Anti-Ark Encounter ads rejected by billboard companies, atheist group looking for takers

The atheist group that is in opposition to the Ark Encounter theme park in Kentucky had long expressed their plans to put up protest ads along the roads leading to the life-size replica of Noah's Ark. However, two billboard companies turned down the project. 

"We tried with everyone we could think of, and these were [billboard] companies that originally were in agreement to do business with us," Jim Helton, the president of Tri-State Freethinkers, told ABC News. "We're just looking for someone to take our money."

The group had raised $10,000 for the project, but billboard companies Lamar and Event Advertising and Promotions LLC turned it down. Helton surmises that they are afraid of scandal as the proposed billboard would have displayed the slogan, "Genocide and Incest Park: Celebrating 2,000 years of myths." According to Mail Online, there was also to be an image portraying the Biblical vessel with two giraffes poking their heads out and people around the ark drowning in the flood.

"In Genesis Chapters 6-9, the God of the Bible was unhappy with man, so he decided to kill every living thing, except for one family and two of each animal. We see no other way to look at this other than mass genocide," Helton told The Huffington Post in March. "This is the second time that incest was used to populate the world. We are taught this story as children as a fun story, as a good story, filled with animals and a boat. People rarely take a look at the actual story because when they do, they realize how immoral it is."

The Ark Encounter theme park is an endeavor of Answers in Genesis, the same Christian group that runs the Creation Museum. The organization believes that the Earth is 6,000 years old, and it refutes the scientific view of evolution. Rather, it tells people that dinosaurs lived alongside people. This creationist stance is part of the organization's Statement of Faith, belief of which is part of the requirements for people to get a job at Ark Encounter -- something that had stirred controversy in recent months.

Fundamentalist Ken Ham, the president of AiG, responded to TSF's attempts at going against them, tweeting, "The @TSFJim secularists aren't out for free exercise of religion but to impose their anti-God religion on the culture."

Tri-State Freethinkers is reportedly considering putting the billboard outside of Kentucky if anyone is willing to put it up. They are also planning a protest on July 7, the day the park will open its gates to the public.