Time for the critiquing of American Atheists’ Christmas billboards! I will say this: this year, they’re emphasizing a more cheerful message with a little bit of humor, but still, they desperately need a pro to design these things.
Here’s the first one, and I think, the worst one.
Uh, no. Way too busy. Just the text on the right would be OK, but the four small text messages on the left? No one is going to be able to read those as they’re zipping by in a car, and all they’ll see is the shocked, pop-eyed black woman (we’re treading awfully close to racist tropes here) staring at her smug daughter, which is not a particularly good or informative look. Also, it looks more like a banner ad on a website, rather than a roadside sign. Scrap it.
The second one, I like. Clear, simple, a snarky reference to our recent presidential campaign, and nicely promoting a strong anti-church message (if you don’t like anti-clericism, you aren’t going to like anything from American Atheists). I’d have gone for a sans serif font, though, and not used all caps. Otherwise, I think this is one of the best billboards American Atheists have produced yet (which is not saying a lot).
Of course, one lesson they’ve learned, unfortunately, is that the quality of the content doesn’t matter, because no matter what it is, sanctimonious Christians will tear it down. This one lasted less than 2 hours before it was removed.
Related comment from that link: shut the fuck up about “heart of the Bible belt”. It does not justify anything, and the “Bible belt” is a meaningless, empty geographical distinction. I’ve visited communities in Washington state and Florida, Texas and Minnesota, central Pennsylvania and Oregon, that all declare themselves part of the “Bible belt”. The entire goddamn country is apparently this vaguely defined “Bible belt”, and it extends up into central Canada.
I suppose if Mexicans were this insecure about their religion and needed to say they believed in their version of god because of where they were born, the Bible belt would also extend south and be more of a Bible cup.
Oh, that top one makes me cringe, especially in light of an essay I posted about on Affinity. Here’s the essay: Black atheists matter: how women freethinkers take on religion. Highlighting Black atheism is good, but not like that. Yikes.
“Bible Belt” sounds like an implement a fundamentalist christian parent might use to whack the fear of jebus into it’s children.
Honestly, they’re the worst billboard designers I’ve ever seen.
Some first-draft suggestions:
(perhaps in conjunction with other organizations)
They could use images related to past examples of discrimination against and persecution of atheists and other religious minorities in the US.
Seriously? Ask a graphic designer how interesting that one is. Needs something other than a couple of fonts and a fuckload of primary red. I could’ve done that in my sleep and wouldn’t charge much, but why would I have done that?
Or ask a non-Trump voter … apparently AA wants to ride those coattails this year. Or is it supposed to be ironic or something? When was it great? Why not skip church every day of the year? I don’t know. I like hats. Can’t get enough of them.
The second one needs more leading, but the red and the serif font and the all caps are imitating the hats sold by the Dunning-Kruger Shithead, so blame for that can kind of be laid on whatever cut-rate designer Shithead hired (and then probably refused to pay).
The first one is just boring and cluttered and yes, looks exactly like a cheap website banner ad.
I don’t know about the locations around the country, but I know Dave likes to put AA Christmas billboards up on Route 495 in Weehawken, which is the approach to the Lincoln Tunnel. On weekday mornings and on Friday and Saturday evenings, there is PLENTY of time to read all the type on the billboard. But really, the purpose is to get news coverage of the signs, which shows them off to folks who aren’t commuting by car.
Ack, I agree, that first one is just an enlarged screenshot that got plastered up as a billboard. Any driver trying to read that, probably also on verge of distracted driving. It looks lots like a mobile phone screen of MSGs.
I worry that there will soon be several crosses on the shoulder under that sign commemorating ‘victims’ of the sign. BAD SIGN, SAD [*gulp* gosh. Trump is infecting my speech patterns]
Effective billboards have a minimum of text in favor of first glance graphics telling the message. 5 words max.
[Spend Christmas with FRIENDS] <– would be my first draft of a billboard (with a small print subtext of [not church]
—
but me no graphic designer, here’s the grain of salt you’ll need to read what I wrote: Φ
Also wondering if maybe the “Bible Belt” folks have decided that the BB is actually vertical rather than horizontal.
The first one is a not-too-well designed anti-atheist billboard.
The second one is just annoying. What a useless, superficial statement about atheism.
SC, you are absolutely right. It’s just another lost opportunity, but I no longer expect better from AA.
@frog #7:
You mean it’s more like a wedgie?
A Bible belt
The US is more like the bible asscrack, not the bible belt…..
Let’s do a competition to design next year’s batch for them.
How about “Have a Merry Winter Solstice!”?
Underneath, it could say something like “Inspiring religious holidays since 5000 BC”. Not sure of the best date, but the season was noted by a number of ancient religions (IO, Saturnalia!), because the sun seemed to recover from whatever was making the days shorter.
According to The Friendly Atheist the two women in the 1st billboard are Christian and they’re not happy about being portrayed as atheists.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2016/12/06/irony-alert-atheist-billboard-urging-people-skip-church-features-two-devout-christians/
I am not much good with graphics but the statement “it’s the reason for the season” and indicating that the “it” referenced is the tilt of the earths axis in relation to the orbit would be simple and to the point
and would be just subversive enough and kind of hard to counter.
uncle frogy