just give us a sense of of what these events meant to describe kind of a typical day of protest for you we organized our entire lives around this what Westboro calls its picketing ministry so we saw it as the fulfillment of our duty to love thy neighbor to go out and warn people of the consequences of their sentence their sense included homosexuality fornication adultery divorce remarriage idolatry the list of senses and less and the understanding that I grew up with was that everyone outside of Westboro was hell bound and that you know our duty was to go and preach to them we were offering them a message of life and hope that our understanding was that this was the only path for people to go to heaven and to avoid the curses of God in this life as a child kind of describe you sense the look of what it was like it was exciting getting ready for great yeah I mean we again I was I was very happy because I thought we were doing good I thought and what we were doing was you know we were the good guys my understanding was that you know we were the good guys everyone else was was going to hell and so yeah you're going on you're standing on the picket line. And there's a lot of I mean often it was you know high energy people coming out and they were discussing these ideas that are you know it's what life is all about and so I was I was very happy you described in your book how you were willing participants in the most aggressive gay picketing campaign in the country had to see what's response to elicit from people who you were attempting to persuade to convert because we talked a lot about the hatred of God you know people assume that we were hateful so they and they responded to us in kind and generally there was a lot of hostility and antagonism you know people throwing things sometimes driving their cars at us yelling screaming I mean so it was I guess I do when I said high energy I mean it was it was generally very negative energy and for us that was proof of our righteousness because Jesus said bless it or you would mention will hate you and revile you and say all manner of evil against you falsely from my namesake So for us that was Graham said that we should take it as a badge of honor that people hated us the founder of the church the Reverend Fred Phelps Exactly and so my grandfather the church is almost entirely my extended family they saw eggs and beer and big plastic bottles filled with your and your right from behind really solid a watchful approach just to hit and stretch and shove and bellow and spit and grab for all sides all bodies all have the police ready to help but my parents kept a safe Yeah and that's that we saw because it was our duty to be out there I never saw it as you know something that my parents weren't putting us in danger at the criminals or putting us in danger I trusted Obviously my parents implicitly and as as we all generally do in work busted but looking back on it your parents weren't keeping you safe or you they were exposing you to verbal abuse a little putting you potentially in homes what but for them you know they believe that God is with them and requiring this of them we would be in far more danger if they didn't have us out there doing our duty to God And now do you. I still believe that obviously I see that they were putting us in the path of people's hatred but you know every time we would go to one of those protests especially out of town we contact the police department they were actively trying to keep us safe and I do think that the people who are committing crimes are the ones who are actually responsible for that and you still questioning even though your decision to leave no I mean it was something that I thought very I was it was a very considered decision when I left and almost immediately I started having experiences that helped me see that these things that I had been taught my entire life were entirely questionable and the things that I had taken totally for granted the the for the idea that other people were you know either evil or delusional ill intentioned almost immediately started meeting incredible people who clearly were trying to live life in the best way that they knew how so I I do not question at this point my decision to leave I'm interested though you used to cause that also the people whose views of use the families use judges with questionable That's a difficult yes I should. Be clear about yes I yes absolutely you want to just do this and yes you know under understood when I say questionable I mean I mean I have come to believe that they are that they are wrong I believed I knew when I left there were certain things that they did that were certainly unbiblical at this point I mean I still believe that I no longer see the Bible as the infallible word of God as I one stand and I don't think that Westboro is understanding of the world and how it works I have completely rejected that you describe in the book the closeness of your relationship with dual 'd family and your particular reading from particular surely Yes you say you became a right hand you your hopes of. Working very closely with her. Even though you've left the church even though you now have I think with the family you dedicated to the book to your parents Yeah and people listening to this and she would be surprised to say the least but. Well what I say in the dedication is I left the church but never them and that I never will because I don't believe that my family is the problem I believe that bad ideas they have been persuaded by bad ideas and that just like I was convinced persuaded to change my heart and mind that they can also be convinced. Because again I see them as good people who have been trapped by bad ideas what a wonderful full they're a well do you describe as somebody that couldn't be a greater treat to teach of the new I'm humbled to be with you right if you had a child absolutely I mean I obviously there are hard moments as there are for all families you know and the fact that my family believed strongly in physical punishment as as spoken of in the Bible but but because I was convinced I was persuaded of the goodness of those doctrines I was I was happy my conscience and my actions were in line and I felt like I was fulfilling a divine purpose so yeah I was I was very happy. Parents but is aware the reach is enough to say of your parents that that basically good people because that comes a point where if good people do things they don't really good people. I understand what you're saying and so this is where you know the epigraph of the book you know is this line from The Great Gatsby as reserving judgment as a matter of infinite hope and that is for me that is the posture of grace it is the picture of grace it's the idea of seeing people as being on a journey and and that there is hope for them to grow and evolve and change and be better and I believe that is possible of my family so if you want me to say that my family are I will absolutely say without without question and without carry out that they do evil things sometimes and that is extremely painful to look back and at my own past and know that I was doing evil things cruel things unmerciful things they're all children still in. The Westboro Baptist Church. Fellow The extended family the Lloyd elders who brought their children as they've joined up do you think the authorities knowing what they do know should intervene. That is a really you know I think that specifically in terms of you know just because of the 1st Amendment in the United States I don't think they have any standing to intervene when it comes to the doctrines I do think the physical punishment so this was something as I was getting writing the book there was a part of me that wanted not to write about that. But you know I didn't want to I had I feel this sense of wanting to protect my family as I think as we all generally do but it felt important to write about it for a number of reasons and part of it is because I do want them to be afraid to hurt their children that was something that it was was really emotional writing about that because you know they're as you say there are a lot of children there a whimper tickly explosive more he would ever say to annoy me and my sister got to be seen as each for fights he will for insufficient progress or piano lessons and they were bad they were the sort the left big red welts the kind that would bleed to bruises a blue and purple black you also talk about how your mother was beaten so badly by her father at one point that she was left with lifelong injuries that she still has to do with today that's child abuse I am absolutely and it took me a long time because I by that as I grew up I kind of accepted Westborough as view of those those those beatings you know they have there and then again there I quote in the book all these bible passages that the justify those things specifically him even the idea of beating children to the point of bruises that's in the Bible the blueness of the wound cleanse of the way evil and I absolutely do believe that is child of yes what you had with your family since you left which is what 7 years ago 7 years ago 7 years ago this week almost in almost nothing. I reach out to them regularly you know I because you know when I 1st left I despaired of ever having them back and then I pretty quickly came to you know to realize how dare I not have hope for them considering my own journey like if I could be persuaded by kind compassionate strangers who listened to where I was coming from considered my perspective and made it made their case and helped change my heart and mind I felt like I owe that to my family and they they invested these people who invested so much time and energy and resources and love in me I feel like I owe it to them and I also feel like I owe it to the people that they target because if I can help them moderate their positions and change their minds and that they will be hurting far fewer people I hope you talk about Twitter it's this is an important part of your story because huge part of my so you when told Twitter make an soaps. And it's slightly worse for social media we often associate as a mechanism for polarizing opinion for encouraging people to express themselves often in very short but very graphic way he's still to to open your blood could you explain a bit about that person. Absolutely So I mean I think the very 1st change that communication on Twitter brought in me came from the fact that it was so short so having this very 140 characters I recognized really quickly that the insults that my family throw around casually and when I got on Twitter and 1st there wasn't space for it and 2nd when I did insult people I could watch the conversation just completely go off the rails immediately and I didn't want to have these playground quarrels I was trying to have theological debates right so 1st I stopped insulting people and then like the more important parts were Twitter became an alternative for a source of community for me you know Westboro had been my only you know these they were the only people that I trusted that I felt close to it anyway and so the fact that there were among you know this De Lucia of hostility the fact that there were also these very kind of people asking questions and trying to I was seen them parts of their humanity in a way that I never had before and they were saying mine and it enabled these this conversation that eventually led to these for them finding internal inconsistency is in our doctrine the leader of the other 2 different legalism Truett last year social media companies are created allowed in the pool to extremists to lose then this huge from the religion to the street your experience of social media is one hopeful and certainly very different it suggests that it's possible for close not to break the suit just become close but potentially to hoop absolutely you know if I had visited Twitter in 2016 for the 1st time and I was talking to the woman who what when I was 1st on Twitter if she was showing me e-mails that she had written to the other Twitter executives explaining why I wasn't being kicked off the platform if she had done that I would not have had these experiences that let me see outside of West as ideology you know tool Twitter can be a tool for radicalization because you have extremists there trying to recruit people like why why aren't we. Doing things like it why aren't we in the mainstream people with better ideas trying to recruit people if we try to you know kick people off these platforms isolate them all that does is it lends them you know it pushes them deeper into these into this ideology they're all they have that is this echo chamber with no way out big dollar those in it for the authorities at the regulators the companies themselves because on the one hand we're worried about radicalization we've talked about in the cold set of extreme is based activity but actually it is said you were radicalized through your children and you were going through I could be a process of the radicalization and all go it versus you know I think people talk about Twitter being a cesspool for instance and I my response to that is I do believe that social media companies I'm sure that there are things that they can do but I also think that Twitter is a cesspool because we make it a cesspool we get to decide how we're going to engage people we can't give in to these you know very human impulses to respond you know in outrage when we see things that are outrageous or we can decide there's a human being on the other side of this and this person has as this is what people did for me right they recognize that I had a lifetime of experiences that led me to that place and that the way out was not to shame me but to help me see outside of it offer better ideas we've said already that the Westboro Baptist Church was for the. Family business and it was founded by a grandfather the late Fred Phelps who was it's pasta Among the things he said over the years was you can't believe the Bible without believing that God hates people it's pure nonsense to say God loves the sinner and hates the city hates the city hates the good do you think when you when you read back and you hear the things he said and apparently believed now here he definitely believe them he believes that the Bible was the literal and infallible word of God and that his understanding of it was unquestionable that he you know he was in his very smartest you know trained as a lawyer you know one all kinds of awards for his civil rights work so he. It's not a stupid person and that I think led him to this toxic sense of certainty in his own righteousness when I listen to those ideas I understand where he's coming from and I can quote you so many of the verses we spent all I mean every single day we were reading the Bible and memorizing these passages and we would stand on the picket line and we would quote them to people who also claim to believe the Bible and they were shocked that I don't believe the Bible anymore and it seemed such a heartbreaking waste of his you know time and energy and talents he did leave the Bible he would do you believe in God I do not. There there is so much of my upbringing though that I retain these ideas that I learned from religion ideas like Grace and hope and mercy compassion the importance of community there so much of my upbringing that I retain you so you don't believe the Bob you don't believe in God You quote the Bible course a lot so it's clearly in some ways still an inspiration No it absolutely is when I say I don't believe the Bible what I mean is I don't believe in the infallibility of the Bible there are a lot of things that I find in the Bible that I think are wonderful and they absolutely still guide my life it's just that I now feel free to discount and discredit the things that I think are on given do you think that this soap star Church is wrong given you think it distorting religion and fakes isn't it fair to say that this is really extremism must great as a religion subverting the u.s. Constitution hijacking the constitutional right to religious freedom in order to evolve schools so for instance I write in the book also about the Snyder v Phelps case that went to the u.s. Supreme Court I think it was the case in which the father of a dead Marine who feud reputed challenge the Royce of of West for to do that yes and while of course I I believe and wish that my family would stop doing things like that that they should not use the freedom that they have been getting they have been given as you know in the Bible it says as a cloak of maliciousness that is what I believe that they're doing there but I also think that the fact that I think that the justices were right in. In the decision making the decision that they made that we have to have and open marketplace of ideas that the importance of open robust public debate it has to it has to be the priority even if it extends to the colleagues of scenes that the people who used to pick it had to do it because you must have a very profound a deep sense of the distress Absolutely absolutely and that's something that I think about you know I think about it frequently it comes up in you know obviously there are a lot of things that trigger those memories and it is it is deeply distressing to me the things that I did specifically at at fune