Comedy Christian complains about atheist bus ad

Never one to pass up the opportunity of a seat on a bandwagon, Stephen “Birdshit” Green (national director of the fundamentalist organisation Stephen Green’s Voice, aka Christian Voice) has put in a complaint to the ASA about the Atheist Bus Campaign (see below).

Why the BBC thought a single complaint to the ASA from a lone whack-job was newsworthy is anyone’s guess. MWW guesses that they thought it would make a light-hearted comical piece – and it is indeed very funny.

Fresh from his own dressing down by the ASA for making an unsubstantiated claim in a New Statesman “advertorial” (that the HPV vaccine causes infertility), Green is perhaps under the impression that he now actually knows what an unsubstantiated claim is, and has complained that the statement “There’s probably no God” is one.

From the site:

According to one national newspaper, ‘some atheist supporters of the campaign were disappointed that the wording of the adverts did not declare categorically that God does not exist, although there were fears that this could break advertising guidelines.

Well, I believe the ad breaks the Advertising Code anyway, unless the advertisers hold evidence that God probably does not exist.

The ASA does not just cover goods and services, it covers all advertising. The advertisers cannot hide behind the ASA’s ‘matters of opinion’ exclusion, because no person or body is named as the author of the statement. It is given as a statement of fact and that means it must be capable of substantiation if it is not to break the rules.

Clearly the concept of burden of proof is not one Green is familiar with. It is also interesting to note that he brands the ASA’s censure of his Spectator ad

an infringement of freedom of speech.

The BBC reports that news of Green’s action provoked “peals of laughter” at the British Humanist Association offices. It is becoming increasingly hard to dismiss the idea that Green is actually a campaigning atheist, using clever subterfuge to make Christianity and Christians look ridiculous.

All we can say is, keep up the good work Stevie-boy!


11 Responses to “Comedy Christian complains about atheist bus ad”

  1. Stuart W says:

    That’s our Stephen Green (gently pats his gibbering head). Hypocritical beyond parody and easier to rattle than anything on a crèche carpet.

  2. S Robertson says:

    I love this article… Well done!

  3. Jeanette says:

    It’s even more gratifying to note than Green’s (as usual) inconsistent hypocritical whinging has prompted another raft of donations to the online Atheist Bus campaign (http://www.justgiving.com/atheistbus). It’d be well worth every penny to sponsor a huge load of buses & LCD screens round his home town…

  4. […] MediaWatchWatch, Why Don’t You?, Sean the Blogonaut, […]

  5. Mohammed Green says:

    Someone should put together a top 20 of Mr loonys outpourings.

    Anyway, Green confuses me. I’m an athiest, but SOMETHING must have put him on this earth for our amusement…

  6. kevin says:

    good blog

  7. TigerDunc says:

    The irony of it being that the original slogan was supposed to read “There is no God”. The probably was inserted according to ASA guidelines.

  8. […] the Advertising Standards Agency complaint by Stephen Green of Christian Voice (who was involved in the complaints to the BBC about their […]

  9. Jeanette says:

    Today’s comedy “committed” Christian bus driver Ron Heather’s refusal to drive these buses has happily backfired & created further interest in the campaign, including over 45 more online donations today.

    There’s no such thing as bad publicity…

  10. Jeanette says:

    The kindly donor Richard Williams has pointed this out on the JustGiving page which I think deserves a wider audience:

    Latest news: There’s been a response to Stephen Green’s complaints about the Bus Ads: http://creativeyear.wordpress.com/2009/01/17/109/

  11. Kevin Brown says:

    What I find amusing about the christian editorial site. They don’t allow public comment. Every other news site that I have seen does. This could be a simple statment in itself.