Atheist Ad Campaign
James Kellerman
I love this Atheist Bus Campaign. Originally conceived as a response to the Jesus said ads running on london buses the campaign managed to raise £135,000 to put ads on 800 buses, 1000 tube cards and a rolling ad on the LCD screen outside Bond St Station.
I like the simple positive design reflecting the equally positive message, that’s all people now stop worrying and enjoy your life.
Update: From the desk of Internet connected parents comes this almost unbearably ironic complaint from the organisation Christian Voice. From the BBC
But organisation Christian Voice has complained to the Advertising Standards Authority saying they break rules on substantiation and truthfulness...
...The ASA's code states "marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove all claims". The regulator said it would assess the complaint and decide whether to contact the advertiser.
But Stephen Green, national director of Christian Voice, said: "There is plenty of evidence for God, from people's personal experience, to the complexity, interdependence, beauty and design of the natural world.
"But there is scant evidence on the other side, so I think the advertisers are really going to struggle to show their claim is not an exaggeration or inaccurate, as the ASA code puts it."
I can not wait for this to go in front of the ASA, I only hope that all future ads run by religious organisations will have to meet the same standard of proof. I certainly hope that Russell's celestial teapot comes up during the discussion.
If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.