An organization in Bath called “Healing on the Streets” (HOTS) plastered flyers around town advertising their services.
Need Healing? God can heal today! Do you suffer from Back Pain, Arthritis, MS, Addiction … Ulcers, Depression, Allergies, Fibromyalgia, Asthma, Paralysis, Crippling Disease, Phobias, Sleeping disorders or any other sickness?
We’d love to pray for your healing right now!
We’re Christian from churches in Bath and we pray in the name of Jesus. We believe that God loves you and can heal you from any sickness.
And then…a miracle happened. It’s utterly unbelievable, at least to an American.
The Advertising Standards Authority declared them to be irresponsible, false advertising and ordered them taken down.
Can we import them over here and put them to work? I’d like to see all the churches shut down. Also, all those annoying advertisements about “natural male enhancement” products.
HOTS Bath is stunned. They don’t understand.
All over the world as part of their normal Christian life, Christians believe in, pray for and experience God’s healing; our ministry, in common with many churches, has been active in praying for God’s healing (of Christians and non Christians) for many years.
That’s a fairly typical Christian response. They always act like they’ve been poleaxed whenever they discover someone who sees through their lies and notices that their claims are bullshit.
Despite all data to the contrary. The death rate for xians is 100%.
The number of children in the USA killed by faith healing isn’t known too well but is around 10-100 per year.
The number of adults isn’t known either but likely to be much higher. It’s perfectly legal for adults to kill themselves with faith healing so no one collects the statistics.
Wow, the ASA do something other than ban hot poodle ads for being a bit too risqué?
Good stuff!
It’s more or less a given that freedom of religion is the freedom to bullshit.
Glen Davidson
What’s with the ellipsis after “Addiction”?
We we’re stunned. Stunned, I tell you! Our magic faerie dust was denied! How could anyone object to that?
I live in Bath, and I’ve been racking my brain to recall if I’ve ever seen these people about. I vaguely recall walking past them, but thinking of them as some kind of new-age thing, rather than Christians.
BTW, are there any other Pharyngulites from Bath?
Sadly, the ASA would be unlikely to result in any churches being shut down. They don’t actually do anything much in relation to religious advertising, indeed, and ad that said that some god loves you and will guarantee you a place in paradise would be acceptable, whereas the atheist bus ads were required by the ASA to say there is probably no god.
Check this one out:
https://twitter.com/#!/LisaMcIntire/status/164909199476793346
I would ask how effing clueless you have to be to accusing pro-choice people of ideological bombthrowing when its the anti-choicers who throw actual bombs, but cluelessness is the least of their problems. Right now, I’m actually hating these people.
via http://www.balloon-juice.com/
The ASA, whilst not without their issues (see the “probably” note above @6), seem to have shown the most teeth of all the governmental and quasi-governmental agencies against woo in general. They have certainly come down hard on claims made by the purveyors of alternative medicines and the like – I get the feeling they would be even more effective in this regard if they had a wider purview than just advertising.
I think the difference is between falsified claims, and unfalsifiable claims. “Praying cures cancer” is provably false, and so falls within the ASA’s remit. “God loves you” is unfalsifiable, and so cannot be legally treated as a false claim.
Well, in the US, the FTC also oversees advertising claims (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_advertising#United_States_advertising_regulations)
Also, many states have false advertising laws as well.
I’m wondering though how this could be applied to a case like this? Maybe someone here knows.
My major concern, though, is that the woooists are very clever and know exactly how they have to advertise their products in
order not to run foul of the law.
They also know how to avoid that their woo stuff is not subject to regulation by these drug agencies, like the American FDA, or its counterparts in other countries..
That just about makes up for the idiotic decision the ASA made when it decided ISPs can call broadband with caps and bandwidth throttling, unlimited.
Trouble is the headline is misleading, the ASA actually doesn’t have the power to ban anything, any advertiser can just ignore a ruling and some do. If the law isn’t broken so badly that businesses are (rarely)referred tp say the UK Office of Fair Trading Without co operation the only sanction they have is to name and shame on their website.
Oh and normally religious and political ads are exempt from the regulations on factual statements.
Of course not. What is the American dream but the freedom to lie, cheat, and swindle (but don’t show a nipple)?
I constantly get email spam for “natural” male enhancement, which I don’t understand because I only have lady bits.
Well, sometimes the FTC does its job re false advertising, here’s a case from 1975 concerning “psychic surgery” tours in the Philippines.
http://www.ftc.gov/os/decisions/docs/vol86/FTC_VOLUME_DECISION_86_(JULY_-_DECEMBER_1975)PAGES_715-825.pdf
I wish they would forget about back pain and fibromyalgia and halitosis, and focus all of their prayers on amputees.
Surely, these folks need healing more.
So you’re only interested in “unnatural” male enhancement?
BTW, are there any other Pharyngulites from Bath?
The first line of a naughty limerick?
The way these folks often weasel their way out of accountability for their claims is by equivocating like mad on the meaning of the word “heal.” Sometimes it means one thing; sometimes it means another.
Sometimes the word “heal” is used in the normal, medical, technical, secular sense: to cure or restore to health. That’s an outcome which can be measured in this world. If a health professional states that they will try to ‘heal’ you of back pain, ulcers, ms, etc., then you will have specific expectations about a measurable, demonstrable outcome. Your back won’t hurt, your ulcer will go away, your ms will recede, etc. The claim means something.
But sometimes the word “heal” is used in the special, supernatural, psychological, metaphysical sense: to restore to spiritual purity or integrity. You can’t measure that outcome in this world. Virtually any result is consistent with a spiritual healing — up to and including a suicidal depression and/or agonizing death. God/the woo didn’t fail — YOU did. Or, perhaps, the contaminated flesh has been replaced by the purity of the soul’s essence, freed from the disease of life. Or maybe you feel slightly better and a lot closer to God. Success! Hell, make it up. Anything goes. A claim for spiritual “healing” means nothing.
Faith is the ultimate cop-out, the eternal Get-Out-of-Jail-Free card. It teaches you how to equivocate and still keep your conscience clear. Clear? Why, your conscience is even better than before! It was spiritually “healed.”
@ jnorris #18
Nice idea. But as Bath is a city in the south of England it is pronounced barth, as in….well.. bath. Not (as they say up north) bath, as in.. well..bath. Now where are we going to find rhymes for that? Oh where is Digital Cuttlefish when you need hir.
Damn, with an acronym like HOTS, I would expect a little more than a friggin’ prayer. No wonder the ASA accused them of false advertising.
I couldn’t tell from the articles, but I’m assuming that the “adverts” were just propaganda asking for prayer requests, and not for pecuniary benefit. (“I’d be happy to beg Jesus to cure your coldsore, I got an “in” with him, for a nominal fee.”)
Here in Unitedstatesia, one trigger for whether speech (including printed materials) can be regulated is when it becomes commercial.
I mean, come on! If we started banning false statements in non-commercial advertising, the Republican Party could NEVER air campaign ads!
hyperdeath
I’m just up the road; Taunton. Close enough that I groaned at the local-ness of it. (Shouldn’t make a difference, I know, but somehow it does.)
Do they smell as bad on the outside if you take them for a Bath?
There was a Pharyng’lite from Bath
of whom there’s, in that place, a dearth…? :-S
What else rhymes, other than Darth Vader?
Here is a link to the blog of the person who made the complaint to the ASA. It is worth a read.
http://hayleyisaghost.co.uk/healing-on-the-streets-why-i-am-not-a-group-generally-opposed-to-christianity/
This is totally illogical.
If they really, truly believe that prayer heals, there isn’t any reason at all why they would need to advertise, or to make a personal connection with individual sick people. God knows who’s sick. They could just pray fervently for ‘healing’ in general and when the prayer-o-meter up in heaven dinged for another ‘sufficient faith’ fill-up, God would cure whoever deserved it the most.
Obviously, since people all over the United Kingdom are still getting sick, even little children and babies!!, these people’s training in praying is lousy, and none of them has faith even the size of a mustard seed (because if they did mountains would be moving), and therefore the Advertising Standards Council is absolutely right — they’re a bunch of con artists.
Religious freedom is important to me, though, so why not compromise? Let them keep advertising, so long as they agree not to accept one cent in donations from anybody.
@Daz, @Grumps, @jnorris, @hyperdeath, @David Marjanovic
I know this is not a true limerick, but…
A person from Bath, pursued a lone path,
As his atheist views were quite singular.
But this solitary man, joined a globalised clan,
On the day he discovered Pharyngula!
(I’m also from SW UK, near Glastonbury – world renowned centre of all things woo).
This ASA ruling is the result of a complaint by well-known British skeptic Hayley Stevens. She blogs about it here:
http://hayleyisaghost.co.uk/bath-chronicle-write-about-my-complaint/
Because people still might believe in the claims and forego actual effective medical treatment.
A person from Bath.
A Pharyngulite she is.
Or he, whatever.
@drummer25
Not a limerick but wonderful. Well done and thanks.
Yes Glastonbury is probably one of the woo centres of the world… love it. Every other shop is selling crystals, books about lay lines, holy grails and shit. For an ex-hippy like me it’s paradise..except I’m now an ex-hippy, totally skeptic, non-believer, woo-bashing atheist fucker.. but I still love it.. purple tie-dye etc.
Currently living in Martock, Hi.
There was a young person from Bath,
Who was cheered not by prayer but by hearth,
As a skeptic most singular,
Mentioned on Pharyngula,
To fame she is now on the path.
Reading the comments above, you could be forgiven for thinking that the ASA is a nice friendly secular organisation. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The HOTS ads were pulled because they made specific health claims, which is illegal. But other recent decisions by the ASA have looked vary like an attempt to bring back a blasphemy law… by protecting people (specifically Catholics) from being “offended”.
More information here (also follow the links to the earlier stories).
The ads are actually very amusing, in a tasteless kind of way. I haven’t tried the ice cream.
David Marjanović
dearth … birth? Could be a born-again reference.
Oh come on, even Tim Minchin admitted that prayer can work, he wrote a song about his mistake.
“Naughty limerick” is dangerously close to being redundant. As everyone* knows, there are three classes of limerick:
1) naughty limericks
2) limericks about limericks
3) bad limericks
Every limerick ever written falls into at least one of the above categories. Some of the best combine class 1 with class 2.
IslandBrewer writes:
I couldn’t tell from the articles, but I’m assuming that the “adverts” were just propaganda asking for prayer requests, and not for pecuniary benefit… If we started banning false statements in non-commercial advertising, the Republican Party could NEVER air campaign ads!
The UK’s advertising codes apply to all promotional materials, including (since last year) the internet. Literature handed to people in the street is subject to the codes, regardless of whether it’s promoting a product to buy or a church.
However, political parties are exempt from the codes. No political advertising is allowed on TV or radio, but advertising in newspapers, on billboards and so on are (mostly) unregulated.
Anisopteran writes:
Reading the comments above, you could be forgiven for thinking that the ASA is a nice friendly secular organisation. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
The opposite is the case, in my view. I can’t see any evidence that the advertising regulators are treating any group differently; the rules of intentional offence in advertising are clear and apply equally to everyone.
This is something the UK’s National Secular Society should support, and I think they’re making a tactical error in trying to portray it as a re-introduction of a law on blasphemy. In fact, I would describe their argument as irrational.
(Sorry international readers; this won’t interest you much. Also, I’m an N.S.S. member.)
Daz:
Grumps:
Greetings. Although I don’t visit the degenerate wastelands of south Somerset that often.
drummer25:
Isn’t that the place that tried to ban WiFi?
Hasn’t worked, either. Time to shut that study down.
Wow. If they could provide some evidence (a successful blinded experiment, for example, say, regrowing an amputated limb), they could really show us all.
I wonder why they never do. </sarcasm>
Great to see someone smacked down for false advertising who really deserves it.
There once was a pharyngulate from Bath
Who kept a dead porcupine on his hearth.
When asked “What does it do?”
He said “Bend over, I’ll show you.”
And that’s why there are no creationists in Bath.
If Bath rhymes with hearth how do you pronounce barth?
1.
An active young atheist from Bath,
Was leafleted on the footpath.
The flyer said “Jesus
Will cure your diseasus”,
But the ASA had the last laugh.
2.
Professor PZ is most singular
He maintains a web blog called Pharyngula.
His thousands of minions
Support his opinions,
And give fundies the stiff middle fingular.
@M Groesbeck and all limericists, (well done stephenminhinnick)
Re good/bad limericks, the perfect limerick, in my opinion, has:
1. Perfect scansion with the required triplet rhythm, and no extra syllables to break the flow.
2. Scandalous sentiments couched in gentile language.
3. An explosive denoument reserved for the last word of the last line.
The example par excellence, with the bonus of having a go at religion, is:
From the depths of the crypt of St Giles,
Came a scream that resounded for miles.
Said the vicar, “Good gracious!
Has Father Ignatius
Forgotten the bishop has piles!”
And now we’d better finish with off-topic limericks or we’ll be banned.
drummer25,
I agree about the importance of scansion – if you can’t make it scan properly, keep it to yourself. But I think there are some fine limericks that deal with scientific topics:
A young fencer from Finchley named Fisk
Had a style most exceedingly brisk
So fast was his action
Fitzgerald’s contraction
Foreshortened his foil to a disc
@Gramps
Either you meant leylines, or else that’s an awful lot of books about chat-up strategies.
Hayley lay some Righteous Indignation Smackdown on these guys; it’s been a long time coming. HOTS are street harassers of anyone with an obvious disability, and the ASA have kicked arse with this. All I’ve managed to do is get a ruling on a homeopath (they didn’t even get back to me on the chiropractic, I must follow that up soon); when the Daily Heil and Faux News picked this up I was hysterical with glee. It’s time Hayley got more kudos for her activism; she’s Good People.
@ hyperdeath and Baz, Grumps and drummer25
I’m the other side of Dartmoor, at Lifton (nr Launceston).
I used to live near Plymouth and that place is religious-botherer central. Everyone used to come knocking – not just the Morons and Jehovos but the Christadelphians, the local Baptists, even the CofE vicar.
Saturday morning was their favourite time. I used to see them coming from the window, and took to answer the door in a state of undress, holding a vodka bottle.
Bath, meanwhile, is where the great Bill Bailey comes from.
Dredged from the dark recesses of my brain …
An innocent virgin called Mary,
Was visited once by a fairy.
He said “Gabriel’s the name,
Impregnation’s the game” —
A nice story to trap the unwary!
@changeable moniker
But for Mary the fairy was scary,
She was therefore inclined to be wary:-
“I’m impressed by such things
As your halo and wings,
But why is your scrotum so hairy?”
Said the angel, “I know it sounds odd,
I was actually sent here by God,”
But it wasn’t divinity,
That took her virginity,
It was randy old Joseph, the sod!
Nice! ;)
Daz says:
3 February 2012 at 12:25 pm
Oh, snap!
And I think I’ve seen these guys a few times in Taunton High Street.
There’s also a bearded guy in a hat that I sometimes see preaching in the High Street (“God loves you and is going to destroy the world. Homosexuality is an abomination” etc). I’ve considered challenging him a few times, but he’s never around when I’m not busy. (I also haven’t decided what tactic to use: play it straight and say “that’s disgusting and bigoted – you should be ashemed of yourself”, or pretend to take him seriously but not in the way he’d want: “clearly this god is an enemy of humanity, and we should be trying to find a way to kill him first”).
Citizenjoe @ 16 really says it all. For all the wonderful healing the christian prayers have done, these folks have turned their backs on amputees through the ages. You would think they have something against the poor amputee, not once has a christian ever troubled him/herself to ask that someone’s limb grow back. I don’t know for sure, but I suspect these folks have some sort of conspiracy going on when it comes to amputees. Gawd could do it of course, but for some reason they ain’t asking.
I’m guessing it was the second line that was the problem.
This is why we don’t see adverts for ‘miraculous healing’ magnetic bracelets in the UK; but they can be still sold using testimonials from people who say it worked for their arthritis/rheumatism/etc.
So long as they don’t out and out state a claim they’re fine to use their belief and those of others to sell their product.
As to remarks about blasphemy and offensive; that tends to be for targeted groups. So I couldn’t put up an advert stating “All Christians are stupid; become an atheist” as that would be directed at offending Christians. On the other hand they wouldn’t be able to display “All Atheists are sinners; become a Christian” for exactly the same reason.
In exactly the same way for factual evidence “There is no God” and “There is a God” would (or at least should) be treated identically.