The Atheist Bus Campaign

Before I even start, I apologise. I have already posted today, and I have promised to stop being so harsh on Richard Dawkins.

But I am, as you will know, simply not the kind of person who can read about the Atheist Bus Campaign and not feel an immediate need to rip the piss right out of it. Unfortunately, in this case, satire is virtually superfluous.

The Atheist Bus Campaign (organised by the British Humanist Association and various other people with too much time on their hands) was conceived by a Guardian columnist; Richard Dawkins has been matching all donations made to the campaign, and enough money has now been raised to stick posters saying 'God probably does not exist. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life' on the side of some London buses.

Several things.

First, according to the Advertising Standards Authority, you can't just go around making wild claims in your adverts. Let's take the 'God probably does not exist' part (incidentally, I like the 'probably'). On what is this statement based? Because if it said 'Our shampoo is probably better for the environment', you'd be inclined either to (a) be extremely dubious, or (b) want the stats.

Second, who was worrying? At least, who was worrying on the basis of whether or not God existed? And why should they be less worried now that they have been informed that God probably does not exist by a message on the side of a bus ('Ah tell ye, Donald, ah read it on t'side ot' bus, it mus' be right')?

Thirdly, are we to believe that we can only stop worrying and enjoy our lives if God probably does not exist? 'Cos I believe in God and I'm having a nice enough time, thanks very much.

Anyway, all of this is in response to some ads a while ago by a group called 'Proclaiming Truth in London', which linked to this site and attracted certain amounts of criticism from those who managed to remember the web address and muster the energy to look it up.

Which all leads me to wonder how we managed to drag buses into this.