According to Christian News Network:
Evangelists that visited the largest free festival in the Southeast this past weekend say that police looked on while event-goers engaged in openly lewd acts and turned hostile toward the message of the Gospel.
Christians from at least nine states traveled to the Bele Chere festival in Asheville, North Carolina, to witness to the thousands that were expected to attend. The music and arts festival, which began in the 1970′s as a means to generate income for the community, is said to draw upwards of 350,000 people every year from across the country.
However, those who have been attending the annual festival for some time say that the event has become more perverse with each passing year.
I avoid Bele Chere at all costs, I will not even come within 10 miles of downtown. As stated above, it originally started as a means to generate income for the community. Now it is nothing more than a drunk fest & very few of the venders are local, so very little of the money spent there stays in town.
The more whacko street ‘preachers’ in attendance, the more perverse it becomes. Evidently, these louts are supposed to be free to taunt, insult and otherwise get in people’s faces to spew their hatred and stupidity, but if others take issue with them, it becomes the typical whining “poor persecuted Christians” mantra.
Don’t look if you don’t want to see. Personally I’d rather not see nutty street preachers spew their rhetoric at these events myself.