Censored! FFRF Billboard Removed by Outdoor Company
The Freedom From Religion Foundation's "Imagine No Religion" billboard, which only went up late last week in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., for a two-month run, has been censored by General Outdoor Co., which took down the Foundation's vinyl message today. While the Foundation has encountered billboard companies unwilling to lease boards in several locations (Rapid City, Mich., Peoria, Ill., rural Nebraska and Salt Lake City), this is the first time one of its billboards has been censored after going up.
The colorful billboard carries the Freedom From Religion Foundation's name and website, and boasts a John Lennon-esque statement, "Imagine No Religion," against a stained-glass window background.
The billboard had already engendered a story in the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, (Ontario, Calif.), which went out over the Associated Press wire, as well as major TV coverage in the valley on ABC and CBS TV stations last night.
Foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor called such censorship "unprofessional and cavalier."
"Are religionists so thin-skinned they must squelch free debate? One small freethought billboard in the immense state of California is such a threat to insecure religious egos that it must be censored?"
Gaylor said: "With local freethinkers' help, the Freedom From Religion Foundation would love to plaster the valley with our message. Let's fight back!"
"There is nothing insulting in our message. We simply invite the public to think, to imagine a world free from religion. Think of the history of believers warring over their imaginary gods, the fact that more people have been killed in the name of religion than for any other reason! The human race needs to grow up. We should concentrate on improving this world, and stop worrying about the next," Gaylor added.
A Foundation billboard, using the stained-glass motif with a little holly added and the seasonal message, "Reason's Greetings," will be going up next month in Olympia, Wash., and in Madison, Wis., among other sites.