Atheist Billboards Aim to Provoke the Faithful

The plan was simple: Use billboard messages to create controversy and cause people to stop and think.

Bruce Gleason of Backyard Club, an Orange County atheist club, said the plan has worked, and the group will continue to use billboards as a way to attract the attention of the masses. However, the latest round of billboards are less inflammatory than the club’s earlier billboard efforts, and they haven’t triggered the same amount of controversy or publicity.

The latest billboards, which went up in late September on the South Side of the Garden Grove (22) Freeway at the San Diego (405) Freeway connector and on Chapman Avenue, East of the 55 freeway in Orange, have not only garnered a largely positive response, said.

“At least 90 percent of the response has been of a positive nature,” he said. “Most e-mails and comments revolve around loving the billboards and people wanting to donate or join the group.  Our web hits are through the roof and are donations are skyrocketing.”

“Faith Has No Answers – It Only Impedes Questions,” reads the newest billboard off the 22 Freeway near Valley View Street. The billboard has a picture of a man holding the Bible through prison bars. Gleason said the billboard has a double meaning – the first that one is imprisoned by their religion and the second that religion has no answers.

“The nice thing about the billboards is different people see them depending on where they are going, these people can’t be desensitized,” he said. “I feel the press has not hopped on because it is old news, but we are making an impression on the individual, and that after all, is our goal.”

The location of the billboards is in large part due to the availability of the billboards themselves. Gleason said most billboards are under yearly contracts, so the group finds out what is open and picks from there.

“The only real aspect we look at when choosing a billboard as far as location, is what to put on the billboard,” he said. “The slogan on the billboard on the 22 Freeway is shorter, people are driving on a freeway and can’t read a paragraph like the billboard in Orange. But we aren’t under any time limit, so we can wait as long as necessary to pick a location.”

Backyard Skeptics, a group made up of about 500 members, up 60 people from August, will be purchasing more billboard space for their messages, Gleason said.

“We are planning on other billboards that have to do with the religious right trying to take over America,” he said. “It seems as though a lot of conservatives in Orange County are on track with the separation of church and state, and they have been very supportive of our campaign.”

Gleason said the group has found an audience in Orange County.

“We are getting more donations than ever,” he said. “People are actually putting their money where they think it will do most good.”

However, for many people, including local Christians, the billboards simply aren’t a big deal.

Pastor Tia of First United Methodist Church of Seal Beach hadn’t ever heard of the billboards. But said that the group has every right to speak out and not believe what they want.

“God is God no matter what,” she said. “I have a right to believe as much as they have a right not to believe. But God is God no matter what.”

Gleason said at the end of the day, his group is “trying to make this a better world by letting people know the flaws and dangers of religion. We feel that religion causes us more harm than good. It only takes an inkling of curiosity to discover why people should reject superstitions.”

The ad campaign is financed by "an anonymous donor" to Backyard Skeptics, sponsors assorted activities, including science-related field trips to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, monthly lectures and occasional movie nights.

Club members also trek to the Huntington Beach Pier several times a year to proselytize in person--just like their Christian counterparts--with "secular signs" to recruit new nonbelievers.