An organization called 10:10, whose mission is to promote a global campaign to get everyone to (voluntarily) reduce their carbon emissions by 10% starting in the year 2010, has produced what is perhaps the most ill-advised publicity campaign ever.
Apparently they thought it would be funny to highlight the allegedly voluntary nature of this campaign by, um, alluding to the very justifiable fears that many environmentalists are willing to impose their values on others by (deadly) force. It would be wonderful if everyone would make some small sacrifice to reduce their carbon emissions by 10%, so the campaign goes, but if you don’t want to, that’s cool. It’s your choice. No pressure. Red button pressed. BOOM!!! SPLATTER!!! Such a pity you made the wrong choice. Tee hee!
I’m not kidding. Watch the video below. But be forewarned: it is graphic.
The video, in light of the organization’s 10% campaign, ironically brings to my mind the Roman disciplinary practice of decimation. Decimation was a punishment imposed on Roman military units for failure, cowardice, or mutiny in which one in ten (10% of) soldiers were selected by lot to be slaughtered by their comrades. Only the decimated victims in 10:10’s video are chosen for this ultimate punishment by their failure to make the “right” choice. No pressure.
Decimating the global population sure is one way to reduce carbon emissions by 10%…but it is not very humane. The video is strategically clueless and in poor taste at best.
I really don’t understand what 10:10 was thinking in making this video. They have since pulled it from their own website, stating that apparently not everyone found it to be funny and hinting that some were even offended. Gee, I wonder why. Likely, the video will prove to be great fodder for skeptics of global warming alarmism and statist environmental policies for years to come.
Here is 10:10’s explanation. See if you can make any more sense of this fiasco.
NO PRESSURE
Sorry.
Today we put up a mini-movie about 10:10 and climate change called ‘No Pressure’.With climate change becoming increasingly threatening, and decreasingly talked about in the media, we wanted to find a way to bring this critical issue back into the headlines whilst making people laugh. We were therefore delighted when Britain’s leading comedy writer, Richard Curtis – writer of Blackadder, Four Weddings, Notting Hill and many others — agreed to write a short film for the 10:10 campaign. Many people found the resulting film extremely funny, but unfortunately some didn’t and we sincerely apologise to anybody we have offended.
As a result of these concerns we’ve taken it off our website. We won’t be making any attempt to censor or remove other versions currently in circulation on the internet.
We’d like to thank the 50+ film professionals and 40+ actors and extras and who gave their time and equipment to the film for free. We greatly value your contributions and the tremendous enthusiasm and professionalism you brought to the project.
At 10:10 we’re all about trying new and creative ways of getting people to take action on climate change. Unfortunately in this instance we missed the mark. Oh well, we live and learn.
Onwards and upwards,
Franny, Lizzie, Eugenie and the whole 10:10 team
~*~
Cross-posted at The Libertarian Standard.
Geoffrey is an Aristotelian-Libertarian political philosopher, writer, editor, and web designer. He is the founder of the