Meet Your Neighborhood Atheists October 15, 2010

Meet Your Neighborhood Atheists

By Guest Contributor
October 15, 2010

This may be the best atheist ad campaign yet.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation is putting up 13 king-size bus ads and one billboard in Madison, WI where their headquarters are located. (I count 14 in the set, though, and I’m not sure where the discrepancy is.) The campaign is supposedly going to extend across the nation, with local atheists being featured in their cities’ ads.

The ads feature regular people, in their own words, with a background that’s colorful and attention-getting. The font verges on Comic Sans, but I like it — it gives it all a more personal touch.

There’s a theme behind all the images: Atheists are regular people, despite what your pastor, priest, or parents may have told you. There’s no need to fear us or fear becoming one of us.

Beautiful and positive. How awesome is that?

***Update***: As the commenters were quick to point out, that’s a whole lotta white people in the ads. I still like the campaign but I’m surprised FFRF overlooked any minority representation.

***Update 2***: Annie Laurie Gaylor, the co-president of FFRF, responds to the “whole lotta white people” comments here.

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  • spink

    They are corny, but great!

  • If you ran these in Oklahoma or something they would probably set fire to the buses and claim these ads were a hate crime. That being said, they are well done!

  • Maliknant

    I absolutely love these! Great positive message to put out there.

  • Geri Faustich

    Proud to be from Wisconsin!

  • Little James

    These are great, except for two of them which I think will be instantly misconstrued:

    Theists will see the slogan “I have faith in myself, not a God” and say “See?? Atheists just worship themselves! So arrogant and smug!” [Maybe a better slogan would have been something less self-centered, like “I look to my friends and family for comfort, not a god”]

    They will see “Chemistry and the unconscious force of physics are my gods” and say “See?? Atheists just worship science! Science and atheism are just religions!” A short sound-byte to a hostile audience is no place to be making subtle references to Spinozan philosophy 😉

  • Carl

    Katie is in there twice, so there’s 14 ads by 13 people. Maybe that explains the discrepancy?

  • Sarah TX

    That’s a lotta white folks…

  • ditto what @Sarah TX said.

  • I have to agree with both Spink and Little James. I don’t mean to stand on the sidelines and throw stones at the people who are actually doing the work (I contribute regularly to FFRF), but…

    Number one, surely there’s a way to get the public to accept non-theists as valid members of society without being as corny as religion.

    Number two, what Little James said:

    They will see “Chemistry and the unconscious force of physics are my gods” and say “See?? Atheists just worship science! Science and atheism are just religions!” A short sound-byte to a hostile audience is no place to be making subtle references to Spinozan philosophy

    …well put. But hey, in the end, most anything that mainstreams non-theism and non-religion is a good thing.

  • Hypatia’s Daughter

    Most are kind of….Meh. But I like Annie Laurie’s “Give me human rights over religious rites.”

  • Vas

    Boy that IS a whole lotta white folks! It reminds me of parties at the yacht club after a regatta.

  • Richard P.

    Now that’s awesome.
    You really think there corny.. Really. I think there just what’s needed, nice, simple and concise.

  • I wish more panels and initiatives at skeptic conferences and elsewhere were focused on the lack of racial diversity in the skeptic community. There are TONS of non-white skeptics out there, so it’s just a matter of making that connection with the larger community. It should be a priority.

  • I do like the idea of the billboards, and I hope to see some up around my neighborhood. But I have to agree, that’s a whole lotta white folk.

  • ewan

    that’s a whole lotta white folk

    Is anyone actually going to draw a conclusion from that, or just hide behind vague snarky innuendo?

    If you’re saying the FFRF is racist, say so, if you’re not, you might want to make it clear what you are saying, because right now, it isn’t.

  • Little James

    If you’re saying the FFRF is racist, say so, if you’re not, you might want to make it clear what you are saying, because right now, it isn’t.

    I don’t think anyone is saying FFRF is racist and I didn’t interpret those comments as innuendo. I understood the commenters as saying that these billboards don’t portray atheism as a very ethnically diverse group.

  • Kamaka

    These are great, except for two of them which I think will be instantly misconstrued:

    Oh, I think the entire project will be misconstrued.

    “No one died for my sins.” Break out the smelling salts, fainting is imminent!

  • J. J. Ramsey

    Kamaka:

    Oh, I think the entire project will be misconstrued.

    “No one died for my sins.” Break out the smelling salts, fainting is imminent!

    Yes, but “No one died for my sins” is defensible on account of it being a straightforward conclusion of atheism. While it’s brash, it’s not reasonably construable as “Teh Thiests Iz Stoopid,” nor is it particularly arrogant on other grounds.

    Personally, I find “I have faith in myself” to be a bit cringeworthy simply because, well, I don’t. I have a mild and somewhat conditional trust of myself and a healthy appreciation for human fallibility. Indeed, the latter is part of why I am an atheist: learning how well-meaning people who aren’t dumb can nonetheless pass along very false ideas.

  • Kamaka

    Yes, but “No one died for my sins” is defensible on account of it being a straightforward conclusion of atheism.

    I agree. But I think the jesus-bullies will have a lot to say about that one. Given it’s an ex-catholic that’s blaspheming so, I predict the Madison diocese will be chiming in shortly.

  • Let’s say every single atheist was a white male. Who cares?

    The racial constitution of a group implies nothing sinister about said group.

  • Margy

    Implying that the FFRF is racist is one hell of a stretch. But I did immediately note the absence of ethnic diversity, and I found it puzzling and disheartening. The title of this article is “Meet Your Neighborhood Atheists.” Well, in MY neighborhood, my Chinese-American neighbors are atheist, and in Hemant’s neighborhood, he, at least, is atheist–but none of these people are represented in these ads. Why not?

  • Chris M

    If you’ve watched the news lately then you know that a lack of diversity will be picked up on. I like the personal touch but you couldn’t find one black person in all of Wisconsin?

  • Michelle

    I have a brown husband that would be sure to volunteer if it comes to IL.

  • I do concur that there are a lot of white people there. I don’t think it has anything to do with racism (overtly anyway), but I sure hope they are able to get some minorities on those billboards.

    I am glad that there are quite a number of women up there. That’s fantastic. Getting some minority women would be doubly fantastic, but a few minority guys would be fantastic as well. How about Sikivu(sic?) Hutchinson, Hemant, Masala Skeptic, or xxxThePeachxxx?

    I’d recommend Ayaan Hirsi Ali, but I think these billboards should probably be limited to Americans.

  • Grimalkin

    The first one is different from the rest. I hope the discrepancy isn’t that it’s not part of the bundle because it’s definitely my favourite.

    I did immediately notice the lack of non-whites as well. While I equally hate the idea of “token diversity,” it’s not like it’s hard to find a non-white atheist. We have a prominent one right here writing this blog!

    Nothing wrong with corny…

  • Casey Crisp

    @Supercheetah: The problem with those people is that ads are featuring locals on the signs.

    I wouldn’t think it’d be that hard to find some token atheist diversity in Madison though…

    All in all though, I like these ads a whole lot more than most of the previous FFRF ads.

  • Is Wisconsin a particularly white state?

  • Tony Harvey

    If you trust Wikipedia – and why not – based on the demographic break down in Madison, WI there should be the following number of signs per race.

    White 10.9148
    Black 0.7592
    Asian 0.754
    Native American 0.0468
    Pacific Islander 0.0052
    Hispanic 0.5317

    All and all a pretty white place at 83.96%.

    Don’t know if having all whites in the ads is racist – it may just be a rounding error! 🙂

  • Drew M.

    Hah. I’m a rather brown person (hispanic) and I didn’t even notice their color until I read Hemant’s update.

    I’d bet it was self-selecting when FFRF did the casting call. I wouldn’t do it myself.

  • I’m just glad that the people in these ads are real actual Atheists. Some we even know and recognize easily. No clip-art here! Excellent!

    But that font…it’s really hard to read. Looks like a child wrote it. No offense to children. :o)

    The FFRF ROCKS! More more more!

  • nice work. still there’s a whole lot of white folks. am sure it’s nothing racial, coz racism is a religion thing.

  • I like the last one the best, although I think I would word it differently.

    “I’ll take human rights over religious wrongs.”

  • Those ads work for me.

  • flatlander100

    Grimalkin:

    Yup. The first one — bikin’ bakin’ and sleepin’ in on Sundays — is my favorite too. No heavy message other than “Atheists are regular folks who like the same things many of you do, sleeping in on Sundays included.” I.e. no horns, no eating babies, no cloven hooves. Others want to Make A Statement about human rights vs religious rites, fine. But I think the first one may be the most effective in doing what I presume this particular campaign was intended to do.

  • Jim

    I’ll be honest and admit that I didn’t notice the lack of diversity in skin color until someone else pointed it out.

    But here’s the thing. For those of you who aren’t from the Midwest and haven’t spent any time in Wisconsin (I’m from Chicago myself), the state isn’t exactly known for its abundance of brown people. From what I could tell just about everyone in those ads was from Madison, and a quick search of Wikipedia shows that at last count the city was 84% white. So if the FFRF chose which atheists to feature on its ads without any consideration given to skin color, there was always a decent chance that just about everyone featured would be white.

    In any case, I certainly think there’s still a debate to be had here. I’m not oblivious to the fact that there are many would-be atheists from minority ethnicities who face a much more difficult time coming out of the closet than do European-descended whites like myself. Indians from Hindu backgrounds, Mexicans from Catholic families, and African-Americans from Black Evangelical backgrounds come to mind. Current and future atheists stand to gain a great deal the more people realize that’s it ok not to believe, and non-believers of all backgrounds won’t be so afraid to come out when they know there’s a lot of us who think like them and want to help and support them.

  • Pali

    I’ve lived in downtown Madison for the last five years, and I have to say, we are not the most ethnically-diverse city. I work in a deli downtown – we have one out of a dozen workers that is non-white.

    I find it very, very easy to believe that the FFRF just took people who were available and responded to whatever ad they ran for it (wish I’d seen it…).

  • Rollingforest

    I would be okay with “I have faith in myself, not God”. In this case the word “faith” is being used to mean “trust”. Guidance councilors use this “have faith in yourself” slogan all of the time.

    These signs are okay. Personally I like the older signs that say “Don’t believe in God? You’re not alone” because it is very hard to spin as attacking religion. It is obviously just atheists meeting together, so the theists can’t campaign that they are being targeted. I also like the slogan “God may not exist. But you do.”

    The Mormons are releasing a similar campaign. They have slogans like “I’m a runner. I often bake cookies for my kid’s class. I have a black Labrador retriever for a pet. I’m a Mormon.” We should do ads like that with “I’m an atheist” at the end. It decreases suspicion and it is very hard to spin as an attack on religion. We are just talking about ourselves, not the theists.

  • OneSTDV:

    Let’s say every single atheist was a white male. Who cares?

    The racial constitution of a group implies nothing sinister about said group.

    Uh… yeah. That’s really not at all what the complaint is about.

    If this is meant to be a localized advertising campaign, and the local population is overwhelmingly, nearly entirely white, then I don’t really see a problem with the ads all being white people. The issue we’re experiencing is the fact that the ads, when viewed from a national level, no longer accurately represent the demographics. If it’s meant to be a national ad campaign, that’s a problem. The popular public face of atheism has thus far been mostly white, male, and upper-class. I’m sure we’re all aware that this isn’t a fair representation of all of us, and that we’d all like better representation.

  • Peter

    Trouble is, in such a heavily white place – heavily blonde and blue-eyed for that matter – inserting one or two minority pictures will look like “tokenism” and so might well be counterproductive. Didn’t the university there get into trouble a few years ago for photoshopping a black student into a picture of crowds at a football game?

  • J. J. Ramsey

    Kamaka: “But I think the jesus-bullies will have a lot to say about that one.”

    Then let them. Part of the usefulness of the bus ads is to get opponents riled up. The trick is to get them riled up for the wrong reasons (e.g. “Oh noes! Athiests iz making themselves visible”) rather than good ones (e.g. complaining about atheists implying “Teh Thiests Iz Stoopid”).

  • aspentroll.myid.net

    There must be a lot of black atheists, but,
    remember they are already stigmatized because of the religious right in this country. This could be a tough closet to come out from for them.

    It’s a great idea and I can’t wait to see other states get involved. Let’s swamp the assholes with this approach.

  • Chris

    Saw one on my way home from work last night. Awesome!

  • If you’ve ever been to Madison, WI, then you’d say the same thing. That sure is a whole lotta white folks.

  • The ads put me in mind of that old Sesame Street ditty:

    An atheist’s a person in your neighbourhood,
    in your neighbourhood,
    in your neigh-bour-hood.

    An atheist’s a person in your neighbourhood,
    they’re a person that you meet, while your walking down the street.

    They’re a person that you meet each day.

    Campaigns like this one, stories such as the recent Pew survey and other similar activities will go a long way to “demythologizing” the image of an atheist for a lot of people.

  • The first one is my favorite, mostly because I can relate. I am a mother of two preschool age daughters and I love to bake, garden, volunteer and sew. I would have preferred that more of them were along those lines, reaching out to point out our similarities, rather than quotes that point out our differences.

    Having said that, I know no matter what they said, the religious folk would find some problem with them.

    Anything that reaches out to Freethinking people who may be feeling isolated and alone is fine by me. I know how it feels to lose your religion and not know where to turn. I hope we can get more things like this out in more areas throughout the country, that reach out to the people who need it. We all know that these billboards aren’t aimed to ‘convert’ religious folks to rationality and reality. They are to reach out to folks who feel like I felt, it’s important to know there are others like you.

  • ewan

    If this is meant to be a localized advertising campaign, and the local population is overwhelmingly, nearly entirely white, then I don’t really see a problem with the ads all being white people.

    It’s a Madison based campaign, running on local buses in Madison, featuring ‘Neighborhood Atheists’, all of whom are from Madison. That’s all right there in the original post. As other commenters have established, Madison actually is pretty full of white folks. So, presumably, on that basis, you’d be happy to acknowledge that there’s nothing wrong with the ethnic mix of the ads?

    the ads, when viewed from a national level, no longer accurately represent the demographics. If it’s meant to be a national ad campaign, that’s a problem

    Again, right there in the original post it says:

    The campaign is supposedly going to extend across the nation, with local atheists being featured in their cities’ ads.

    So, unless you’re suggesting that the FFRF is deliberately selecting in favour of white people, the use of locals in each case should naturally give a reasonable balance. There certainly seems no basis to suggest otherwise given the evidence available from this local, Madison campaign.

    The popular public face of atheism has thus far been mostly white, male, and upper-class. I’m sure we’re all aware that this isn’t a fair representation of all of us

    That’s not so clear cut. Clearly there are atheists that don’t fit that description, but it’s quite possible, even likely, that a greater proportion of atheists do than would be the case for the general population.

    Unless the FFRF start making ads that are less diverse than the atheist populations they’re supposed to represent, and do so because they’re deliberately excluding minorities, there’s no fair reason for complaint.

  • Revyloution

    As the commenters were quick to point out, that’s a whole lotta white people in the ads.

    Well, dammit, lets get Neil Degasse Tyson to come out of the closet then. He always back peddles when asked about religion. I know he doesn’t want to turn anyone away from astronomy by openly admitting that Christianity is anti-science, but a spade is a spade after all.

  • Vas

    I’m not drawing any conclusions, but that is in fact a whole lotta white people. Some of us come from places that are racially diverse and to some of us the exclusive use of white people in advertising is striking. even more so when all the ads are lined up in a row. It would not be as striking if the were on different buses rolling around town. sometimes people just notice stuff and comment on it, it’s just an observation. I race yachts and often notice that at the post race party back at the yacht club, that there are a whole lotta white folks, (for the most part the same white folks who were on the race course but they are now all in one place). To be honest it feels awkward at times. I’m not drawing the conclusion that yachting is inherently a racist sport or that sailors are racists, but I do notice it and sometimes comment on it. The same applies to FFRF, I don’t conclude from the ads that FFRF is a racist organization but their ads sure do have a lotta white folks in ’em.
    There is no need to fly off the handle just because someone notices a fact and comments on it, it’s not a judgment but it is a valid observation. There is nothing sinister, snarky or vague going on, just an observation and comment about a factual matter. If Madison is truly lacking in diversity, and it appears this is the case, it may have never occurred to the folks who put this campaign together that it lacks diversity as the campaign looks just like the world they live in. A little outside perspective my be a thing they could make use of. I don’t condemn FFRF for this campaign and I’m not inferring they are a racist group. I’m also not complaining, but it was the first thing I noticed in the post, and I’m not the only one.

  • Okay, for all of you obsessing over whiteness: first of all Dan Barker is native American and a member of Lenape (Delaware) Indian tribe. And Sabrina is his and Annie Laurie’s daughter. So that’s two with non-white blood. Hope you’re happier.

    As others have said Wisconsin is largely white. 89.4% on the 2009 count according to the US Census. I don’t know what percentage Atheist; however, given the population and the percentage of said population liable to be Atheist, they just may have featured all the non-white they could have though I honestly don’t know. If they have some other local members of color, you don’t know if they wanted to volunteer for this. I can’t imagine if they did that they’d be shut out.

    I love this idea and I can see it locally:

    Donna, 52, loves babysitting her grandson, crosswords, video games, Facebook, blogs and chocolate.

    However, not sure I’d have the guts to put my face on a billboard. Probably not. I don’t need local wackos confronting me in public.

  • Revyloution, have I told you lately that I love you? That comment was just great!

    Plus it made me think of Tyson and drool. Er, guess I’d have to add manwatching to my loves above. (But I admit I’d discreetly leave it off the billboard.)

  • Hemant –

    One is a billboard. The other 13 are bus ads.

    – Shelley

    (Hemant says: Thanks, Shelley! Fixed)

  • I do like these, but I think billboards and bus campaigns probably work best in places that are used to seeing religious groups advertise that way. Where I live, it would just seem strange. We had a Catholic radio station buy billboard space not too long ago, and it generated a whole thread on Yelp because it’s not typical for religious groups to put up billboards, and they were actually advertising something concrete, not just preaching at people to convert. I think rural, conservative, heavily religious communities would be the target audience for this sort of thing.

  • Claudia

    Muggle beat me to it, Madison is overwhelmingly white. Local campaigns should be representative of local populations. That said I do think we need to be mindfull of these things, given the special difficulty encountered by black atheists.

    The Connie Threinen one is my favorite, especially because we so often associate the older generation with high religiosity.

  • Hemant, you could volunteer to have your face up there for the next round.

  • It’s fun to read these comments on FFRF’s new bus sign/billboard campaign. The billbooard statements are limited to no more than 8 words for obvious reasons & the participants write the statements (there’s no right or wrong-it expresses their views). Second, FFRF is taking this campaign multimedia (await more announcements) in a way to permit any freethinker, no matter where, to participate. Third, FFRF is the only freethought group with a black woman on its regular billboards and bus signs (Butterfly McQueen) up right now in Atlanta, Trenton & Louisville. FFRF actively & explicitly solicited racial diversity in inviting our Madison-area membership to participate. We pitched that twice and made overtures to some individuals who had perfectly good reasons for saying no. You can’t force someone out of the closet; this is a voluntary & very public campaign nor does anyone enjoy being a token. As we take this campaign around the country FFRF will encourage racial representation. Freethinkers are their own minority group too & everyone in the campaign is to be saluted. Madison-area FFRF members (or students) who want to be sure we represent racial diversity can still be added to the campaign if they call or email right away: advertising@ffrf.org There is great power & potential in this campaign & Madison is just the start.

  • Peter Mahoney

    I love the billboards. Maybe even better would have been mentioning even more descriptors that almost everyone can even more readily identify with. For example: Son, brother, father, coworker, neighbor, gardener, bowler, and… atheist. Essentially, it puts the “atheist” descriptor right in there with the mundane/bland/common things like coworker, sister, etc., to even more dramatically show that we are not pigeon-holed into one thing called “atheist”.

  • Kamaka

    @ Drew M.

    Hah. I’m a rather brown person (hispanic) and I didn’t even notice their color until I read Hemant’s update.

    I’d bet it was self-selecting when FFRF did the casting call. I wouldn’t do it myself.

    And there we have it, folks.

    Having your face on a bus sign or a *billboard* is really putting yourself out there. In a big way. People of color have enough bullshit (overt or subtle) to put up with day-to-day without volunteering to subject themselves to even more discriminatory abuse.

    You can’t force someone out of the closet; this is a voluntary & very public campaign nor does anyone enjoy being a token.

    It takes much less courage for an old-fogie (yes you, Dan, Bill, Connie) to do this than the younger folks…

    Katie, Sabrina, Kendra, Bonnie, I have great admiration for all of you and the courage you have shown.

    *Bows to our future overlords*

  • ewan

    I’m not drawing any conclusions, but that is in fact a whole lotta white people. […] it’s just an observation.

    Well it sounds like an insinuation, and I think everyone that brought it up would have known that. Otherwise why mention it at all? Unless you think there’s something behind it other than simple demographics it’s got all the relevance of saying “Hemant Mehta – he’s a bit brown”. It’s ‘just an observation’, and it’s got nothing to do with anything that matters.

  • Susan Robinson

    Methinks the atheists doth analyse too much.
    I think at least 6 of the billboards are FFRF employees. This is a small group of atheists who are willing to be very public in one northern city. Stop with the white thing.

  • ludovico

    Terrible choice of typeface–hard to read, especially on a moving bus.

  • Serenity

    I would rather have a bunch of these than all the pro-life posters I’ve seen popping up in my city lately… 🙁

  • Vas

    Oh for fucks sake, I stated flat out that I was not I’m not inferring they, (FFRF) are a racist group. Trying to claim I was insinuating anything by my post is as ridiculous as claiming the Annie was insinuating that only white folks were brave enough to participate, it’s just plain bogus.

    This is a media campaign and if you think that the readers here will be the only ones to notice the lack of diversity in these ads you might well be underestimating the public’s perception, or maybe you are right and it was just a fluke that it was noticed here.

    Do you like turtles?

  • Anonymous

    Annie Laurie Gaylor – best wishes, and thanks!

  • Thanks, Annie Laurie, for the background information.

    I like these ads a lot, and (like Casey Crisp) I prefer them to most of the previous FFRF ads. I think the approach of featuring real, local people, speaking in their own words, is great!

    I especially like the billboard because it conveys just the right message–we are normal people.

  • Annie Laurie, good to see you here! I’ve always found you very responsive when someone corresponds and it’s good to see you even catching us on-line.

    I think the signs are great. I hope they catch on in a lot of cities. I’d love to have the guts in my city but doubt I would. Of course, anyone who knows me would roll their eyes and say it figures.

  • Miki

    *Black bisexual woman here.*

    More important to me than racial representation is that the ads depict a balanced representation of all ages and both genders. I live in the DC area and can hardly locate other black/brown atheists. I wouldn’t take any organization (or anyone else) to task for its inability to do so.

  • Shaun

    I like the ads. What struck me though, was that only people under 30 have their age listed. What’s up with that?

    And the “y” in the font looks like a “4”.

  • I’ve raised this question elsewhere, but regardless of the explanation received, I always find it amusing to see atheists spend money to place ads about something in which they do not believe. I’ve yet to see an ad stating, “I don’t believe in the Easter Bunny!” or “My Christmases are so much better without a belief in Santa Claus!”

  • Donny, it’s because atheists are the most distrusted minority group in the country, even more than Muslims and gays, according to various surveys.

    These billboard and bus campaigns (which are typically in heavily religious communities) have two purposes: a) to reach out to other atheists who feel isolated, and b) to lessen the stigma associated with atheism.

    If you think it’s a waste of time, you’re free to have your opinion, but you should at least realize why people are participating in these campaigns.

  • Erick

    I suppose since “God” has been around for thousands of years and “race” for only hundreds, I shouldn’t find it so frustrating that people are able to understand the non-existence of one and not the other. Race, much like religion, is a construct that people believe in and clearly is part of their identity formation, but when will we start to look at it like “God”? It’s just one more myth in the dominant ideology that disrupts understanding the larger community.

  • Izzy

    I find it funny that they are so anti-religion, but in reality they are no different than any other religion. You may not believe in a God, but you are a group of people who share common beliefs, and now you’re even doing missionary work in the same way many Churches do. I find it highly amusing.

  • Izzy

    I find it funny that they are so anti-religion

    Did you even look at them?

    in reality they are no different than any other religion.

    Apart from not being a religion you mean.

    You may not believe in a God, but you are a group of people who share common beliefs

    Actually we share lack of beliefs. None of us believe in leprechauns either.

    now you’re even doing missionary work in the same way many Churches do.

    Except it isn’t missionary work because we aren’t doing the old bait and switch common to missionary work where something is offered for “free” as long as you listen to the sermon. These ads are up front and honest. They are saying that there is an alternative to the dogma of religion and you can be free from it.