So the Atheist Bus Campaign are delighted that they’ve raised £135K to put up adverts around the place telling people not to worry cos there probably isn’t a God.
So, let’s get this straight – their logic is that putting God-bothering ads on buses is a stupid idea. So in response they… put up anti-God-bothering ads on buses. Genius! An eye for an eye. An ad for an ad. Maybe we can just start having whole conversations via 15 word slogans on the sides of buses. it’s a pretty nuanced way to talk about things.
Oh no, my mistake, it’s a fucking stupid way to discuss anything. Regardless of my own beliefs/faith/whatever, I’ve always been baffled by posters stating ‘facts’ about God, or with bible verses on them. It always smacked of some kind of talismanic evangelical witch-craft; ‘if we use bits of the Bible, it has special powers and people will be saved‘… Surely actually talking about this stuff is more useful. As some fab Welshmen once said, ‘this is my truth, tell me yours‘.
But, to counter it with equally bogus ‘there probably isn’t a God..’ banners helps no one. It does as much for discussion of the merits of faith and atheism as the original posters do. Precious little.
The picture at the top is my contribution to the debate. Happy new year, whatever your faith-persuasion. 🙂
what are you up to musically these days? I get asked about you more than almost any other solo bassist!
Ooh, what a lovely thing to hear!
Well I do have a few things slowly developing for the return of SB in the fullness of time. So unless I accidentally die first, there will be something at some point. Just not sure how soon. But you will certainly be one of the first to know when things start happening again 🙂
In fact whenever you post about music on the web I’m usually pondering “now would that work for me, and if so how?”
Less than a hundred thousand spent on a non-religion bus campaign vs.
BILLIONS spent on religious ones that should have gone to helping people in order to promote there own religion and gain more followers or is it customers…..
If you truely believe in your religion, than what does it matter what a bus says.
Jennifer: “In fact whenever you post about music on the web I’m usually pondering “now would that work for me, and if so how?†– Cool! We should have a chat about it some time, maybe I could interview you for this ‘ere blog 😉
Spector – indeed. If you read my post again, I’m not even remotely defending the God-bothering stuff on buses. Both are utterly pointless. The trigger for this, I guess, is that I expect over-zealous churches to put up stupid signs on buses and billboards, and have got good at shutting them out. My sadness is that the intelligent response was deemed to be ‘fight fire with fire’ or ‘fight dumb-ass posters with more dumb-ass posters’. That seems tragic to me.
Your last sentence sums up the utter futility of it. If someone truly believes their religion (or their conviction that religion is BS), then they aren’t about to be changed by a poster. And if they aren’t, I’m sure 15 word slogans pointing them in either direction aren’t about to do justice to the depth and magnitude of the topic, and just present them with the idea that the alternatives are ‘believe in our version of God or go to hell’ or ‘anyone with any kind of theistic faith is clearly as nuts as the people who put up the ‘jesus says’ posters, therefor they should all be patronised with our expensive stoopid poster.’
Both are wasteful, divisive and ultimately anti-dialogue, as far as I can see. I’d rather see neither, TBH.
We should have a chat about it some time, maybe I could interview you for this ‘ere blog 😉
Sounds to me like a fine plan 🙂