If you've been around Bored Panda long enough, you know we have a soft spot for signs.
From Australian artist Michael Pederson to the legendary El Arroyo restaurant, we cover pretty much everyone who knows how to send a message. Or doesn't!
There's a Facebook group called 'The Absurd Sign Project' and, as the name implies, its members are sharing the funniest sign fails they can find.
We're talking brutal spelling mistakes, contradictory statements... you know, the good stuff. So join us and let's take a look at some of the most popular posts on the group.
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We contacted the group's administrators and moderators and one of them, Craig Hey, was kind enough to tell us more about this amusing corner of the internet.
"The community is fantastic," Craig told Bored Panda.
The gang is approaching 100,000 members but the predecessor of 'The Absurd Sign Project' had 166,000 before Facebook decided to ban it.
However, when it comes to content, numbers aren't the most important thing.
From time to time, bigger Facebook groups attract toxic users who want to litter all over them but Craig said they don't have this problem.
"Sometimes we have to take down a post we think Facebook won't like, but we don't get too many trolls. We have a dedicated admin and mod team who love seeing the group thrive and grow. Our most common issue is people not being happy over the posts we have to take down so we don't get shut down."
As you can see, the signs that get featured on the group come from a variety of places but there are a few leaders.
"The biggest provider of entertainment, I would say, are restaurants and supermarkets," Craig said.
The representative of 'The Absurd Sign Project' thinks the main reason why there are so many funny signs isn't incompetence. Rather, it's our desire to make each other laugh.
The Greek part says "We're Orthodox Christians" so you might have to edit it a little 😉
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Step outside Ma'am, we've had several reports of someone screaming Oh God Oh God last night
Translation is wrong: ‘we are Christian Orthodox. We do not allow anyone to bother us/lecture us on our religion’. That’s what it should say.
I speak Greek but I'm definitely not an expert so please take this with a grain of salt I think the part in Greek is trying to say that we won't let anyone bother us because of our faith (like persecute or hurt us?) The English translation is definitely wrong
"We are orthodox Christians. It is not permitted for anyone to bother us on the matter of our faith."
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because, tho i dont say it outloud much, there ARE ppl who arnt religious! and they are mostly polite, so they keep their traps shut! believe it or not, they even feel uncomfortable when others talk about this stuff, SO, thats why!!!!
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Check your municipal ordinances. In my city, if you post a "no soliciting" sign, it includes religious proselytizers. They ignored my sign once, whereupon I demanded to see their permit, also required by municipal ordinance. They left quickly.
Actually this translates to: we are orthodox Christians and don't allow anyone to come here and speak to us about matters pertaining to our religion.
Eimaste hristianoi orthodozoi den epitrepomen se kanenan ma mas enohlei gia themata tis pistis mas (in Greek)
If you want a peaceful time with no consequences later you all better not talk about: Religions, politics, someone's weight/age.
And Politics. And Social Politics. ... well, to anyone that want to discuss anything! I just want nice conversations on my property.
Try telling that to those young Men who come to your Door wearing a Bright White Dress Shirt and shiny Black Shoes..
ΕΙΜΑΣΤΕ ΧΡΙΣΤΙΑΝΟΙ ΟΡΘΟΔΟΞΟΙ ΔΕΝ ΕΠΙΤΡΕΠΟΜΕΝ ΣΕ ΚΑΝΕΝΑΝ ΝΑ ΜΑΣ ΕΝΟΧΛΕΙ ΓΙΑ ΘΕΜΑΤΑ ΤΗΣ ΠΙΣΤΗΣ ΜΑΣ actually translates to WE ARE ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS WE ARE NOT ALLOWED TO BOTHER US ABOUT MATTERS OF OUR FAITH
I tell ‘em “Why yes, I have time and would love to hear about your Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! But I get to go first and tell you about my Lord and Savior The Flying Spaghetti Monster.” Some times, so as not to get bored, I change it up to “My Lord and Savior Cthulhu” or the old standards, “My Lord and Savior Satan, or Beelzebub, or Baphomet.”
Was that sign in a tavern? They should have politics on there also. Alcohol doesn't mix with those two.
I want this by my gate to stop people knocking on my door asking to be either Mormon, Catholic, Protestant, or any other religion with me putting a little added to it saying i believe in my myself.
I could discuss religion and politics all day! I used to invite Jehovah Witness' into my home to confuse them about religion. They soon stopped coming. Don't know why.
They stopped coming because they are looking for people who want to learn about the Bible, they are not looking to discuss with people who are obviously not interested in learning what the Bible teaches.
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It is a sign to warn off Jehovah's witnesses who usually ring the bell and ask if you would like them to talk to you about religion. So both the Greek and English translation make sense, in their own way.
I think the folks complaining about the quality of the translation have missed the point…
The translation is wrong. Sing says "we are Christian Orthodox and we don't allow anybody to annoy us about our faith". It's actually NOT a cool sign.
I wish the English version was what they intended to say and the greek version just a bad translation!
That’s not even what the sign says in Greek. It says “We are Orthodox Christians, no is allowed to bother us about matters of our faith” This is put up in Greek homes in areas in Greece (and US, Canada, Australia, etc) where there are a lot of Greek Jehovas Witnesses trying to convert the Orthodox Christians to their false religion. We don’t want to hear it.
We are christian Orthodox, we don’t allow anyone disturbing us in regard to our faith. This is a very typical sticker the local church is giving to their hardcore members and even the language choice (old Greek) is disturbing and problematic, highly associated with the far left.
Far right you mean, not left. Fascists and extremists.
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Would it be disgusting in your eyes if they were secular and didn't want to be bothered by religious people? If they don't want to be harassed by people questioning their decisions and beliefs regardless if they would be religious or secular, I personally don't have an issue with it.
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"We are the biggest absurd sign group I've found and we are the original group," Craig added.
"If anyone has any absurd signs of their own and wants to share, we would love to keep growing as a community and we want to see them!"
If you also have to make a sign, whether it's for your kid's lemonade stand or a business of your own, it might be worth remembering a chat in our earlier piece on funny and clever signs with Adrian Geach.
Geach, who has been a signwriter since 1980, told Bored Panda that "a good sign should be eye-catching, easy to understand and not too wordy with enough negative space around the text or logo, and have a good color scheme."
Stay in drugs, eat school, and don't do vegetables. Sounds reasonable to me....
And then the man went wee wee wee wee wee, all the way home 😉
Geach has been successfully involved in all areas of signage and graphics for decades but not that long ago, he went back to his roots and now concentrates on traditional signwriting.
With the current resurgence of interest in signwriting and hand-rendered work, he utilizes his skills to offer clients a more personal, unique, environmentally friendly, and organic signage solution using old-fashioned materials and techniques.
"A sign might only be looked at for a few seconds so it needs to leave an impression within this time frame, hence the less is more approach," he said.
Where else am I supposed to do my competitive dog grooming? In the elevator!?
"There are many factors to take into account when designing a sign, but the most important thing is to make sure it doesn't get lost in its surroundings," Geach revealed.
"A bad sign is too much lettering, not enough space around or in-between text and logos, and bad color choices."
But after seeing a few more posts on 'The Absurd Sign Project', we'll become experts on those by ourselves!
Watch someone take the table and leave all the rest of the stuff on the ground, untouched.
I love EVERYTHING about this. Especially the voodoo dolls being made while you wait 😂
The fact that they probably had to write the sign based on some persons actions is unreal
For those of you not familiar, Rocky Mountain Oysters are bull testicles...
The missing closing quotation marks is what bugs me the most about this...
This is the weirdest thing I have ever seen/read in my whole life without a doubt
Had a student who called everything a thingy when she couldn't remember the name of it in English.
Okay, we know what you don't stand for... Now tell us what you do stand for!
All of you talking about the sign, meanwhile me: 'why are that guy's legs so long?'
“Our visit was wonderful but we never saw any bears. Please train your bears to be where guests can see them. This was an expensive trip to not get to see bears.” – Yellowstone visitor complain.
Is it sad that my new goal is to have a BP comment with 500 up votes?
I understand they put these signs up to assist people from countries where toilets aren't raised but are set into the floor so you have to squat over them.
Guys, it's filler text, it appears automatically as sample text in many programs. It's not supposed to mean anything important, they just forgot to delete it.
Welcome to the Hotel California. You can never leave. Because you are forever lost.
This sign makes a lot more sense when you realize it's in Hawkins, Indiana
And here's what it looked like after the small tornado from that Bugs Bunny cartoon came through!
In my home town there was the White Bus Company. The buses were painted blue. The White family preferred them that way.
Quite a few of these pictures would also qualify for "You only had one job" kind of list.
But it's so FUN to down vote them into oblivion!
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why is always the place to find job offers? and why are they always spam?
I once went to this great Amish restaurant called 'Old Buggy Buffet ' Imagine what I thought when I first saw that on their sign.
Nope, you just drew more attention to it. Downvote and move on, don't do this c**p
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Quite a few of these pictures would also qualify for "You only had one job" kind of list.
But it's so FUN to down vote them into oblivion!
Load More Replies... why is always the place to find job offers? and why are they always spam?
I once went to this great Amish restaurant called 'Old Buggy Buffet ' Imagine what I thought when I first saw that on their sign.
Nope, you just drew more attention to it. Downvote and move on, don't do this c**p
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