'Tis The Season For Holiday Display Controversies And Atheist Advertising

It is November, so it must be time for holiday display controversies, with a special bonus this year--atheist billboards, from D.C. to Denver.

First from D.C.:

You better watch out. There is a new combatant in the Christmas wars.

Ads proclaiming, "Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness' sake," will appear on Washington, D.C., buses starting next week and running through December. The American Humanist Association unveiled the provocative $40,000 holiday ad campaign Tuesday.
. . .
"We are trying to reach our audience, and sometimes in order to reach an audience, everybody has to hear you," said Fred Edwords, spokesman for the humanist group. "Our reason for doing it during the holidays is there are an awful lot of agnostics, atheists and other types of non-theists who feel a little alone during the holidays because of its association with traditional religion."
. . .
Edwords said the purpose isn't to argue that God doesn't exist or change minds about a deity, although "we are trying to plant a seed of rational thought and critical thinking and questioning in people's minds."

A similar campaign has sprouted in Denver:

Here's an unusual sign that the holidays are coming: just in time for Christmas, a group of atheists and freethinkers plan to sponsor 11 billboards in Colorado.

Against a blue sky backdrop, their billboard poses the question: "Don't believe in God? - You are not alone."

COCORE, an umbrella organization of 11 groups ranging from the Boulder Heretics to the Humanists of Colorado, are spending $5,000 to post their message at 10 sites in Denver and one in Colorado Springs, for four weeks starting around Nov. 17.
. . .
Straub said the one sign in Colorado Springs was not meant to tweak religious groups in that area.

"Absolutely not," Straub said Tuesday, noting that there is a freethinkers chapter in Colorado Springs.

He said the primary goal of the campaign is to reach about eight to 14 percent of the population who tell pollsters that they are not religious.

I support both campaigns on First Amendment grounds. There is nothing inherently offensive about the content, and the phrasing itself isn't as potentially provocative as the D.C. ad campaign.

I do, however, question the timing.

Why not conduct a campaign that occurs year-round? The groups believe that their efforts aren't intended to "tweak religious groups," but the choice of November/December should clearly indicate their intentions. At worst it is a cynical attempt to draw free media attention due to the proximity to Christmas and Hanukkah, and at best is a lame gesture at piggy-backing on the popularity of the holiday season.

Meanwhile, fresh on the heels of the holiday display controversy the last few years up in Fort Collins (extensive coverage and analysis by SP), a rabbi has asked the city of Golden to allow a Menorah display on city property, prompting another dispute over displays:

'Tis the season for municipal holiday decorations, and the city of Golden, after being asked to allow placement of a Jewish menorah on public property, will consider a resolution Thursday that says only secular displays are acceptable.

Golden's proposed policy excludes religious symbols. Its list of acceptable celebratory symbols includes snowflakes, icicles, snowmen, snowballs, ice skates, skis, penguins, polar bears, other animals, lights and foliage — real or artificial and in garland, bush or tree form.

Rabbi Levi Brackman, director of Judaism in the Foothills, has asked the City Council for permission to install a 6- to 8-foot menorah, a candelabrum used during the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah. The site Brackman requested is on city property, next to a large conifer that is traditionally strung with lights, at 10th and Washington streets.

Mayor Jacob Smith said Brackman's request catalyzed the discussion at an Oct. 16 study session of the city's first formal policy on holiday decorations.

After reading the city's resolution, drafted Oct. 30, Brackman realized its passage would make the menorah a no-go in Golden.

"This is secularist discrimination against religion," said Brackman, who heads the center for Jewish education and outreach. "And the other thing is that . . . Christmas trees are not secular. You won't find a secular person from the Jewish or Muslim traditions who celebrates the holidays with lights on trees."

At the study session, the mayor said trying to evenhandedly include many religious and secular symbols in a constitutionally correct, multicultural display — the all-or-none approach approved in recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions — would be challenging enough to cause city officials extreme hair loss or even "brain damage."

The city will consider excluding all religious symbols.

The flat-footed government solution to be inclusive of all during the "holiday season"--exclude all religious symbols.

It doesn't appear that Golden has backed itself into the corner the way that Fort Collins own display regulations had--allowing a Christmas tree (described as such) while appearing to not allow a Menorah. The mayor's lame joke about hair loss and "brain damage" notwithstanding, it is clearly the job of the City Council to sort out these difficult, often heated controversies, and the Supreme Court appears to give cities little flexibility with an all-or-nothing approach.

Thursday's vote will certainly not end the growing controversy in Golden--we'll keep you posted.

Larimer County Sheriff Decks The Halls With Nativity, Menorah

"I think the task force was well-intentioned, the city was well-intentioned, but they took a hard left at some point in the process"--Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden

A left turn into ACLU-aided moonbattery. A big turnout, complete with a Nativity and menorah--the reasons for the season:

Sheriff Jim Alderden led an old fashioned tree trimming celebration Saturday in protest of the City of Fort Collins' decision to remove religious symbols from city property.

The tree trimming was originally organized in response to a holiday task force that recommended the Fort Collins City Council vote to remove all religious references and colored lights from the city's display. Because the sheriff's tree is on county-owned property, it is not subject to any decisions the Fort Collins City Council makes.

"To me, the whole thing was absurd. Why did we need a 15-member task force to even explore what should be appropriate on public property," Alderden said. "I think the task force was well-intentioned, the city was well-intentioned, but they took a hard left at some point in the process."
. . .
"You look around and you see all the people showing up for this old fashioned tree trimming and I think it's wonderful," said City Council member Diggs Brown.

Brown voted against the removal of Christmas trees and colored lights, saying "I'm not going to be the Grinch that does away with decorations."

"From my perspective, this was a freedom of speech, freedom of religion issue. The vocal minority of intolerant progressives was trying to run down the majority," Alderden said.

Alderden says he received $1,500 in donations for Saturday's event and more than 500 e-mails supporting his stance.

"I've gotten a great deal of pagans and atheists coming in to see me and e-mail me (because of) their recognition that some sort of spirituality isn't a bad thing."

In addition to the tree, Alderden's display includes a Nativity scene and a menorah.

Only ACLU/progressive-approved spirituality is allowed in moonbat diversity-land.

That leaves out the "fascist" Christianity (Nativity) and "Zionist" Judaism (menorah).

Fort Collins Holiday Display Resolution Still Lacking

The Fort Collins menorah/Christmas tree/holiday lights saga is still unresolved, according to one Fort Collins Councilman:

Though a Fort Collins City Council vote last week ended a months-long discussion regarding holiday decorations on city property, one councilman said the initial question of menorah placement still has not been answered.

Councilman Wade Troxell circulated an e-mail to other council members and staff saying the city had not satisfied the need for an inclusionary city square open for free religious expression and that it should scrap parts of the plan the council adopted 6-1.

Troxell said the council needed to work with Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik — whose denied request to place a menorah marking Hanukkah on city property two years ago sparked the debate — to integrate a menorah with the traditional Christmas display.

Troxell cast the lone dissenting vote Nov. 20 to the proposal that maintained traditional, secular Christmas symbols such as decorated trees and colored lights on city buildings. It also created a display for next year on the Fort Collins Museum property that could have religious symbols such as the menorah.

"The museum display isn't inclusionary at all. It's a perversion of inclusion," he said. "It will be developed by city workers, which isn't an expression of faith. It's an interpretation."

As with any bureaucratic/governmental solution, the results are often incomplete, inadequate, and dissatisfying. The requested menorah that sparked this unnecessary controversy is still at issue--and was the primary reason for this councilman's no vote.

Previous coverage of the Fort Collins holiday display "task force" debacle here.

Fort Collins Chooses Hybrid Holiday Policy

Audio of the "holiday display task force presentation", Mayor Doug Hutchinson's ground rules and clarifications, and citizen comments:



An immigrant from the UK describes the nefarious encroachment of socialism/multiculturalism and explains that the "celebration of diversity" really means more restrictions and less inclusiveness:



Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelik explains his original request to display a Menorah that touched off the controversy, first when his request was denied twice, and then with the formation of the "holiday task force":




Still legal in Fort Collins--at least this year


Citizens of Fort Collins prepare to weigh in on the "holiday task force" recommendations

Avoiding another battle in the "war on Christmas", the Fort Collins City Council ultimately decided on adopting the third, hybrid option recommended by the "holiday display task force"--keep traditions by retaining current policy, while adding a new multiholiday exhibit at the Fort Collins museum:

All holidays are welcomed and celebrated in Fort Collins. City Council voted, 6-1, to adopt a Holiday Display Policy that honors current Christmas traditions and adds a new multicultural display at the Fort Collins Museum.

Council chose to adopt a hybrid plan which incorporates elements of both the existing Holiday Display Policy and a portion of the Holiday Display Task Force recommendations.

Consistent with existing policy, interior and exterior of City buildings may include traditional displays of trees, adorned greenery, wreaths, and other secular symbols or messages. Both white and colored lights are acceptable.

Based on recommendations from the Holiday Display Task Force, a multi-cultural educational exhibit will be placed on the grounds of the Fort Collins Museum. Both secular and religious celebrations and traditions will be included.

This decision, however, does not remove the responsibility the City Council bears for having put itself in such an awkward, attention gathering situation. It failed for two years to approve a request to add a Menorah, at no cost, to its existing display. It also punted the political football created by the controversy by overreacting and appointing a bureaucratic nightmare of a task force whose composition--widely derided by the citizens of Fort Collins--seemed to be predisposed to providing a multicultural mess of a recommendation that became media fodder overnight and drew even more negative publicity for the city.

The hybrid option did not please some task force members including, unsurprisingly, the lone ACLU member:

Some members of the citizen Holiday Display Task Force committee said Monday they are unhappy with changes city staff made to a holiday display policy coming before the City Council for a vote Tuesday night.

The task force, which met weekly for more than two months, made recommendations to ban colored lights and wreaths from the exterior of city buildings but to allow building managers' discretion in determining what adorns building interiors - including flexibility for religious displays.

The "hybrid policy," mashed together with parts of the task force recommendation and input from individual council members and the public, would allow for colored lights and Christmas tree displays on city building exteriors, including Oak Street Plaza, but limits what can be placed inside city buildings to items secular in nature unless part of an educational piece of artwork.

"My primary concern is that the (hybrid) recommendation includes aspects that were neither in the original policy nor the task force recommendation," task force spokesman Seth Anthony said. "I am concerned that some of the things were not thought all the way through and carefully (vetted) like the task force recommendations were."

City manager Darin Atteberry disagreed, saying the city has a long-standing policy and tradition of using citizen group input along with other factors when preparing policy for council debate and vote.

"That is why they are called advisory groups," Atteberry said, adding these types of decisions are always left to the city's elected officials.

Fort Collins Holiday Display Flap Set For Vote; Mayor Opposes Recommendation, Sheriff Plans Christmas Tree Protest

"Fort Collins is becoming more like the imbecilic borough of Boulder than many would like to admit, where social agendas substitute for common sense"--Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden

Council member Diggs Brown said he agrees with the mayor, says he'll vote against the task force recommendation because he doesn't want to be the "grinch" that ruins Christmas for Fort Collins' children (video):

"I will ask City Council to reject any recommendations that diminish Christmas in Fort Collins, especially our traditional display of Christmas trees, colored lights and other traditional secular symbols," Mayor Doug Hutchinson wrote in an opinion piece in Wednesday's The Coloradoan.

Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden is taking a different tack--inviting the public to help him decorate a Christmas tree in protest, complete with red and green lights:

Decrying people he says are taking the "Christ out of Christmas," Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden is inviting the public to help decorate a Christmas tree on his office lawn, and seeking donations to ensure no tax dollars are spent on it.

"Most of the members of the Larimer County Sheriff's Office are Christians and celebrate Christmas. We pray for the continued safety of our brothers and sisters in blue, and recognize that the laws we are sworn to uphold have their very foundation in the laws laid down by God through Moses," Alderden said in his Bull's-eye newsletter. "Our criminal codes are based on Judaic Christian doctrine. To deny that by restricting symbols of Christian faith on public property is beyond the pale."

Alderden devoted his most recent newsletter to the ongoing controversy over the city's holiday light display task force's recommendation that religious symbols be limited in public places. The City Council will discuss the recommendations at Tuesday's meeting.

Because the sheriff's tree will be on county-owned property, it's not subject to the task force's recommendations.
. . .
"There's such a thing as religious tolerance, but you can be tolerant without excluding the majority, and that seems to be the road we're heading down," Alderden said. "We respect people of other faiths and religions. We respect other people's right to have their opinions, but don't ask Christians to hide their faith."

For moonbats, tolerance swings only in one direction. Everyone must accommodate the minority, while the majority must remain silent and traditions are removed to placate the delicate sensibilities of the "offended"--whether real or imagined. This is the ultimate result of nanny-statism and multi-culturalism, and RMN editor Vincent Carroll details what awaits down the slippery slope:

We used to debate whether religious symbols were appropriate — or even legal — on public property at Christmas time. Now we apparently must debate whether anything that makes someone think of Christmas should be displayed.

A city appointed task force in Fort Collins has concluded that the answer is no. Even objects that have no more religious significance than a fat elf with a long white beard might jeopardize the civic goal of ensuring that all citizens “feel valued, welcomed and included.” As a result, for example, the task force would allow no colored lights on city buildings or in common areas inside. And no ornaments. It would even mandate that any “garlands of greenery” be “unadorned.”

Mustn’t let a ribbon give the public the wrong idea.

Apparently the worry is that someone who doesn’t celebrate Dec. 25 might notice a red ribbon and think, “Aha! They’re pushing Christmas.” The next thing you know, the poor fellow will be seeking advice from a therapist on how to cope. What kind of “inclusive” city would willingly subject its citizens to such traumatic ordeals? Better to limit displays to white lights, icicles, snowflakes, snowmen, penguins, polar bears, and skis (all declared harmless by the task force) rather than flirt with the harrowing possibility that a string of colored lights might trigger a bout of depression in a sensitive passerby.
. . .
Officials who decide to scrub one holiday from the calendar in the name of a uniting “all city residents and visitors in the spirit of community celebration” may soon discover their work is more complicated than they thought.

Previous coverage of the Fort Collins "holiday task force".

Fort Collins' "Holiday Display Task Force" Deemphasizes Christmas, Favoring "Winter Symbols" And Diversity

This display is too "Christmas-y" and therefore offensive to Fort Collins' "holiday display task force"

Beginning with last year's controversy over a Menorah display, Fort Collins' holiday displays will be "festive" but decidedly less "Christmas-y" this year--a "secular winter celebration incorporating cultural and religious differences" (video). In order to avoid controversy and not offend anyone, Christmas elements will be deemphasized in favor of celebrating Fort Collins' "diversity"--blue and white lights instead of red and green.

Who is responsible for the recommendations? Why Fort Collins' own "holiday display task force"--17 "religious, cultural, and legal experts". Holiday-by-committee will render the already watered-down displays into meaningless "winter symbols" when they issue their recommendation to the city council in the coming weeks.

Stop The ACLU--Friday Free For All

Fort Collins Forms Holiday Display 'Task Force'

In a move that replaces legislative fiat with potential bureaucratic red tape, Fort Collins City Council has formed a holiday display citizen "task force" assigned to grapple with the pressing and difficult issue of whether or not to display a menorah during the "holidays":

The Fort Collins City Council took the right approach to a difficult dilemma by agreeing to form a citizen task force to review the city's holiday display policy.

For two years, the issue of whether a menorah could or should be allowed on city property has been left generally unresolved. City Council voted last year to continue its policy of not allowing unattended displays in Old Town, even after public forums dominated by discussion from residents who advocated the placement. While the menorah was rejected, the city does allow a Christmas tree to be placed in Old Town.

Tuesday's decision, though, transcends the menorah issue to address the city's guidelines for all holiday exhibits - an approach that is both sensible and inclusive.

The same goes with forming a citizens' group made up of stakeholders from religious, business, social and government communities. It is hoped that a diverse group can form a diverse and, perhaps, creative approach that allows for free expression rather than exclusion. This group can start by studying how other communities have addressed what has become an all-too-common controversy throughout the nation.

This is, indeed, a community conversation. And it is one in which City Council may have to be led rather than lead on determining appropriate displays for public property.

A recommendation will be brought to the City Council by Oct. 31 and the council will vote on the issue at its Nov. 6 meeting.

City officials are touting their foresight, civic fortitude, and "inclusionary" undertaking:

"I am really delighted to see us taking this step," said Mayor Doug Hutchinson. "We learned a lot about this issue two years ago, and I think Fort Collins is a great city, and I think great cities are inclusionary. I think what council is doing tonight is an act of proactive inclusion."

The 20-member task force will include representatives from many different city organizations, both religious and secular in nature, city staff told council members.
Controversy arose during the holiday season in Fort Collins during the past two years when City Council voted to maintain its policy of not allowing unattended displays – including the menorah – in Old Town.
. . .
"I am pleased council is doing this," said council member Kelly Ohlson, who suggested the task force at a study session. "I want to be clear, though, that we're not telling any churches or businesses or property owners what they can do on their own property. This purely a policy about what the city can do on city property."

"Inclusionary" bureaucracy. Gets you all warm and fuzzy!

We supported the display of a menorah in Fort Collins last December. That position hasn't changed.

We just find it amusing that a 20 person task force has been created to study the issue. Thanks to the ACLU for necessitating such a wasteful and pointless bureaucratic process, as the city cowers behind bureaucracy to avoid ACLU lawsuits and deflect cries of discrimination.