Published December 11, 2023 by FOX 13 News (Tampa). A Broward County school district review committee voted to retain the Bible in school libraries after activist Chaz Stevens challenged it as “too controversial” for classrooms. Stevens, a First Amendment advocate, said he filed the complaint to highlight the “hypocrisy” of conservative activists pushing other book bans – a point underscored …
Published July 11, 2022 by Florida Politics. As part of his “Satan or Silence” project, Stevens requested to open a North Lauderdale City Commission meeting with a “Hail Satan” invocation, prompting the city to suspend all invocations rather than allow it. Since 2014, Stevens’ satirical invocation bids have led several Florida cities to drop prayers entirely instead of including a …
Published April 29, 2022 by Business Insider. Stevens – a self-described “stunt activist” – acknowledged his Bible petition was “trolling DeSantis and his administration”. By turning Florida’s book-banning law against the Bible, he aimed to spotlight the law’s absurd breadth and provoke the state into confronting its own standards. Read the entire story here.
Published April 26, 2022 by The Independent (UK). Stevens invoked Florida’s new “Stop WOKE” law in petitions asking school districts to ban the Bible for its content on slavery, racism, and sexual violence. “If they’re gonna ban books, then the whole library should be in play,” he wrote, pointing out the Bible’s stories of rape, bestiality and infanticide to highlight …
Published April 26, 2022 by NPR/WUNC. Stevens sent petitions to 63 Florida school districts urging them to “immediately remove the Bible from the classroom, library, and any instructional material” – and to ban any book that references the Bible. Citing the Bible’s graphic passages (from murder and adultery to rape and bestiality), Stevens asked, “If you want to teach morality …
Published April 2022 by Florida Politics. After nearly a decade of placing satirical holiday displays in Florida’s Capitol, Stevens says officials are now barring him from the designated “Free Speech Zone” In 2022 he tried to install a display mocking Gov. Ron DeSantis (first a fake Playboy cover of DeSantis, later just a blank sign) to protest new state laws, …
Published December 6, 2021 by Miami New Times. In a cheeky holiday stunt, Stevens mailed huge butt plug sex toys (with lubricant and condoms) to several “naughty” Florida politicians. “Their heads are so far up their goddamn asses, so I figured when they take their heads out, they’ll need something else to put up there,” Stevens explained of his gag …
Published March 1, 2016 by Politico. Stevens, the atheist activist behind Florida’s Capitol Festivus pole, sought permission to display a 6-foot Shinto phallus in the state Capitol in spring 2016. He argued that if officials allow Christian or other religious symbols, they must also allow his phallic “Festival of the Steel Phallus” – otherwise, he warned, they should expect a …
Published December 17, 2015 by Maxim. Chaz Stevens won approval to erect a rainbow-colored Festivus pole topped with a disco ball in the Oklahoma Capitol rotunda as a nod to gay rights. “Out goes the Ten Commandments. In comes the gay pride Festivus pole,” Stevens quipped, noting Oklahoma’s removal of a Ten Commandments monument and celebrating the year’s progress on …
Published December 10, 2015 by TIME. For the third year in a row, Stevens brought a Festivus pole to Florida’s Capitol – this time a 6-foot-6 “Rainbow gay edition” pole with a rainbow sleeve and a disco ball, celebrating LGBT pride. Stevens said the colorful display was meant to “celebrate diversity… [and] religious freedom for all, not just… some,” underscoring …