Help This College Atheist Group Win $1,000

I just spent the evening with the Alliance of Happy Atheists at the University of Oregon — it was a wonderful night with a really active, fun group of people.

How can you not love a group that uses these signs?

They also went out of their way to promote my talk!

While we’re at it, how awesome is any campus atheist group that holds its own prom?

Anyway, it turns out they’re currently in a contest to win $1,000 and you can help them win the prize!

Here’s all you have to do:

1) “Like” the Courtside page on Facebook:

2) Click on the Poll “Which UO club do you think should win a GRAND?“:

3) Vote in the poll for the Alliance of Happy Atheists:

After you vote, you’re free to “unlike” the group. You can remove the Poll application by going to Account, Application Settings, and X-ing out “My Poll.”

As I write this, AHA is currently winning 122-84 over the second place team, but there is over a week left in the competition and I want to see them hold an insurmountable lead. Let’s see what we can do!*

(*At least until PZ Myers decides to have his way with it.)

Miko

This poll should have been restricted to UO. While it probably will teach them something about poll security, it’s really not the kind of poll that should be crashed. If you want to crash a poll that’s trying to put scientific issues to a vote, or which is trying to create a skewed result, or which is falsely pretending its results are scientific, have at it. In this case, however, you’ll be exploiting a loophole to make funding decisions with other people’s money, and the mere fact that you can doesn’t mean that you should.
Sackbut

I agree with Miko. I do wonder what other outside groups are influencing the voting for other clubs.

It should be noted that the poll uses the My Poll application. Voting in the poll would require authorizing that application, if you don’t already have it authorized. So it’s not simply a matter of liking and unliking the page involved. Not everybody wants to authorize every application that comes along on Facebook.
Reginald Selkirk

Ack!

Please do NOT vote for the “Men’s Club Ultimate Frisbee.” They apparently do not even know the correct name of their own sport. It is “Ultimate.” Just “Ultimate.” Frisbee is a trademark of the Wham-O Corporation.
Evilspud

Personally, I’d rather vote for the Rela for Life.

Either choice would be good cause though.
Alan E.

It should also be noted if you do vote that “Unliking” the group is not all you should do after you vote. You need to get rid of the application they use for the poll (something called “Polls” or something). Take note of the name before you accept the application! After you vote, go to Account>Application Settings. Find the name of the application you should have taken note of, and click the X on the far right on the same line. You can do this for any of the applications you don’t want anymore, or you can limit the settings on the applications you do want (highly recommended!)
Krissy

yeah, I was tempted to not vote, since I didn’t feel right skewing the results of a poll at a school I don’t attend, but given that a frat is in second place…I don’t really feel too bad.
‘Tis Himself

Sorry, not even for this contest will I sign up for Facebook.
Ashley

For people worried that this is somehow against school regulations, Courtside, the organization sponsoring the poll and giving away the $1,000 is not affiliated with the University of Oregon. Courtside is a brand new apartment complex being built near the new basketball arena (hence the name Courtside). There’s nothing wrong with non-UO people voting in the Courtside poll. They are not limiting who is allowed to vote in the poll.

Outside groups are most definitely influencing the poll, maybe it’s not ideal, but the UO doesn’t care… it’s not their poll.
Justice Has No God

Cool story:

It’s not a scientific poll, it’s a marketing gimmick. They’re just doing exactly what anybody else would do AND what Courtside wants which is to hawk their apartment complex as loud as possible to as many people. It’s not hurting you-oh in anyway, in fact, it’s promoting one of the recognized student groups. By voting for AHA! you’re actually CONTRIBUTING to the UO whereas if you vote for one of the fraternities it goes straight to next week’s kegger and police bribing.

Enjoy!