Christians attack ‘marital affair’ billboards – A Facebook group has been started to stop maritalaffair.co.uk advertising publicly in the UK
Here we go again, some Christians pressurising for censorship as usual.
The Christian community is adept at fighting for its own freedoms as exemplified yesterday in the Lords defeat of the governments so called ‘equality bill’, however, some quarters of the Christian community are not so keen to extend freedoms to others.
Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t like advertisements for an extramarital dating service, but the Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) has refused to intervene, because the advertisement does not offend against “widely accepted moral, social or cultural standards”. The ASA says:-
“Whilst not everyone will agree with the advertiser’s service, the poster’s content and presentation were not explicit and it was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence or be seen as irresponsible.”
But this does not satisfy some Christians and why is that? This is because according to their own regenerated heart, they know that this is morally unacceptable, so they pressure those that do not have a regenerated heart to conform. How can we impose our God given morality on the unregenerated, if they are slaves to sin?
All too often we see headlines like this, emblazoned: “Christians attack” or “Christians condemn” this or that, and wag their fingers and say “No, no, no”. How does this make us look in the eyes of non-Christians? Whilst we trumpet our own ‘rights’ and ‘freedoms’ and then pronounce everyone else’s to be unacceptable to us. This is not right. You cannot demand ‘special excemptions’ to protect your own freedom of expression and then actively oppose others.
This will only backfire and create more publicity for the ‘wrong doers’ and we all know that the only bad publicity, is no publicity. This again makes us look like religious censoring extremists, as in the shameful case of Dr Bridget McConnell, the head of Glasgow’s museums and art, who has been under siege from Christian fundamentalists.
A Facebook group, Stop marital affair.co.uk advertising publicly in the UK, has gained more than 1,000 members in its first two days.
Jon Kuhrt, who works for a Christian charity in London, created the protest group after the ASA declined to act on his complaint about a billboard in Merton which read: “HELLO GIRLS. Get instant excitement at MARITALAFFAIR.co.uk.”
The advertisement, which also featured a picture of a man with no shirt on and a bra slung over his shoulder, are for a website which claims to deliver “uncomplicated adult fun” for “bored housewives looking for a bit on the side”.
The website’s homepage says: “Marital affair delivers a dating arena for those looking for adult dating and extramarital relations. Sexual needs are there to be met and sometimes life is better when the complications are left at the door.”
In an ASA letter reproduced on the Facebook page, Mr Kuhrt is told the agency will not act because the advertisement does not offend against “widely accepted moral, social or cultural standards”.
The letter adds: “Whilst not everyone will agree with the advertiser’s service, the poster’s content and presentation were not explicit and it was unlikely to cause serious or widespread offence or be seen as irresponsible.”
On his Facebook page, Mr Kuhrt highlights the “trauma and suffering caused to individuals and communities by the damage of affairs and the breakdown of relationships they cause.”
Members of the group have been urged to e-mail the ASA to register their disgust.
One user said: “This is a sick world and agencies like this will only make it sicker. Complaint has been filed. Very glad to be able to do something that is positive.”
I wish that these groups would stop running around condemning everyone and hold out the love and light of the Gospel, which is the only real solution, and start dealing with others as Christ has dealt with us.
We cannot have it both ways, we must allow for freedom of speech and expression for all – regardless of whether we find their speech and expression offensive – thus, we can express our freedoms and continue to share the full counsel of God, the Gospel, the Good News of our Lord and Saviour.
Christian should be rejoicing the defeat of potentially intrusive legislation yesterday and chill out, as this behaviour only causes resentment towards Christians and an inevitable backlash.
Tags: Christianity, Media, News
January 30th, 2010 at 11:00 am
Hi there, I’m afraid I don’t know the name of the author of the post – so forgive me for just starting commenting. I’m one of the people who led the efforts to get the billboards advertising cheating on your other half taken down.
I’ve read a couple of times your well-thought through blog post on my decision to try and make it harder for this company to advertise its services. I am trying to better understand your criticism of what we did. I think you are saying:
– We were not respecting other people’s freedoms to act (which is hypocritical because we expect our freedoms to be respected)
– We were using our time badly: we should be extending the gospel to people rather than doing this
– We were wasting your time: as it doesn’t work to make ‘ungenerate’ hearts (am I using this phrase right?) act in a ‘generate’ way unless they change themselves
– We were making Jesus look bad, by letting people think faith is about banning people doing stuff. That it’s about legalism, not life.
I hope that’s a fair summary.
I guess the way I saw it was that this was a case of bullying. Person A (the owner of the website) was making money by helping Person B (a married person) to cheat on Person C (the other half of the marriage), thus harming them and possibly Persons D and E (their children – may I assume 40% of them have kids?).
Reading your blog, I wondered if you felt that the aim of our action was Person B? In other words, we disapproved of their choices and wanted them changed. This wasn’t my aim.
My concern was Persons C, D and E. They were being harmed. I didn’t feel any judgement to Person B (I am no stronger or better than they), but I did want to stand up to Person A. They were the person with power here, who was using it to harm Persons C, D and E.
The calling I felt I was responding to was Jesus’ call to protect the weakest in society and stand up to the rich bully. It was the same feeling that I felt as a schoolchild when I saw people in my class bully weaker people. Or when I worked in Kenya as a development worker, how I felt when I saw politicians in power abuse their position to harm the population. I knew that in doing this, I would be criticised and misunderstood – not least by being accused of being a judgemental christian. I think I thought to put this first was to put my need first or the reputation of my religion first. Both of which seemed secondary to the calling to stand up for the weakest.
What I didn’t particularly want was another power to force the website to change. In other words, I didn’t particularly want the government to ban the website. I don’t really believe in banning things. As a Christian, I should – more than anyone – know that change happens through spirit not law. As a follower of Christ, I should – more than most – be terrified of power rather than seek to use it. (This is why we have hibernated the facebook group, to minimise the temptation of abusing the power that comes with it)
What I wanted was to stand up for the weakest in society. And so I stood and put pressure on the website and the company behind it. As a result, the billboards have come down, hopefully reducing the ability of Person A to make money from helping Person B to harm Persons C, D and E.
In the same way, I stood – 15 years ago – up to the bullies in school (to my own cost) I tried to stand against these bullies too. I think – for me – that’s the gospel in action.
You are clearly a very smart, passionate individual with well thought-out views. I am saddened, a little, however I failed to communicate better in the campaign about the logic behind what we were doing, and have therefore made it possible for people to think that we were just trying to make Person B live the way we want them to (which would be to totally miss the gospel message I agree).
I was sad that I didn’t communicate this better as I really didn’t entirely recognise your description of myself and my friends who got these billboards brought down.
Maybe one day we’ll meet over a beer and I can understand more about your clear passion for Christians to follow Christ more authenticly and hopefully you will get a change to test whether I am the person you describe in your blog or not.
Yours sincerely,
Jon Yates