Driving on the Mass pike today a little west of Springfield, I saw a big billboard that said “And Then God Created” with a “No Darwin” symbol next to it — by this mean a little circle with the word “Darwin” and symbols of apes evolving into men, with a line through the circle.
Has anyone seen this before? What’s up with it? Do they have billboards like this elsewhere or only in liberal, elitist states?
eemom
dunno, but I’ve seen a bumper sticker that trumps it:
“We have the fossils. We win.”
Tee hee.
Joshua
Western MA is considerably more conservative than the rest of the state. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that sign was funded by a homegrown fundie church.
MAJeff
There’s one between between Grand Forks and Fargo on I-29.
WereBear
That’s a new one on me, though I did see a Dead Fetus t-shirt in Kansas.
(I think that’s a terrible band name. Even for Punk.)
Denny
In Oregon we have one’s that tell people not to let “them” make a monkey out of you. I like being a “them”.
carlos the dwarf
@Joshua:
Um, huh? The Pioneer Valley is basically San Francisco east. Central Mass is more conservative, but even that’s fairly liberal.
WereBear
Probably thanks to the subject of this thread, the ad at right says that the Berlin Wall of Evolution is about to come down.
But I’m too chicken to click.
amorphous
I didn’t see that the last time I drove that route a month or so ago. Maybe I just missed it.
But they have shit like this all over Texas and Oklahoma. I’d say I “escaped” Texas, but I ended up in Albany, so I’m not sure which is worse.
Jack Sheppard's Abandoned Sideways Son
I love how any atheism promoting billboard anywhere draws nationwide attention and condemnation, but religious people can piss all over atheists and it perfectly acceptable.
Conservatives only dislike political correctness when it means they can’t call people the N word.
eemom
some may remember an Onion piece a while back about how the schools need to teach “intelligent falling” as a counter argument to the theory of gravity.
Somewhere on the innertubz yesterday I saw a link to a piece about some “scientist” who actually does “challenge” gravity. I didn’t click on it to check out his creds. Really, there is only so much I can take before I actually do crawl under the bed and stay there.
LarsThorwald
Laugh it up, monkey boy!
FlyingToaster
WYDN out of Worcester is a Daystar affiliate; we have plenty of nutcases on the Cape and in central Massachusetts who would put up the money for
this crapbillboard space in a less pricey area.I’d love it if they ponied up for the
billboard“Premiere Panel” down the hill; that message wouldn’t survive one overnight. Of course, Stop-n-Shop ads barely last that long.Steeplejack
I don’t even get it: “And then God created not Darwin”? WTF?! That sounds like something from the “I know you are but what am I?” school of classical rhetoric. (I believe that was Poseurophon and Pseudolatus, circa 200-100 B.C.)
DougJ
@Steeplejack:
It was very strange. At first glance it looked like maybe it was saying God didn’t create Darwin. It took me a minute to parse it .
Jason Baur
Just for edification purposes, Wikimedia has a helpful graphical depiction of the political distribution of Massachusetts State House seats. The Republicans are mostly clustered in Central Mass and the western Cape.
MikeJ
@eemom: Meh. There’s a lot to challenge in thinking about gravity. We don’t understand very much at all about it compared to the other forces., He’s not denying things fall down. He’s saying the reason we’ve never found gravitons is because gravity doesn’t work like that.
MaryQ
Well so much for my fantasy that I am going to leave the crazies behind in Texas when I move back home to just west of Springfield.
Joel
@eemom: Actually a legit physicist challenging the theory of gravity under the auspices of thermodynamics.
Spaghetti Lee
I’ve met atheists from rural North Carolina, rural Arkansas, and rural Saskatchewan. It shouldn’t surprise people that there are likewise enough fundies in MA to set up a billboard.
Gordon, The Big Express Engine
My buddy from Dallas has a bumper sticker that says, “My wife is a Highland Park honor student” right next to his other bumper sticker that says, “Satan works for me now.”
iowa housewife
And I am about to send my daughter off to Boston University, thinking that Boston is just like San Francisco, my home town.
Uh-ohhhh……….
TrishB
@Joshua: Ever been to Northampton?
Steeplejack
@eemom:
The story I saw was in the New York Times. My take-away was that the scientist is saying that our understanding of gravity is what’s wrong–that it’s not the fundamental force (power?) we think it is but merely a byproduct or side effect of deeper forces that we don’t understand yet.
Citizen_X
@DougJ: From your description, it definitely says “God didn’t create Charles Darwin.” So Darwin was…created by another, Evil God? (Gnostic Heresy, much?)
Probably not the intended reading, but that’s what it implies. It’s typical of creationist pseudoscience: it works–if you don’t think about it at all, past the sound of the Biblically-correct buzzwords.
Jay in Oregon
I’ve seen plenty of these around:
http://www.planeticthus.com/detail.aspx?ID=48
Jager
I bought a car in South Florida a couple of years ago and drove it back to SoCal. Billboards like that were common on I-10 from Florida through Texas, along with anti-abortion, “Dear leader” George Bush boards and of course topless bars…in one stretch in the Florida panhandle within a 1/4 of a mile we saw a graphic anti-abortion board, a board that said “Are you ready to answer to Jesus”? A board for a titty bar and one of Clear Channel’s Bush boards. Don’t see many of those in Cal, but we do have the Lyndon LaRouche guys outside Trader Joe’s and the “Impeach Obama” assholes over by the Post Office.
greennotGreen
I’d just like to point out that not all people who acknowledge the reality of evolution (and appreciate our present understanding of biology that is based on it) are atheists. Admittedly, Christian fundamentalists don’t realize that, but that’s no reason for progressives to get confused about it, too.
Kryptik
It could be worse, Doug. You could see this Billboard instead:
Iowa billboard compares Obama to Hitler; draws criticism
TrishB
Oh, and I forgot to mention, no crazy signs aren’t just for liberal, elitist states. Just north of the late, not-so lamented Big Butter Jeebus on I-71 in OH, there are a couple of hateful billboards.
Citizen_X
@Jay in Oregon: My, but that’s a confused view of evolution. “So, if out of the slime a male is developed, it must immediately find a female and reproduce”??? Monkey Jesus help us!
eemom
ok, ok, so that guy was legit. Delighted to hear it.
But considering we live in a world where reality is putting The Onion out of business, history is being purged from textbooks, and every winter day means global warming is a hoax……ya can’t blame a mom for being a tad paranoid.
mds
@Jack Sheppard’s Abandoned Sideways Son:
What greennotGreen said. Fundamentalist Christians can piss all over anyone who knows that biological evolution is real, whether they’re religious or not.
@Joel:
Just to flesh things out a bit, Verlinde seems to be reasoning from analogy with black hole thermodynamics, which is tied up much more with information theory than the normal “hot flows to cold” style of thermodynamics most of us are used to dealing with. And his approach would certainly turn everything topsy-turvy, since it’s a complete departure from the approach used for every other known force in nature. Then again, gravity always has been the weird one.
demimondian
@Kryptik: Seriously… “Radical leaders prey on the fearful and naive”? Really? What a nasty thing to say about Saint Sarah and her ilk!
matt
Ha I drive by that sign all the time on the way to boston, there’s been ignorant shit on that billboard for years now. Before this were some fire and brimstone REPENT boards, and some anti gay ones after that, and this is the latest one.
demimondian
@greennotGreen: It’s also largely irrelevant. If a man is judged by his enemies, then I’m proud to oppose the self-styled “Christians” who put such billboards up. My own religious beliefs or lack thereof don’t matter; like the bumper sticker says “We have the fossils. We win.”
Jay in Oregon
@Citizen_X:
Well, the site is an extra dollop of crazy; I was referring to the fish-eating-fish bumper sticker.
demimondian
@eemom: FWIW: http://www.stampandshout.com/shop/bumper-stickers/we-have-fossils.php
Comrade Luke
@demimondian:
It kills me that the car is a Prius.
burnspbesq
@amorphous:
If you’d been through a real Capital District winter, you would know the answer to that question.
I was born in Albany, and my parents have pictures of bringing me home from the hospital with a foot of snow on the ground. Which doesn’t seem terribly unusual – except that my birthday is in May.
ChrisZ
@Jack Sheppard’s Abandoned Sideways Son:
This billboard really has nothing to do with atheism. It’s about science and Christianity.
JBerardi
@Joshua:
I know other people have already countered this statement, but I’d just like to add: whhhuuuuuuuuuuuaaaa?!!
All I remember from living in Western Mass are the “Be a Hero, Buy Local” bumper stickers on every single car and the copies of The So-shuh-list Worker in my local coffee shop. Come to think of it, I really wouldn’t mind moving back there…
Joshua
@carlos the dwarf: Mind you, I live in Boston, so anything west of Newton becomes “Western Mass”. ;)
TrishB
@burnspbesq: There’s a reason my parents have pictures of me in my Easter bonnet and dress making snow angels. I’m sure they got me inside right after.
nodakfarmboy
@MAJeff: The Balloon-Juice commentariat is amazing. Here I was, thinking “no one will know about the one north of Fargo- I’ll make a comment,” and someone was on top of it within three comments.
Well played.
fucen tarmal
its a part of an ad campaign for the g dub presidential memoir
*the origins of specious*
Xenos
I just completed my move out of Western Mass, but used to drive through the Chicopees and the Westfields on a weekly basis in pursuit of ever-more remote travel soccer team quests. There is a regional billboard company owned by a fundamentalist Catholic, so when business is slow there are all sorts of weird signs that go up exhorting us to live up to higher moral standards. Sometimes there are signs dedicated to local priests (‘Celebrate Father so-and-so on his 90th birthday!’) and such, but never anything about the many parish closures going on.
It is the local version of Clear Channel. It has its charms.
Ravi J
You don’t needs billboards like these in Alabama or Georgia.
The Tim Channel
@eemom:
The gravity challenge guy is not a nutjob. It’s not that he is denying the effects of gravity, he’s merely redefining it as an emergent (as opposed to fundamental) property. Interesting mumbo jumbo that is way over my head (as well as perplexing to some of his peers), but does not fit into the category of religious charlatanism unless you define theoretical string theory as such.
Enjoy.
Brick Oven Bill
Want proof of human evolution?
Non-whites.
There were only white people on Noah’s Ark. Everyone else was wiped out. So where did non-whites come from? They must have evolved over time from the white people on Noah’s Ark. Probably from genetic mutation caused by people with similar genetics sleeping with each other because that’s all that was on the Ark. Or maybe the Ark survivors cross-bred with the animals. I wouldn’t put anything past Christians.
Either way…evolution is real. Sorry Xtians.
Malaclypse
I’ve seen that same billboard in Connecticut and in Utah.
There were only white people on Noah’s Ark
I would advise not going there with a fundie, unless you want your jaw to permanently drop when they bring up the “curse of Ham.”
Pat
The Masters Of The Universe are digging out any and all “wedge” issues they can find to have the “masses” arguing among themselves while they have the government quietly do their bidding. Keeping us fearful and angry is the name of the game from here on out. I guess we will always be dumbfounded by the lengths they will go to and they will go to extremely great lengths to create false outrage and anger. That’s what lots of money does to people. The thirst for power and control becomes an obsession, and besides what better way to spend your billions.
That is how I see the Deficit Commission assembled by the president. IMO, the media, internet, blogs, etc. are giving the very strong impression that this commission, appointed by the president, elected by nobody will just tell congress and the American people this is the way Social Security, for example, has to be cut and blah blah blah. The message I’m receiving is this commission cuts out any debate by the congress and congress is just going to put into law what they recommend. If that is the case, then I guess I will also have to ask, “What happened to the America I used to know?” IMO again, I see the West Wing and congress just as much a culprit as the people spending money on these stupid billboard that have nothing to do with the real problems this country is facing as doing their part in wanting to keep the “masses” at odds with each other.
brantl
@Denny: It’s too late for anybody to make a monkey out of them, they’re making monkeys out of themselves. For my own sake, I would tell them that devolution happens on occasion, too.
Albatrossity
@greennotGreen: Yeah, but to the hard-core evolution-deniers, folks who are theists but also accept the reality of evolution (so-called theistic evolutionists, or TEs) are lumped in with the athiests. If your whole denial of evolution is based on the notion that evolution is an atheistic religious belief system, then there’s not a lot of room for nuance. You’re either for us or against us.
For some recent evidence of this sort of “thinking”, check out the comments on this thread at Uncommon Descent, the blog of the crypto-creationists (aka Intelligent Design). The author of the opening post tries to include TEs in the big tent of ID, and the commenters are having none of that.
[Warning: the amount of condensed stupid that can be found in a typical comment thread over there is extreme…]
scav
Must admit to finding the “We have fossils. We win.” line of argumentation a little confusing. Both sides have fossils. It’s just that on one side they’re neat little whirlythingys in stone and in the other, they’re doing walkabout and fancying themselves as leaders.
birthmarker
@Jay in Oregon: It’s early here, but when I first glanced at this, I thought it was a pro-Darwin symbol. Survival of the fittest?? Circle of life?? Could go either way, really. Also here you will see graffiti that says, WWDD. My son said he thinks it means What Would Darwin Do? This is a deep red area but it only takes one…
Alice Blue
I live in west central Georgia, and you’d think you would see at least one of these billboards around, but I haven’t. About once a month I drive up to north Georgia to see my mama, but I haven’t seen any up there either.
Woodrowfan
What strikes me is that they could have used the money to feed the poor, cloth and shelter the homeless, etc. Instead they use it to insult those they disagree with.
mad the swine
There were only
white peopleSemites on Noah’s Ark.Fixed that for Jew.
jimf
none of those billboards in Illinois…only in liberal elitist states.
NTB15
I live in Wmass and I can say that there are some very liberal parts (NoHo, Amherst) and some really conservative parts (Westfield, Southwick, the hill towns). Lots of kooks out this way, so I wasn’t too shocked when I saw it. I am surprised to learn that the Catholic Church owns it. It has been a tough 20-25 years for the Church in Wmass, I’d think they’d have bigger fish to fry than Charlie D.
Chinn Romney
Pulling out a Northhampton to disprove Josh’s statement is a bit like saying ‘ever been to Austin’ to refute a claim about the politics of Texas. Cut the Pioneer Valley out of the picture and Josh’s generalization is pretty accurate.
I avoid the Pike as much as possible, but I’m not surprised to learn of the existence of this billboard. I see plenty of right-wing bumper stickers, and kooks who write in to the Telegraph, to know that there is a large audience for this pap.
FNWA
I’ve seen a similar, if not exactly the same, billboard on I-84 in Connecticut.
Redshirt
@iowa housewife: Don’t worry. Boston, especially college parts of Boston, is as Liberal as it gets in this country.
SadieSue
@Joshua:
I see some other WMassites have chimed in already but no, Joshua, WMass is NOT more conservative than the rest of the state. There are liberal & conservative parts of both but I will admit that our liberal parts are VERY liberal (& quite active, which often counteracts the more conservative areas nicely).
And if you look at a map of our last election where Scott Brown won, you’ll see that most of WMass & the Boston metro area voted for Coakley. Granted, these areas don’t vote in lockstep with this map in every election, but having lived here off & on my entire life, I think (ok, feel strongly) that this map rather nicely depicts the more liberal & more conservative areas of MA quite nicely.
Back on topic: DougJ – I haven’t seen the billboard but it doesn’t surprise me. MA is considered hell on earth by so many conservatives that perhaps some organization is attempting to save our doomed souls. =)
Judas Escargot
I am surprised to learn that the Catholic Church owns it.
What makes it even more surprising is that the Catholic Church isn’t particularly anti-evolution (at least it wasn’t back in the 1970s and 1980s when I was a nice little Catholic School Boy).
One of our theology teachers was a Jesuit priest, straight from Ireland. Whenever the subject of evolution came up, he’d never miss the opportunity to mock ‘those silly Protestants, thinking the Bible’s just a history book’.
Long time ago, though, I haven’t been nominally Catholic in almost 3 decades. Maybe things have changed…
Chris
Just outside Iowa City, there is a billboard reading:
“God is Pro-Life. Are you?”
Hard to argue with that logic. I only wish I knew what God’s position on the financial reform bill is…
Howlin Wolfe
@Jack Sheppard’s Abandoned Sideways Son:
Bingo!
They have their own, more virulent strain of PC.
LanceThruster
“How on earth can religious people believe in so much arbitrary, clearly invented balderdash?….The acceptance of a creed, any creed, entitles the acceptor to membership in the sort of artificial extended family we call a congregation. It is a way to fight loneliness. Any time I see a person fleeing from reason and into religion, I think to myself, There goes a person who simply cannot stand being so goddamned lonely anymore.”[Kurt Vonnegut Jr., quoted in 2000 Years of Disbelief, Famous People with the Courage to Doubt, by James A. Haught, Prometheus Books, 1996]
muddy
I saw that ‘And then god created’ one in New Hampshire this week, north of Nashua somewhere, it was raining really hard so I don’t remember exactly where. There was amusement in the car when 2 people said at once, ‘Nuh-uh!’