A TV ad campaign featuring lingerie-clad women praying for beautiful hair has been banned by the advertising watchdog because it might offend Christians…
Ghd’s ads showed scantily-clad women in various positions, such as lying on a bed, while looking upwards with their hands clasped as if in prayer. Some had objects that looked like votive candles and rosary beads…
One woman was thinking “May my new curls make her feel choked with jealousy”, while another was saying to herself “May my flirty flicks puncture the heart of every man I see”. At the end of each ad an endline ran: “Thy will be done”.
The Advertising Standards Authority received a total of 23 complaints, including one from the Archdeacon of Liverpool, objecting that the ads were offensive to the Christian faith…
Martin Penny, the managing director of ghd, said that the ban was perplexing, adding that the company had used the phrase “a new religion for hair” for seven years with little problem…It is a fashion ad which is tasteful and sensitive. The ASA seem to be frightened of their own shadow.”
Brits are becoming so accustomed to tailing after the USA, they’re adopting all the stupid habits.
#30 – “Faith isn’t believing without proof – it’s trusting without reservation.” William Sloane Coffin
As for what that has to do with one’s overall mental capacity, keep in mind that we are all human and we all have different mental capacities regardless of what our beliefs are. It is possible to be Christian and a reasonable thinking being, just as it is possible for someone to be Christian and a complete and utter dolt.
#29 – Funny, I didn’t say anything like that. In fact, I believe that radical Christians are quite possibly more potentially dangerous than radical Muslims. Abortion clinic bombers, anyone?
Ahh more anti-Christian rhetoric. All the rave these days. Do our beliefs scare you, mmmmm?
#31–shadow==different words meaning exactly the same thing is supposed to be proof of what exactly?
and #32–yes, otherwise sane people believing without proof/trusting without reservation in things without proof is Very Scary.
In fact, the only saving grace for most religious types is they are lazy or hypocritical and don’t actually act on their core beliefs. When they get fundamental and real about their beliefs, then, yes==very dangerous.
I noticed the second part of my statement there got completely skipped over.
Being Christian is not supposed to be about “I’m better than you”; this is where most people get tripped up. It’s about “in myself, I’m not good at all; I need His help to improve myself and my world”. It’s the people that do things to prove their own righteousness or who claim themselves better than everyone else that you have to watch out for.
Let me repeat in no uncertain terms: It is not “I’m right and you’re wrong”. It is “I can’t do what’s right by myself.” It’s not about selfishness; it’s selflessness.
#34–shawdobird==I didn’t skip over the second part of your statement. I addressed it directly. I said, and I still hope, that you remain totally lazy and hypocritical and don’t get that “help” you say you need.
Much better to stand on your own two feet without the need for fairies, gods, and other made up things other than the help and support of real people in your trusted/family circle.
Oil and water.
#32 – Ahh more anti-Christian rhetoric. All the rave these days. Do our beliefs scare you, mmmmm?
Yes Joel. Born again, bible-thumping, moralizing, Pat Robertsonesque, hate speech endorsing beliefs, like those of a minority of Christians, do scare us.
Because if you have these beliefs, you are an idiot. A moron. Incompetent. Lacking in critical thinking skills. Illogical. Drunk with your own sense of self-righteous indignation and prideful and arrogant enough to think you can force your simple-minded way of life on others.
Fuck you and your delusions of anti-Christian rhetoric. There is a born again Jesus Freak serving as President of the United States, so you are definitely not a persecuted group of people.
The loud, vocal, narrow-minded asshats that comprise the so-called Christian Right are hypocrites who defy the teachings of their own mythological god and judge all others around, with scorn in their voice and vengeance in their hearts, and then suddenly, with tears in their beady little eyes, whine like bitches about being persecuted.
Fuck conservative Christians.
Fuck their feelings. Fuck their opinions. Fuck their deeply held personal beliefs. And fuck them when they knock on my door and want to share their delusional mental illness with me.
I will watch what I want to watch.
I will read what I want to read.
I will fuck any consenting adult I like.
I will drink on any day I please (theoretically, because I actually don’t drink at all).
But more important than the preservation of my personal liberties is the defense of my culture…
My culture will teach science in science class.
My culture will produce any kind of art it likes and will not cower before bigots who call for censorship.
My culture will protect the natural and absolute right of any woman to govern her own body through reproductive freedom.
My culture will not cave to petty pseudo-ethical arguments against stem-cell research, especially when the stakes involve diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer’s, and many other devastating illness’s that destroy quality of life.
Yes… Their stupid and petty, anachronistic beliefs scare us because all rational, intelligent, and responsible humans should fear a regression into a new Dark Age at the hands of brutal theocrats who in their darkest hearts dream themselves as masters over humanity.
So far, zealots are held at bay with words and the rule of law. It they who should be afraid. When fundy Xians finally cross the line and attempt to control our lives through force or coercion, I, and many others, will meet the challenge with far greater force and no forgiveness or compassion.
We may not know how to hate like fundamentalist Christians do… but we have one distinct advantage… We are so much smarter than you.
>> But when I am offended, I change the damn channel.
>> When Christians get offended, they change MY channel.
Aren’t you just making that up?
I can’t think of a single American TV channel Christian have shut down.
And there are 224,000,000 Christians in America! You’d think if we really wanted to shut down your favorite channel, we could have.
http://tinyurl.com/c45xz
#37 – You are the one who wants to claim there are 225 million Christians. Maybe you should think about breaking that down into sects.
I’m talking about a small but vocal brand of Christianity typified by windbags like Donald Wildmon, Pat Robertson, Bill Bennet, Ralph Reed, the late Jerry Falwell, and their ilk. I think I make this distinction often enough that a regular like you should know it.
If you want me to believe that ALL Christians are batshit crazy, keep telling me about the 225 million Christians.
Sorry, that on that particular post I failed to make the qualifier about which particular set of Christians I was referring to. But really, don’t you think my posts have enough of a windbag quality to them already with you needing even more verbiage from me to get the point?
I can’t think of a single American TV channel Christian have shut down.
The omnipresent threat of a Xian boycott against advertisers has a chilling effect on the quality and content of mainstream American TV. How important that effect is, is debatable, and variable depending on the content in question… But do you really think we’d have had the FCC explode after the microsecond glimpse of Janet Jackson’s pixilated tit, were it not for the legions of busybody church mavens always standing at the ready to autodial their favorite networks anytime the urge be offended strikes?
Yes. In my own small, sadly ineffective way, I am waging a “crusade” against backward Xian idiots who insist on assaulting our secular culture and imposing their narrow moral views onto my way of life. And I honestly do feel bad that you feel stroked by the seemingly broad brush of my attack. But until at least 175 million of the 225 million Christians in this country are ready to look the remaining 50 million in the eye and tell them to sit down and shut their freaking pie holes, I really have no way to better separate the good citizens from the troublemakers and the swat of that brush is the price you’ll have to pay for standing so close to a subset with so low a moral character.
#36 – That’s a little subtle, how do you really feel?
Can’t really argue with you except that everyone should be required to drink beer, unless they have an allergy, in which case another alcoholic beverage is an acceptable substitute.
#39 – 🙂 – I actually am unable to drink alcohol… (diabetes)
Mythological God gave us the the herb, and that will do.
See your help in my way, and I’ll seek it in mine. Don’t put me in the same boat with the idiots who want to press their beliefs on you.
It isn’t right, you say, for the fundies to call non-Christians wrong. How much more wrong is it for non-Christians to label all Christians in the wrong for the deeds of a few?
Am I liable for the terrible things the Church has done that were done long before I was born? Am I responsible for the things they do now that I inwardly and outwardly despise! In the words of St. Paul, “Certainly not!”
Why should I be punished for the misdeeds of those overzealous few when I am perfectly content to reach out to my fellow mortals here in an attempt to prove that not all Christians are uncaring jerks?
You speak of Christian hypocrisy…is it not equally hypocritical to do exactly the same thing that the Fundies are doing? Why should atheists get away with it while Christians cannot?
#41 – If you are talking to me… You should read what I wrote.
If you are a normal person who happens to be a Christian, your reading skills will lead you to realize that I am making a distinction between mainstream Xians and culture warriors.
If you are a fundy, it won’t matter because you’ll never deviate from your bullshit talking points no matter what I or anyone else writes.
If you are not talking to me, who are you talking to?
#41, Shadowbird,
You speak of Christian hypocrisy…is it not equally hypocritical to do exactly the same thing that the Fundies are doing?
Whenever I see an atheist telling me I’m going to hell because of whatever and then the atheist turns around and does that exact same thing, yes, that is hypocrisy.
Why should atheists get away with it while Christians cannot?
Good point. Atheists should not tell others not to have homosexual sex all the while they are doing it themselves. Atheists should not be telling us to help our neighbors while they keep telling us they need money to do the atheists work and spread the atheist word. Atheists should not get away with trying to impose their beliefs on a woman’s body.
Yup. That was a very good point you brought up and I’m personally glad you did.
#41–shadowbird==you trip over one of the main critisms I have of the christian religion ((besides the fact that god doesn’t exist)) and that is the “unfairness”/illogical/lack of love etc that exists at the heart and soul of the christian religions==guilt by association.
“I believe” there are many good and decent people on the earth==not perfect, just good and decent. I see no reason for all of us to be tortured for a lifetime on earth (ie-removed from the garden of eden) just because Adam and Eve violated gods word.
This is why “the bible” is not a source of moral teaching. Morals come from outside the bible and only happen to coincide every once in awhile.
You don’t punish people for what they believe or don’t believe as does god, you punish people, if at all, for what the DO.
You don’t punish people for what their parents did, as does god, you punish people, if at all, only for what THEY do.
You don’t punish people for what they think or don’t think, do or not do, FOR ETERNITY, as does god. You teach, rehabilitate, and give second chances.
So–if god did exist as you believe and teach==he would only be a powerful entity to contest.