In February 2016, Georgia legislators passed HB 757, a bill that legalized religious discrimination against the LGBTQ community, and would forever damage the reputation and welcoming and tolerant environment the state of Georgia had established over the past four decades. Working with one of the most impacted potential victims of this legislature, Lost N Found, a nonprofit providing shelter and support for homeless LGBTQ teens in Atlanta, our objective was to encourage voters to speak up against this legislation, and tell Georgia Governor Nathan Deal, the only person left standing between HB 757 becoming a law, to veto this bill. Because of the urgency of the situation, and the fact that the bill could be signed any day, we had to incite a large public response immediately.
To show the gravity and potential impact of this discriminatory legislation, we wanted to show people what the future of hate looked like in Georgia if HB 757 became law. To do so, we created a fake online sign company, 4A Graphics of Georgia, that offered a huge selection of discrimination signs available for sale. While the bill was a direct attack on the LGBTQ community, the entire range of discrimination signs on the company’s site would be valid and legal under HB757. When a sign promoting legalized hate was clicked on, a new sign was revealed showing Governor Nathan Deal’s contact information with a message to urge him to veto this bill.
We promoted the company through hundreds and hundreds of flier drops around Atlanta, wild postings, Craigslist and other free local business listing websites. We set up social media accounts facetiously offering our signs to supporters of the hate bill, including the bill’s primary author, Georgia Senator Josh McKoon, as well as a company phone number and voicemail to receive angry complaints.
We wanted to get Georgia voters and political and social influencers around the country angry enough to share these simple and blatant ‘future of hate’ discrimination signs through social media to amplify the discussion and outrage around HB 757. These signs were intended to harken back to the days of segregation and hateful Jim Crow laws that legalized discrimination against African-Americans in the twentieth century.