The “atheist bus” campaign was momentarily bound for Ottawa, but OC Transpo has ruled out allowing provocative advertisements bearing a no-god message.
The Toronto-based Freethought Association of Canada has sparked controversy across the country after launching an ad campaign in January with a pro-atheism theme.
The message, which appears in hot red and pink lettering, boldly declares: “THERE’S PROBABLY NO GOD. NOW STOP WORRYING AND ENJOY YOUR LIFE.”
Authorities in Toronto and Calgary have agreed to run the ads on buses and at other sites in their transit networks.
Halifax was the first city to reject the group’s request to run the ads, and now Ottawa’s transit corporation – citing regulations that prohibit “offensive” religious advertising – has turned down the advertisement, as well.
Transit officials in Vancouver, Victoria and Kelowna in British Columbia, and London, Ont., have also refused to run the ads, said the Freethought Association in a Feb. 15 statement issued via its atheistbus.ca website.
“We’ve been rejected by OC Transpo and at the moment our advertisement is not permitted to be displayed on any Ottawa public transit vehicle,” the statement said.
“This comes as a shock to us… We will attempt to contact OC Transpo to try and discuss our options.”
The group posted an e-mail response it received from OC Transpo regarding the proposed ad: “The advertising standards section of our contract specifically excludes religious advertising which might be offensive to transit users, so we cannot approve this ad.”
The rejection of the ad came just days after the Freethought Association first announced on Feb. 10 its plan to bring the no-god campaign to the nation’s capital.
“Ottawa was chosen because it’s the federal capital and we wanted to send a message the nation’s media and politicians that when you are talking about ethics issues of religion in the public space it is no longer acceptable to ignore 20 per cent of Canadians who are atheist or agnostic,” FAC president Justin Trottier said at the time.
The idea to advertise on buses came from an identical campaign currently under way in Britain.
When he saw the success of that campaign, Chris Hammond, a first-year political science student at York University, quickly bought an Internet domain name and set up a Facebook group to solicit support.
The ads are being paid for through a public donation fund, which recently topped $40,000.
After the Halifax transit system rejected the ad, Trottier told Centretown News that the decision constituted a violation of FAC’s right to freedom of speech.
“It’s a question of a group’s ability to freely get their point of view across. We are an educational charity, and our mandate is to seek debate and dialogue between secular and religious groups,” said Trottier.
“Those transit authorities who have tried to stop us doing that, like in Halifax, are actually making it difficult for us to fulfill our government-endorsed mandate. And that’s something that we are not going to take sitting down."
“Apparently they don’t understand dialogue at all, and so our next step is to consider legal options. And we’re willing to take it as far as we have to,” he said.