The opposite of public relations and a moment of truth

The 10:10 campaign is an effort by Big Green to get people and governments to impose a 10% cut in their carbon emissions. As part of their marketing efforts, 10:10 engaged the services of British filmmaker Richard Curtis to make a short film called "No Pressure." You have to see the film to believe it. It's so shockingly nasty that its makers have been playing a sort of whack-a-mole game on YouTube, where it appears and disappears. The link at Powerline works, and I believe the link at the Telegraph works, too.

If these links disappear, here's a very brief synopsis. We are shown four vignettes: a schoolteacher speaking to her pupils, an office manager speaking to his staff, a soccer team speaking to its coach and a woman doing a voiceover for the film itself speaking with a man at the control board of the recording studio. In each instance, individuals are asked if they are willing to participate in the efforts of the 10:10 project, with people given an opportunity to decline, because there's ostensibly "no pressure" involved. Once those who refuse are identified, the teacher, manager, team and producer all respectively reveal a red button, which they press. When the button is pressed, those who refuse to go along are blown up, with blood spattering everyone in the vicinity, as shown in the picture accompanying this post.

Nice, huh? As James Delingpole says in the Telegraph:

With No Pressure, the environmental movement has revealed the snarling, wicked, homicidal misanthropy beneath its cloak of gentle, bunny-hugging righteousness.

Do you think that's overstating the case? You'd like to think that it is, but I'm not sure. If you doubt that, consider the blithe response the 10:10 people offered when confronted with the overwhelming disgust their little film has engendered (from the Delingpole post, emphasis mine):

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’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,

Eugenie, Franny, Daniel, Lizzie and the whole 10:10 team.

Now, I know nothing says comedy quite like making a film in which people are killed for comic effect. Actually I can think of two excellent examples -- the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where Indiana Jones casually blows away a sword-wielding dude in the marketplace, and the final scene in Dr. Strangelove, in which Slim Pickens rides an atomic bomb. But there were crucial differences -- the scene in Raiders was just a throwaway, while Stanley Kubrick's message was deeply rooted in concerns about the machinery of war, a consistent theme in his work. Although Kubrick was a bit of a misanthrope at times, he did value humanity. Do you get a sense that the people at 10:10 value humanity?

Read through the comments of the 10:10 team again -- doesn't the "sorry if you were offended" and "oh well, live and learn" tone of the note betray something quite callous at its core? And does it not amaze you that if over 50 people worked on this 4 Minute Hate, not one apparently thought to question the message? There's an amazing amount of cynicism involved, and even more immaturity.

It takes a special kind of intellectual and moral blindness to commission and distribute a film like this. I'm glad that 10:10 did, though, because it reveals something that we all need to know. I'd also suggest that we ought to ask some of our more environmentally-conscious candidates for public office whether or not they found this movie amusing. No pressure, though.