Not everyone has a problem with a controversial ad that made its debut in New Westminster earlier this week.
As The Record previously reported, an ad promoting atheism and the Centre for Inquiry Canada, an educational charity aimed at promoting evidence-based thinking, is now on a billboard on McBride Boulevard between Sixth and Eighth avenues. The ad features a young man holding a camera with the words "Dave 27:1 ... Lead with your heart. Not with your Bible."
"... These ads are specifically slanted in a ways as to attack Christians and believers in the Bible on the grounds that somehow belief in the Bible is some kind of assault to freedom of thought or self-determination, which is essentially bigotry," Mark Jaskela, a member of a volunteer ministry in New Westminster, told The Record in a previous interview.
But Centre for Inquiry Canada spokesperson Justin Trottier says complaints like Jaskela's are all part of the motivation behind these types of ads.
"I have no issues at all with people's strong opinions about the advertisements. Obviously the advertisements themselves are the result of our organization having itself, very strong opinions about religion, about humanism, about alternative systems to religion, and wanting to have a conversation about it," he said. "We welcome the very, sometimes loud and messy, but very necessary debate and conversation that ensues."
So far, the ads seem to be doing exactly what Trottier said was their intention. A number of people have already commented on Twitter and Facebook expressing their support for the ad and the different view it represents.
The ad in New Westminster is one of six posted throughout Metro Vancouver. At this time, these are the only ads in country, but Trottier said the centre is promoting them across Canada as a way to encourage other communities to sponsor similar ads.
CBS Outdoor owns the advertising space currently in use by the Centre for Inquiry Canada. The centre initially contacted Pattison Outdoor, part of The Jim Pattison Group, for space on its billboards but was rejected. Pattison later told Global News the ads were rejected because the designs did not meet the company's guidelines.
The centre intends on filing a human rights complaint regarding the rejection. Trottier said Pattison's decision to not approve the ads violated the centre's rights, and the statement made to the media was not the same as what Pattison told the Centre for Inquiry Canada.
The centre has six months to file its complaint.
The Jim Pattison Group could not be reached for comment at this time.
