Earlier this year, glam-poppers Panic! At the Disco generated headlines — and tons of community support — when they took on the controversial Westboro Baptist Church. After the homophobic organization announced plans to picket the band's Kansas City show (in protest of frontman Brendon Urie's comments to the press about his "sexual fluidity" and past sexual experimentation), the band struck back, by vowing to donate $20 to the LGBTQ charity Human Rights Campaign for every church member who showed up. When only 13 Westboro picketers actually arrived at the scene, the band simply rounded up their donation to $1,000; they gave 5 percent of that night's merchandise sales to the HRC as well.

Westboro retaliated with a poorly conceived Panic! At the Disco parody single, but clearly Urie and company won this battle. Sitting backstage months later, before their Yahoo On the Road show at the Comerica Theatre in Phoenix, Urie tells Yahoo Music that he has received nothing but positive feedback regarding the incident.

Photos: Panic! At the Disco performs for Yahoo On the Road

Read on as Urie talks about emotional teen fan responses, his own wild teen years (and how his very religious parents were always his biggest supporters despite all that), other causes near and dear to his heart… and if Panic will ever cover Westboro's funny flop single, "You Love Sin, What a Tragedy."

YAHOO MUSIC: What sort of response have you gotten from the whole Westboro feud? Are people mostly supportive?

BRENDON URIE: Yeah, it's encouraging and validating to see the positive response, because it gave us this attention for a cause that we already believe in. We already planned on donating to this charity of our choice, and it just gave us more attention. It kind of reinvigorated some hope for me for the future — because I haven't really gotten any negative feedback. It's all been positive. It seems like everybody agrees with us.

Really? You weren't bombarded with Twitter hate from homophobes, or anything like that?

No… I mean, I can go back and check! [laughs] I'd be curious now. No, we didn't. Everything was really positive. It was really cool to see that. When you make a move in that direction and you're not alone, it's a very validating feeling — that most people think what I'm thinking. That's really awesome.

Can you talk about any especially great responses you received from fans?

Oh, yeah. I got a couple of really moving tweets from a few fans, like maybe a couple days after the whole debauchery of Westboro. One in particular: A girl tweeted me a link to a Tumblr she had written, this whole thing, like, "You actually gave me the courage to come out to my parents and tell them who I am and what I believe in," all this stuff. That's a huge move. Because I remember telling my parents what I believed, and how terrified I was. Not having a support system can be so daunting. Psychologically, it takes a toll on you. You're like, "Am I worthless? What am I doing? Why do they not believe in me?" So it was really touching to see that I have, even if it's a small impact, some kind of impact. It's why I get to do what I do, because of fans. The fact that they show me such a positive response is, like, unreal.

What was it that you told your own parents that made you so terrified?

My family is very religious. So I remember when I was 17 and I had just joined the band... I was like, "Well, I just have to man up. I have to do this and kind of be a grownup. I need to sit down with my parents and act like an adult." And I sat down with them at the table in our living room. I said, "I'm so honest with you guys, and I want to tell you everything." So I went through it all: "I've been having sex casually. I've been dealing drugs on and off for the last few years." I laid it all out. And at the very end, I just laid the full atom bomb: "And I'm an atheist. I have been since I was 13. Just want you guys to know." That just crushed them. I felt terrible for years after that. But my parents were cool afterwards — as daunted as they were, and as shocked as they were and appalled at my information. It was really rough for like a few months, and then after that they were just like, "You know what? You're going to be who you're going to be, and regardless, we're proud of you." And that's a big move. They were so scared to know that instead of religion in college, I wanted to do a band. They were just like, "What are you doing? You're going to starve. You're not going to be able to make a living." But I am proud because the way they handled it was so cool. Because I was a maniac! I was a maniac as a teenager; I'm not going to sugarcoat it. I was crazy. But they were so cool about it.