Atheist Ad At Angelika Theater In Plano, Texas Stokes Controversy

Normally no one pays much attention to the advertisements that movie theaters run before the previews start up. But at one Texas movie theater, they've drawn quite a bit of controversy.

One day before they were set to run, Angelika Film Center, a movie theater in Plano, Texas, pulled ads from a Dallas-area atheist advocacy organization following complaints from local Christian activists, CBS Local reports. The ads for the Dallas-Fort Worth Coalition of Reason aimed to educate viewers about the ability of families to be "Great Without Religion."

Here's the ad via Patheos:

A lawyer with the American Humanist Association, an atheist advocacy organization, told CBS Local that they're considering filing a discrimination suit over the incident. This isn't the first time the AHA has been embroiled in controversy. The organization recently raised a scholarship fund for a teenage atheist who challenged the practice of prayer at her Rhode Island high school.

Angelika Film Center agreed to run the group's message after another theater, Movie Tavern in Arlington, Texas, rejected the Coalition's ads, which were set to start on the Christian holiday of Good Friday. The first theater, which says they haven't run church ads either, cited a universal policy against all religious advertising in explaining why they pulled the commercial, according to the Star-Telegram. The Coalition claims Angelika has permitted church ads on the big screen.

Advertisements selling an atheist message have often stoked controversy. Last year, a federal judge ruled in favor of local atheists to run ads that read, "Are you good without God? Millions are" on public transit buses after the Central Arkansas Transit Authority initially rejected them.

The Center for Inquiry in Michigan -- an organization that promotes scientific claims and free inquiry -- recently sued a country club for backing out of their contract for a book signing and lecture event for Oxford University professor and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins last fall after the club realized that Dawkins is an atheist, according to news service Michigan Live (h/t Patheos ).

Comments

[Nicole Crenshaw]

04:05 PM on 08/12/2012

So their faith in God is so weak that just looking at an ad for atheism will shake their beliefs?

[Michael Kittredge]

03:42 PM on 12/21/2012

No they just want to block out beliefs that differ from their own. It makes them angry, they take it personally.

[Indy609]

12:47 PM on 05/02/2012

A lot of folks are simply conditioned to get their defenses up at the mere mention of atheism. It's a very effective defense meme, that helps their belief systems survive scrutiny from outsiders: if someone questions the reality of your deity, they are not to be trusted.

[Hakulanni]

11:19 AM on 05/02/2012

Someone asked me about Religion today. The question was: So what is your opinion about Religion? Here was my answer: I appreciate the wide variety of Art it inspired.
My Friend then asked: That's it? I answered: I don't appreciate the Mass Killings, Torture, Child Abuse, Coddling Of Power and Hypocrisy it has also inspired.

[sssteverrr]

10:37 AM on 05/02/2012

I am an Athiest who tries to follow the teachings of Buddha and Jesus Christ, but so few "christians" seem to get it. It's simple: be kind to everyone, look for opportunities to help others,
do not judge others and treat everyone with loving kindness. Try it, you will find it brings you more happiness than hate.

[VictoryBlue]

12:20 PM on 05/02/2012

Asking christians to be more christ-like is asking way to much.

[NicktheBruin]

08:02 PM on 12/19/2012

Wait, you mean Jesus didn't speak out in favor of guns, fossil fuels and corporate interests?

[Kailuabred]

10:29 AM on 05/02/2012

I wonder what the christian right is afraid of? Do they think that watching an ad will pull people away from their beliefs? Evidently so or they would not care.

[Jim NLN]

08:58 AM on 05/02/2012

To heck with this. I do not have time for this. Halloween is just around the corner, which means, I have to get ready for my annual WAR ON CHRISTMAS!

[Lucy T]

01:02 PM on 12/21/2012

After that, gird your loins to plunge into battle in the War on Easter!

[AZreb]

08:31 AM on 05/02/2012

Had a couple of ladies stop by with religious tracts and they told me they could tell me what will happen after I die. My question to them was "Which one, or maybe both of you, have died and come back to life so you can definitively tell me how it was on the other side?" No answer. I then politiely told them to NOT stop at my home again.

My mini-bio comes partly from when I drove two older lady friends and neighbors to a religious group that met once a month at night. When I was introduced to new ladies by one of the friends I was not "Sister ______" - I was "This is _______, our resident heathen." I took it as a compliment, not an insult.

[briceverdi]

03:57 AM on 05/02/2012

Christians and Atheists are free to speak their minds. Radical Atheists and Far Right Believers are not entitled to force their veiws of us. I like to see people in prayer and religious displays during holidays. I like to see people teaching evolution and the sciences. I humbly appreciate seeing myself as a human being created by the Divine. Stop with the political correctness and stauch ideology. You can't shun people you don't agree with and erase them.

[cyanmanta]

12:17 AM on 05/02/2012

Show me the passage in the gospel where Jesus said, "He who disagrees with you, badger and harangue and beat him into submission until he retracts his opinion and submits to your worldview, so sayeth my Father in heaven," and I will begin to understand this line of christian 'thinking' that says that there can be no questioning, no criticism, and no alternative to organized religion. That doesn't sound like Jesus to me; it sounds more like al Qaeda.

[mech126]

11:54 PM on 05/01/2012

Yep, they are all for free speech, until they don't agree with you, then all bets are off......

[AZreb]

08:33 AM on 05/02/2012

fanned - "Believe exactly as I tell you to do or you are going straight to he**!" Boy, that place is going to be sooooooooo overcrowded!

[VictoryBlue]

09:45 AM on 05/02/2012

Good. I don't want to be lonely.

[georgieboyme]

11:52 PM on 05/01/2012

The religious right is doing more harm to religion than any atheist organization ever could?

[BrendanP]

10:05 PM on 05/01/2012

Religion in practice!

[FalconerHK]

09:10 PM on 05/01/2012

I think it's funny that Christians feel the only way to lead an ethical, just existence is through religion. No one commits mass murders, molests children or demonizes entire ethnic/religious groups in the name of Non-God.

Mostly, people just want to left alone to pursue whatever spirituality they feel fits them best. Anything else is politics, crowd control or the expressed insecurities of a powerful few.

[daringsugar]

07:33 PM on 05/01/2012

Typical Christians. If you don't believe like me, I'll do you in, somehow, anyways.

[Waiting4Something]

06:56 PM on 05/01/2012

@AUveritas...who asked for a definition of "good" without God.

I am not an atheist, but it sure is hard to identify with christian right extremists who seek out and literally destroy those who disagree with their anti-abortion, anti-gay, anti-everything agenda. It's hard to identify with that Rev. Dennis Terry (or Terry Dennis) in Louisiana who screamed at the world during a "laying on of hands" for Santorum that if you are anything except what he approves or any religion other than his "GET OUT."

I can't identify with anyone who, in the name of the Lord, kills innocent people in Oklahoma City, murders people at abortion clinics either with a gun or a bomb or plants bombs at a Planned Parenthood facility.

You want a definition of good? How about the people of character who are attempting to answer your question without attacking you? If we were to ask a christian right extremist for a definition, it would be filled with bible-thumping screaming and hate as we recently heard from Louisiana.

And, unfortunately for you (who seems like a level-headed good person), christian right extremists represent all that is wrong with religion (and republicans) today.

[AUveritas]

09:16 AM on 05/02/2012

Thanks for the civility. I understand that theists often disagree with definitions of right and wrong and even how we come to understand theses defintions. The Torah? The Bible? The Koran? And these matters can be debated but really aren't pertinent to the issue I raised. My point is that the notion of good, without an external, objective and unchanging source, "good" is really just a matter of personal preference. In the end, it's what you consider "good." Consequently, it is nonsensical to argue that atheists can be "good." Now, if you said "According to Christian ideals of right and wrong, atheists can be good without any belief in God" I would agree.

[VictoryBlue]

12:24 PM on 05/02/2012

Consequently, it is nonsensical to argue that atheists can be "good." Now, if you said "According to Christian ideals of right and wrong, atheists can be good without any belief in God" I would agree.

Why would they use christian ideals to define right and wrong if they are not christians? Why not use philosophical ideals to make the same statement?