NY Atheists Complain About Street Name Which Is "Insulting"

NY atheists demand sign honoring 9-11 firefighters be removed

"Fox News radio reports Tuesday that a group of atheists are demanding the City of New York remove a street sign that pays homage to seven heroic firefighters who were killed in the Sept 11, 2001 terror attacks.

The street - dedicated last weekend outside the Brooklyn firehouse where the firefighters once served - was christened "Seven in Heaven Way." Fox News reports that the "ceremony was attended by dozens of firefighters, city leaders and widows of the fallen men."

It's the word "heaven" that has the atheists in an uproar. According to them, that word violates separation of church and state.

“There should be no signage or displays of religious nature in the public domain,” said Ken Bronstein, president of New York City Atheists, who objects to the use of the word heaven. “It’s really insulting to us,” he added.

“We’ve concluded as atheists there is no heaven and there’s no hell,” he explained.

That, to him, makes it a “totally religious statement." "It’s a question of separation of church and state,” he said.

Bronstein didn't care that the sign was honoring fallen heroes.

Fox News Radio reported:

David Silverman, president of American Atheists, agreed and called on the city to remove the sign.

“It implies that heaven actually exists,” Silverman told Fox News Radio. “People died in 9-11 but they were all people who died, not just Christians. Heaven is a specifically Christian place. For the city to come up and say all those heroes are in heaven now, it’s not appropriate.”

“All memorials for fallen heroes should celebrate the diversity of our country and should be secular in nature. These heroes might have been Jews, they might have been atheists, I don’t know but either way it’s wrong for the city to say they’re in heaven. It’s preachy.”

But city leaders contend the group had an opportunity to express their opinion during the public approval process.

Craig Hammerman, the district manager for Brooklyn Community Board Six said that "not a single person stood up to speak out against it."

“It’s unfortunate that they didn’t raise this as an issue while it was undergoing its public review either at the community board level or when it came before the city council on their public agenda,” he said, noting that "it’s a little late in the process" for the complaint to be made now.

Perhaps, but the atheists would get more press coverage by whining about the sign after it's already in place."

So. They are perpetually insulted by any government action which is not specifically Atheist... because they have concluded that there is no heaven or hell.

Maybe we need a "separation of Atheism and state" amendment.