Some New Yorkers may want to reconsider exclaiming “Thank God” when arriving at their destination subway station beginning next Monday.
Or at least that’s what a coalition of eight atheist organizations are hoping, having purchased a month-long campaign that will place their posters in a dozen busy subway stations throughout Manhattan.
The advertisements ask the question, written simply over an image of a blue sky with wispy white clouds: “A million New Yorkers are good without God. Are you?”
On October 26, a dozen bustling New York City subway stations will be adorned with the ads as “part of a coordinated multi-organizational advertising campaign designed to raise awareness about people who don’t believe in a god”, according to a statement from the group, the Big Apple Coalition of Reason.
New York City’s subway system is one of the busiest in the world with over 5 million riders per day and over 1.6 billion total passengers in 2008, according to the Metro Transit Authority.
Recognizing this, the Big Apple Coalition of Reason decided the “best bang for the buck” was to place posters in popular subway stations to capitalize on the amount of potential viewers, says Michael De Dora Jr., Executive Director of the New York Center for Inquiry, one of the associated atheist groups.
De Dora says the ambitions behind the advertisements are threefold.
First, the coalition hopes the promotion will enhance awareness of New York City’s secular community. He explained that the coalition also hopes to encourage “talking and thinking about religion and morality,” as well as support involvement in groups that encourage a sense of a social community for non-believing New Yorkers.
John Rafferty, President of the Secular Humanist Society of New York, another member group of the coalition, said the ads are in no way an anti-religious campaign. They are looking to reach out to more people who have similar feelings, but might not be aware of an outlet to express their beliefs, he said.
Rafferty and De Dora cite the American Religious Identification Survey, released earlier this year, as evidence of a shift away from organized religion. Those checking “none” for religion rose from 8% of the population in 1990 to 15% in 2008, effectively making “no religion” the fastest growing religious identification in the United States.
De Dora said that the “million” New York nonbelievers mentioned in the advertisements is the result of an extrapolation based on the survey’s findings. With over 8 million residents living in New York’s five boroughs, the organization projects over a million potential atheist New Yorkers.
De Dora said individuals “don’t need religion to be good people and productive members of society” and ultimately he feels that groups of nonbelievers are “adding to cultural life of NYC.”
Rafferty says the groups involved expect no substantial backlash over their ads. Since news of the campaign was made public early this week “reaction has been mixed,” De Dora said. He emphasizes that the Big Apple Coalition of Reason ads are not “forcing issues, they’re just getting ideas out there,” with the hope of fostering discussion in New York.
The ads are “not poking fun at religion and not being outright nasty,” he said.
A year ago some unease was caused by advertisements that ran inside subway cars promoting Islam. While the ads themselves weren’t controversial, they were partially funded by an imam of a Brooklyn Mosque who served a character witness for convicted 1993 World Trade Center bombing mastermind Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman.
According to the Big Apple Coalition of Reason in their statement, the New York City campaign is just one component of a “nationwide effort” by the United Coalition of Reason that will see billboards and postings in transit systems across the United States.
(Source: CNN)
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24 Responses
As a countermeasure, I think we should post the lyrics to Abie Rotenberg’s “The Atheist Convention in LA” song next to these ads.
ימח שמם וזכרם
To some, this may seem like a pro-God ad.
How sad for these people to not know Hashem.
When people check “none” on a box questioning religious affiliation, it just means they don’t identify with any SPECIFIC religious group. It does NOT mean they don’t believe in G-d. One might ask WHY a group like this apparently seems to need chizuk (from this campaign) for their lack of belief.
The U.S. Constitution guarantees freedom OF religion, not freedom FROM religion.
I find their statement of a “million” atheists to be quite specious. People who have “no religion” are not necessarily non-believers. There are plenty of people who belive in Hashem, but don’t like any of the religions they’ve seen out there. That hardly makes them atheists.
to #1 i second that and then say there’s no athiest in a foxhole (or subway car)
to #3 athiest know Hashem and hate Him b/c He causes so much so much suffering and they can’t see a Good being do what they think is bad
Re #4 AinOhdMilvado – I suggest that they need chizuk because the athiest view requires one to ignore some very elementry issues…they need reinforcement.
Athiests often describe the “big-bang” as if it were the scientifically proven creation event, but, assuming for the sake of argument that the big-bang occurred, they blithely ignore the obvious unanswered question that asks from where came the primordial matter that went “bang.” They simply do not address at all the question as to the origin of matter – the absolute neis of physical existance . . . because they cannot deal with it. They talk about curved space and infinity as if they were simple constructs, ignoring the impossibility of these issues in simple rational terms.
A true agnostic claims confusion on such issues – an agnostic might ignore them by focusing on good deeds here in this world, a distortion of the chassidishe aforism that “…the meisa is the thing…”
By contrast, an atheist, I suggest, militantly asserts the impossible by ignoring fundemental questions of existance. His position is contrary to nature, and he needs reinforcement and chizuk wherever he can get it
About time a public transit agency started getting more “paying” customers. Advocacy groups BUY adds. It sure beats having public service ads from various government agencies. The goal is to produce revenue to pay for transit.
Never ever let your children get into a debate with them. The children will come out with questions haunting them for life.
When the Russian boys used to come Thursday nights to Yeshivas to get to know Yiddishkeit, and they used to get into an argument about Emunah, the fine yeshiva boys ended up coming out Tzitumolt.
Today’s Yeshiva Bochurum are not equipt, to be able to debate.
To: #10 “ader” – You are correct that today’s Yeshiva bochurim are not equipt, but sadly neither are MANY frum adults equipt either! The answer is NOT to keep bochurim from such debates, it is to TEACH them so that they ARE equipt (NOW as bochurim, and LATER as adults) to answer emunah questions (whether from atheists or goyim or frei Yidden). This SHOULD BE a serious part of the chinuch in EVERY yeshiva, because a bachur may know his Gemara learning perfectly, but somewhere in his life he will be confronted by one of these people and may end up off the derech because he didn’t know how to answer these kind of questions!
Regarding ader’s comment — excellent point. We need to educate our youth such that their emuna can withstand challenges. Perhaps our bochrim won’t often encounter leafleting atheists, but personal tragedies, or even a peer going “off the derech,” can produce haunting questions too. Rabbi Yitchak Kirzner, ztz’l, strongly recommended learning Chovos HaLevavos to develop an intellectual emuna as well as an emotional emuna. Perhaps our yeshivas should institute such shiurim.
To #11
A Rov in Eretz Yisr once wrote a sefer which had all questions, he was asked regarding the basis of Emunah, and also his answers.
When he came to the Chazon Ish for a Haskomo, the Chazon Ish told him not to print the Sefer because the questions are better than the answers, and he never printed it.
We have only Emunah Pshutahn. Nothing else. And the Mechanchim know it.
Regardless of what they believe, they have a right to be wrong. Aside from that, they should know that G-d does not believe in atheists.
the ignorance on this page is disturbing. obviously, our constitutional rights are only good when it benefits us jews, right? but if another group decides to advertise beliefs that make you uncomfortable, you all just flip out. maybe you’re not aware that chabad also puts up ads? do you find that upsetting too? strange how much more educated bocherim of past generations were of secular matters than they are now. i guess the rabbis have finally decided that instead of being a light unto nations, we should hide away from the rest of the world in our own insular communties. how sad that we feel this threatened when atheists give other atheists a place where they can feel welcome. how many of you react this way when aish advertises its courses? no wonder so many people are off the derech.
they need chizuk to BELIEF in their shitta
I don’t get it – wouldn’t it make more sense for the atheists to just do nothing? Their active promotion of no G-d (chas v’shalom) seems oxymoronic.
To “ader” – EMUNAH P’SHUTAH IS GREAT, BUT WON’T BE A RESPONSE TO THE QUESTIONS OF THESE PEOPLE. I do not know the sefer you referred to (presumeably because it was never published). I’m sure the Chazon Ish zatz”l was correct in this case.
Nevertheless there ARE answers to any question a goy, Jew for j, or atheist could ask. Personally, I feel totally confident in talking to ANY of these people. If there is a specific pasuk I may not know the meaning or context of, I know I can find it out, and no question any of these people might ever ask me will ever challenge my emunah. To the contrary, my responses to them often leave THEM with nothing further to say for me!
I believe it is critical that every yeshiva, by 8th or 9th grade be giving comprehensive shiurim in emuna. WHY we believe and do what we do. WHY we do NOT believe what the goyim believe.
Emuna is the YESOD of everything else. If a kid really understands WHAT he is supposed to believe and WHY he is supposed to believe it, he does not have to be afraid of any confrontation with any person, OR with ANY circumstance or nisayon that comes his way in life.
bec (#15 . . .not 10)- Even as the Resident Liberal on this site (You’ll agree with that monicker, right Joseph, Joe Katz and Flatbush Bubby?), and even though I am a staunch defender of civil liberties and the First Amendment . . . I think you are, affectionately said – nuts.
People are challenging the substance of the atheists’ message – not their right to advertise. And I would staunchly defend their right to hand out literature, all the while bemoaning and strongly disagreeing with the substance of their message…and I wanting frum Yidden to be intellectually equipped to counter that message effectively.
The distinction between the right to free expression, on the one hand, and the “niceness” of the content of any given expression, on the other, is critical to appreciating the First Amendment. One can recoil from and abhor the message of the antisemite, the Nazi, the Stalinist . . .or the atheist – but still concede the importance of his right to speak.
Personally, I think that advertisements for atheism are as relevant as advertisements to eat at McDonalds–i.e. they are something to be ignored.
But as far as commnet # 18 goes–educating our children to know WHY we believe WHAT we believe–this is essential. That our children can learn, at great expense, in our schools and not know how to answer these people, is ridiculous.
It also goes against Torah. If this is true, something is wrong with our school systems.
I learned years ago “Da ma lehashiv l’apikorus”. The rebbe explained that we should not be getting into arguments with the apikorsim, however, we should “know” the answers to their questions. It’s unfortunate that there are occasions when a bochur or girl asks a question and because a rebbe may not know an an answer he/she feels too insecure to say that he will find out. Instead he/she puts down the child for even thinking such thoughts. Ein habaishon lameid. What’s the child supposed to do? He goes out and finds answers that are crooked. It would be wonderful if all the yeshivos would teach the children the beauty of yiddishkeit. Alas, it’s a difficult agenda to push.
This will backfire on the atheists. More people will be machzik in their emuna than ever because of these stupid posters.
There’s a good reason for this: atheism is not a belief. You can’t advertise it or convert to it. It’s just a meaningless negative, an empty set, nothing anyone ever clings to.
Well said Avreich Man (#22)
Idiots have rights too…always in
America. Goyim are obligated to believe there is a g-d. Yidden are obligated to know it.