South Carolina Has an Atheist Highway, Too! November 23, 2010

South Carolina Has an Atheist Highway, Too!

By Guest Contributor
November 23, 2010

The Secular Humanists of the Lowcountry in Charleston, South Carolina have adopted a highway, too 🙂

Maybe I should visit SC one of these days…

(Thanks to Amy for the link!)

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  • Tracy Ahlers

    will the locals call it the highway to hell?

  • AliKatM

    Yay! I go to school in Charleston. It’s about time that us non-religious individuals made our presence known here.

  • Richard Wade

    litter control next miles

    Just miles? Miles and miles? As many miles as they can do?

  • Revyloution

    Have pride, make sure you bolt your signs on straight.

  • Richard Wade

    Can this be clarified? The link goes to the “Secular Humanists of the Low Country.” So they’re not called the “Charleston Rotary Secular Humanists,” which I couldn’t quite imagine.

    So do they share that stretch of adopted highway with the Rotary Club of Charleston? I wonder how that is received by the Rotaries.

  • Revyloution

    Richard, between you and me….

    It’s South Carolina.

    Nuf said.

  • NotYou007

    Do the majority of people truly know what a “secular humanist” is or how they think?

  • Non-Litigious Atheist

    @NotYou007: Of course not. Why else would another unnecessary euphemism for ‘atheist’ like ‘Humanist’ be invented? It’s a secret sign you can flash to other Humanists without showing your cards to a hostile world outside that little circle. It’s a way of being partially out and partially in the closet – because coming out fully might come back to bite you in the ass.

  • We need a pic of the sign with the folks who do the clean up in the pic as well.

    I’m glad they’re doing this.

  • littlejohn

    Good thing you got this picture when you did. Pretty soon the bullet holes will make it look like Swiss cheese.
    I’m guessing you’ve never spent time in South Carolina, Hemant.

  • Viggo the Carpathian

    Ok, I live in Charleston. I don’t appreciate the snide insults to my home and state. It isn’t perfect and yes it is still infested with religion but find me a place that isn’t. I am openly and vocally atheist and I don’t get harassed or persecuted for it here. In my office there are 3 other openly vocal atheists and several more agnostics. It may be the heart of the south but are not living in the middle ages and I for one don’t let the religious get off unchallenged. No one comes burning crosses in my yard for it.
    Open mindedness goes in all directions people.

    I don’t get the bullet hole thing. Yes, you do see that in the rural districts mostly up-state. I haven’t seen a single shot sign in the Charleston area. Lots of taggers, no shooters.

  • I do have to say that I have liked all the people I have personally known from South Carolina. Our families dogs (Boykin Spanniels) are even the State Dog of South Carolina. One of my favorite recent books was South of Broad.

  • speaking of SC:

    http://joemygod.blogspot.com/2010/11/rambo-jeebus.html

    get on that, Hemant. come on, it’s not just for gays to make fun of, anymore. heh.

  • Richard Wade

    Viggo,
    I’m glad to hear what you have shared. We should question the stereotypes we ourselves carry around, not just bemoan the ones that others have against us.

    I didn’t want to start an SC bashing, I just was genuinely curious if there would be any tension or conflict between the Rotaries and the Secular Humanists sharing the same public service project. Hopefully not.

    This is because here in “liberal and tolerant” California, (yeah, right) the adopt-a-highway sign for Atheists United has been vandalized or even destroyed several times. It’s on a stretch of freeway going through mountains with no easy pedestrian access for a few miles, so the vandals have to make a special trip and risk stopping on the side of the freeway in order to mess with it.

  • Hemant, you should DEFINITELY visit SC. We’d love to have you! ^^

  • Revyloution

    Sorry Viggo,it was just a gentile ribbing. If you like, you can call me a granola munching pot head from Oregon if you like. Even though I don’t smoke pot or eat granola.

  • Amy

    The Secular Humanists of the Lowcountry (SHL) does share this section of the road with the Charleston Rotary Club. I don’t know what the rotary club thinks about it, but we (SHL) have been doom this for quite some time. I also don’t get the bullet holes comment, but there have been problems with our sign in the past. For whatever reason, our name was misspelled. It used to be listed as Sesular Humanists. Anyway, @AliKatM & any other Charlestonians out there, SHL is a very active group, so look us up and come to some of our events. & as far as SC goes, yes, we may be smack dab in the middle of the bible belt (& that sucks sometimes), but SC has some top notch atheists, too. Any state that can claim Herb Silverman can’t be too bad.

  • Hi folks,

    I’m one of the Charleston secular humanists that picks up the litter on this stretch of highway. We don’t actually share the same road with the Rotaries. The sign is for the next 4 miles and we do the first 2 miles and the Rotaries do the next 2 miles.

    This is one the volunteer service projects of the Secular Humanists of the Lowcountry and there are pictures of litter picker-uppers at our webpage if you look around a bit. We’ve been in existence for 12 years, founded by Herb Silverman (current president of The Secular Coalition). We’ve been doing Adopt-a-Highway for at least 8 years as a group. Haven’t gotten anything but gratitude from passersby in the years I’ve been doing it. Like Amy says, we’re a very active group. Check us out and join us if your local.
    lowcountryhumanists.org