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Bus Ads Encourage Muslims to Lose Their Religion
By
John Del Signore
Published May 26, 2010
Modified May 26, 2010
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By
John Del Signore
Published May 26, 2010
Modified May 26, 2010
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Blogger Pamela Geller, an outspoken opponent of the plan to build a mosque near the World Trade Center site, is offending Muslims with a new bus ad she bought with donations from chumps readers of her blog, Atlas Shrugs. The ad, seen here, costs $10,000, and will appear on 40 buses for the next month. It's all part of Geller's "Leave Islam" campaign, and she tells the Daily News, "Will it bother Islamic supremacists? Yes. There ought to be ads also for people who want to leave Islam. Their lives are threatened."
Similar bus ads were yanked by Miami Dade Transit after objections from Muslims who called them a "smoke screen for hatred," but then reposted after a lawsuit. In Astoria, one Muslim tells the News, "I think it's stupid, sorry. You are free to believe whatever you want. If you are in it by force, you are not a real Muslim." And the MTA's spokesman says the ads "did not violate the MTA's advertising guidelines."
On her blog,Geller blasted the News for not balancing the article with quotes from Muslims who were saved from their religion by her ad campaign. "Once again—angry Muslims, but no ex-Muslims grateful that someone is coming to their defense," Geller wrote. "For the multicultural elitists of the Daily News, such people simply don't exist." And if you didn't get enough Geller from her ads and her blog, she says she'll be on Joy Behar's show tonight debating with "the wife of the 911 mega mosque at Ground Zero, Daisy Khan."
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Pamela Geller
John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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