If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.

- George Washington

Friday 1 October 2010

A Kinder, More Tolerant World

Have you ever seen something so bizarre that you wondered if it was a parody? Via Leg Iron, I saw this.



I couldn't believe it at first, and thought it was having a pop at those po-faced climate nutters. Very good, I thought. Bit extreme, they would never go that far, but well-produced and a bit of good fun. Ha ha, blowing up people who disagree with you, very good.

Nope. By 3:00 I realised with growing horror that this was not a spoof. There really are people who think that blowing up people who do not accept the consensus is OK. Not literally, perhaps, but as an illustration of the mindset it is very revealing.

Just look at what it shows: the smiling, faux-matey suggestion that we should "all do something". The "it's perfectly OK to disagree" second stage, showing how reasonable and non-confrontational this all is. And then the casual, vicious and violent destruction of 'the enemy'. Apart from the last stage, we've all seen it before, whether we work in the public sector or corporate, in training sessions and 'team-building' programmes. The openness, the smiles, the chumminess, the willingness to accept individual differences - and the clear understanding, never stated but obvious to all, that there is only one thing we agree on, and it's my way of thinking that you will adopt.

There's something even nastier going on here, too. Look at how uncomfortable the 'dissidents' feel. There's the sulky shrug of the children in the schoolroom, the uncertain, unhappy hand-raising of the office workers, the false confidence of the manager who thinks it's all a distraction from the job in hand. Have you ever felt like that at work? I have - in 'equality training' and 'leadership development'. And notice the reactions of the others after the buttons are pressed. They are not cheering and clapping, glad that the naysayers have been disposed of and we can all walk happily into our carbon-free futures. They are shocked and terrified. That is the point, and it is the way that totalitarianism has worked through the ages. Single out one or two, go after them with extreme violence, and the rest will fall into line. They may not like it, but they will obey. They will even turn informer. A frightened population is easily managed.

I should be grateful to the makers of 10:10, The Movie. They have shown, in the clearest way possible, how the Left think, and how they view the rest of us. We are in the right, and while we will permit you to disagree (it's a free country, ha ha), we will do whatever it takes to make sure we prevail. In a sense, this clip is nothing to do with the future of the planet, and everything to do with how the Left thinks. As Leg Iron says, these are the people who tell us that the EDL are violent thugs.

There are two positives from all this.

First, the comments on YouTube (here) are very encouraging. Here's one:

This is not about AGW. This is about how the left thinks. People who do not agree with them are simply killed. They think it's hilarious!

The threat from allowing people who think like this -- these people are religious nuts telling us what they really think about what we should do with heretics, although they will deny it to their dying breath -- is far, FAR greater than anything global warming, or climate change, or climate interruption or whatever name it has this week -- could ever present.

Second, the hypocrisy, double-standards and sheer nastiness of the 'Liberal' Left are shown in quite appalling detail, which their enemies could never have demonstrated quite so clearly. It's an easy jibe to call the Left 'totalitarian', but I can't see you could call this anything else.

UPDATE: 2:30 pm - the video has been made 'private', so the link above won't work. However, I know that some other bloggers have downloaded a copy, so I will have a look and find an alternative. Seems like they didn't appreciate the comments, which were almost universally hostile and didn't pull any punches.

UPDATE: 4.40 pm - the video was captured by a Portuguese blogger, and can be seen HERE.

UPDATE: 5.05 pm - And now back on YouTube:




Further developments in the comments below.

27 comments:

  1. I missed this at LI's place. Cards took priority last night and I didn't get round to reading blogs.

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  2. So if I don't agree with climate change then I'll get blown up ? This is what happens when these climate change fascists aren't exposed and brought to book by the MSM (esp the BBC). They see it as a green light to produce this filth to further their agenda.

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  3. I'm gobsmacked. Who paid for this shite? (The taxpayer I expect). All I hope is that this is picked up by the Sunday broadsheets and vilified for the utter waste of money that it so clearly is.

    I'm astonished that it even got made - surely the producers would have seen that it is dubious propaganda at best and that does little to promote their cause? Or are they so blinkered that this was actually off their radar?

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  4. I think it's a bit of an own goal, myself. It depends. It's obviously going viral, which was the intention. Whether it fires up the committed and converts the waverer, or just makes the disbeliever more anti than ever, we will have to see and judge.

    I've just spent time looking through all the Youtube comments, and a lot of people have the wrong end of the stick. It's not saying that it's OK to blow up your opponents. That would be far too unsubtle. What it's saying is that joking about blowing up your opponents is OK. You only have to reverse it to see how wrong that is: what about a video where the Tories are seen blowing up Lefties for not agreeing to the deficit reduction plans? Or Christians blowing up atheists - in an amusing and ironic way, of course?

    In the end, it's not the AGW argument that is at the centre of this. It's the idea that, after 9/11, 7/7, Omagh, Bali, and Madrid, it is in any way acceptable to think that blowing up those who disagree with you is 'funny'.

    I hope this gets the widest publicity, as I am sure that the vast majority will turn away from it in disgust.

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  5. Richard.
    You've highlighted another problem with these videos. They try to be too clever. The average person won't understand the subtleties of the video and just see bad deniers getting blown up by actors who they respect so it must be ok.

    Remember this video about polar bears falling from the skies to splat on the pavement...


    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6Ae__MHG-U&feature=player_embedded

    Most people who saw the video probably believed it despite polar bears now being a nuisance in some communities due to their soaring numbers.

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  6. I hadn't seen that one. They love their gore (heh) and violence, don't they? There's no connection made in the text of the film about air travel and killing polar bears, because that would require evidence, but showing them crashing down puts the message over without the need for anything as tiresome as that. Very clever propaganda. I thought the worst I had seen was this one, which is a sure-fire frightener and plays on very deep emotions - and, of course, another evidence-free bit of scaremongering. The use of children in these things disturbs me greatly.

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  7. The email address for these people is hello@1010uk.org. You may wish to let them know how you feel.

    I have written the following:

    Dear 10:10

    I have just watched your YouTube video about blowing up people who don't agree with you over 'climate change'.

    While I don't think you will care for an instant what I think about the video, I just want to say that I think it is vile, unfunny and, in the context of 9/11, 7/7, Madrid, Bali and Omagh, deeply tasteless.

    I don't think you seriously want to blow up your opponents. I understand the idea of humour and I know that it is intended as a joke, a bit of light-hearted fun.

    But the idea of killing people who disagree with you is not funny in the slightest. You would have to be completely ignorant of 20C history not to know that.

    Yours

    Richard Xxxxxxxx

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  8. Analysing the message, I rather suspect it's just a very poor choice of metaphor because someone, somewhere thought that shock and awe was a better approach than subtlety. Somewhat like the "if you vote Tory, you will get cancer and die" campaign.

    I imagine what they were trying to convey was the following:
    "There is a problem. We have a perfectly reasonable solution, all you have to do in is chip in to help it along. It's going to cost you next to nothing, and be no inconvenience at all, which means that nobody in their right mind could possibly refuse. Therefore anyone who doesn't participate is, through sheer selfishness, killing their fellow men. You wouldn't like it if your fellow man did the same to you, now would you?"

    Unfortunately for them, aside from being massively tasteless and unfunny, the film utterly fails to get that across.

    In a way, that's a very good thing - because I also suspect that what they've come up with is closer to the truth anyway. It's a threat, pure and simple: the thin veneer of alleged humour is just a cynical attempt to make the message palatable, but underneath it all, the only joke is that they're not joking. If they could make you, by whatever means necessary, buy into their solution, they would. And if not, your only real use to them is pour encourager les autres.

    It's interesting, because it also smacks of desperation. The AGW science, popularly, has failed to convince. The increasingly shrill arguments of the warmists have been too extreme all along. Kyoto is shortly to expire and, given the complete failure of Copenhagen, it's unlikely to have any kind of a successor. A step up in the blatant propaganda war like this suggests to me that they're losing the battles that matter.

    I'm quite minded to start a +1010 campaign, where people sign up to increase their carbon footprint by 10% year on year, starting now. In the end it'll be a cheaper way of finding out whether there is a CO2 tipping point or not, and it will happen sooner, meaning less collateral damage is inflicted on the environment by all the other factors that the eco-fascists aren't trying to deal with. If they had any sense, in fact, they'd call for the same thing and hope for an early but less catastrophic global extinction event that might spare more of the righteous.

    My final point, not entirely without seriousness, is that I would probably rather be detonated than live in a future dominated by the likes of the so-called "good guys" in that video. I'd like to beat that sanctimonious fucking teacher to death with her own vegan guilt-free-meat-substitute bloody sandals...

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  9. They pulled it!

    Hahahaha.

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  10. How do I do a link?

    http://www.1010global.org/no-pressure

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  11. Ah, now I would take the teacher to one side and show her the error of her ways, very gently but firmly. But the middle-management arsehole that followed her in the clip - shooting would be too good for him.

    What the whole thing reminds me of is a guy I used to know when I was first at Uni. He was much older and lived close to the College with his wife. She worked, and he hung out with students, mainly in the burgeoning environmental groups of the time. We called him Eco-Freak (another commenter on this blog will remember him well!) and his mantra was "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem." It seemed profound to a callow 18-year-old from a Northern town, at the time. He illustrated well what I have noticed about all of the Left ever since: they are far more tribal, more 'us and them', less willing to 'live and let live' than the Right. Conservatives may disagree with Socialists, but it is generally on principle, and not personal. Nothing, however, can match the visceral hatred of a left-winger for the "Tories". If you're one of them, they seem to say,, then there is no hope for you, no reason to speak to you, and anything I can do to you is justified, because you are the enemy.

    To me, that is the context of the Tories Will Give You All Cancer campaign in the last election. Why tell the truth? The Common Good is served by getting the Tories out, and if it does that, it doesn't need further justification. And that is the background to this film. If you don't follow the 'sensible' and 'rational' thinking on Global Warming/Climate Change/Climate Chaos, then you are the enemy and to be outwitted, by fair means or foul, and as you are the enemy, you are expendable.

    "It's for the animals/children/planet."

    It might shock them to realise that this is the thinking that allowed normal British family men to becomne ruthless killers in the two wars. Once someone is the 'other', they are dehumanised, and therefore not to be worried about. The film we have seen is an expression (albeit probably unconscious) of that.

    (I heard a good one today - "it smelt as bad as a Portaloo at a vegan festival." Eurgh.)

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  12. @Voyager - see the updates in the blogpost. It was picked up by a number of people and reposted, and now it is back on Youtube, courtesy of a quick-witted downloader.

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  13. @Voyager - thanks for that link. So they have pulled the film altogether, and given what sounds like an apology:

    "Many people found the resulting film extremely funny, but unfortunately some didn't and we sincerely apologise to anybody we have offended."

    "Unfortunately in this instance we missed the mark. Oh well, we live and learn."

    That email did well, then (amongst, I would imagine, thousands of others).

    Pulling the film does not change any of my comments above one iota.

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  14. Well this is the email I sent to 1010 early this morning.

    Time and time again the propaganda spouted by 'warmists' has been disproved, you have all been brainwashed by the lies and deceit of the individuals and companies that are making money from these lies.
    Start thinking for yourselves instead of relying on so called professionals who are paid to come up with the answers their paymasters require, they are lying to you! This video will disturb children and probably some adults, you should all face legal charges for using scare tactics like this to satisfy your own stupid and sordid beliefs.
    Hitler would have been very proud of you all, you disgusting people!

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  15. Well said, FH.

    I strongly suspect that emails like this did the trick. That apology seemed quite genuine, I thought. If they had been reacting only to the comments on YouTube, I think there would have been far more of the "in the pay of Big Oil, flat-earthers" approach to their explanation. But individuals writing personally to say they don't like something are far more powerful. Can you imagine the scene in the 10:10 office as the inbox started to fill?

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  16. Letter to Stephen Crabb, MP:

    Dear Stephen

    I saw a short video film today called 'No Pressure', produced by a group called 10:10, who are campaigning on climate change. The clip is available on YouTube if you search for "How to cut carbon emissions", uploader is TheRedacted. (Sorry, but I'm not sure if I can post a link on this form.) In the film, people who are not prepared to publicly commit to measures to reduce their carbon emissions are blown to pieces in front of their colleagues. It is a violent and gory piece of work, and the first half of the film involves a class of 9-10 year old children. Along with many others, I emailed them to protest and the video was withdrawn (the clip I mentioned was saved and re-uploaded by someone else). The message behind the film is an ugly one - if you don't agree with the consensus, you are in the way, and we feel able to terminate you. I understand it was meant to be seen as edgy and ironic, but in a world that has seen 9/11, 7/7, Madrid, Omagh and Bali, it is not only extremely tasteless but worryingly totalitarian. Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot would have recognised the 'divide and rule through fear' message underlying the film.

    I would like to ask you if you approve of this message and method - a simple 'yes' or 'no' would be fine - and if you approve of 10:10 receiving public funding to carry out this kind of hysterical propaganda. I have seen an estimate of the likely cost of the film to be in the region of £¼m. As a taxpayer, I am outraged that my money is being given to bodies like this to spend so recklessly and inappropriately.

    I loomk forward to hearing your views, and I thank you for taking the time to read this.

    Richard Xxxxxxxx

    You can email your MP at http://www.writetothem.com/ here.

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  17. Seen how the Guardian have reported this film?

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2010/sep/30/10-10-no-pressure-film

    The comments section is astonishing too!

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  18. Telegraph are on to it! Hurrah!

    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100056586/eco-fascism-jumps-the-shark-massive-epic-fail/

    (How do you do links on this page?)

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  19. Wasn't any great shakes as an apology, was it?

    Translation: unfortunately, a few lumpen idiots failed to get our ultra-sophisticated and humorous creative vibe. Their ridiculous and misguided concerns have caused us to behave far more decently than they deserve and withdraw the film. We include the word "sincerely" because then you'll know we're on the level.

    I quote:
    "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."

    So it isn't that "the team" wish to acknowledge the myriad posted comments on their own site and just about everywhere else, from both supporters and critics of the eco-movement, that this was an appalling, loathsome and disastrous piece of propaganda? No desire to even try and allay the negative consequences of it for the people who are supposed to be on your side? Just a blithe and dismissive: oh well, draw a line under it, move on. (Possibly worth referring to Miliband(D)'s recent use of that same flippant approach over Iraq for a good example of how it fails to placate people who are really annoyed about something).

    In all honesty, it's about what I would expect from an unbearably self-important champagne socialist like Franny Armstrong. Released fewer shit records than Boner and others of that ilk, but otherwise entertains a similar smug sense of Messianic calling to save us from ourselves. At our cost and with added airmiles, of course.

    Even more mystifying than the piss-poor excuse for an apology, though, is the bizarre claim that "Many people found the resulting film extremely funny". I watched it again, just in case I'd missed the comedy gold moments, and found not a one. Unless "get your dad to insulate the loft" counts as post-modern anti-PC humour. It still looks exactly like a charmless threat from overrated luvvie Richard "Three Houses" Curtis, lecturing the less well-off about how they need to make sacrifices he and his fellow celebs would never dream should apply to them.

    Still, if they want to carry on shooting the warmist cause in both feet, I don't think I'm going to make too much effort to stop them. In fact, I may even offer them money to continue.

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  20. I hadn't heard of Franny Armstrong until today, but she does seem to be an unbearably pompous individual. You live and learn. Thanks Endo for that deconstruction of the 'apology' - yes, we lumpen plebs just don't 'get' sophisticated urban humour, do we? And never forget that 'drawing a line under' something always means 'I have run out of things to say'.

    @Voyager: you need to use a small piece of code for a link. All brackets are the 'angle brackets' above the comma and full stop keys: opening bracket a space href equals quote url quote closing bracket here opening bracket slash a closing bracket (can't type it out as it would then appear as a link!), put the link URL where it says 'url' and whatever text you want where it says 'here', that will display the text as a clickable link. I can never remember it, so I keep it as a text file in Notepad and just adapt as necessary. There will be better ways, I am sure.

    And thanks for the link to the Grauniad. Even there, the comments are critical in the main. This really was an epic fail for the warmists.

    And, by the way, that was the best day ever for the blog - 167 visitors (average prior to that 48). Thanks for coming!

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  21. Richard..

    For future reference you will usually find videos that have been taken down after an outcry on this site..

    http://eyetube.me/

    It was created by bloggers who wanted somewhere to archive these types of videos. The latest eco video is already there. It's an independent site and immune from interference from youtube etc.

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  22. I didn't know of that site. Many thanks, and duly bookmarked.

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  23. Amusingly, for anyone who may not have made the connection, Franny Armstrong's most notable achievement prior to this was being rescued by bicycling Boris Johnson from a gang of yoofs last year.

    Which, I'm absolutely sure, must be some kind of irony.

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  24. I have Googled her (and that's not as much fun as it sounds), purely in the interests of science. she is, apparently, a popular music entertainer of average appearance and - I suspect - of a slightly ginger tendency. Whatever was Boris thinking of?

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  25. I like the idea of everyone attempting to increase their carbon footprint by 10% or, indeed, by a 1000% for preference.

    It reminds me of my own humble effort "Burn a gallon for greenie",the title of which does, I believe, sum up the general principle. In essence, whenever a greenie annoys you, go out for an un-necessary drive or give it a bit more boot and brakes than normal or, indeed, just go for a good old-fashioned burn-up. If you need a destination in mind I would suggest a lovely camp fire in a nearby woodland. Eye thank ewe.

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  26. An excellent idea. Start the fire with a good bit of diesel and an old tyre. That'll help.

    Mind you, if I gave it a bit more than normal, I might not be coming back. I'm pretty free with the throttle as it is.

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