My Reply To 10:10

This afternoon, I received a reply from 'The 10:10 Team' to my email of complaint (in the comments) of six days ago.

This is what they said:

Hello Richard,

We're really sorry for the mistake that we made with film. We accept that it was off-the-mark and off-message, and we quickly removed it from our site.

Our UK director has made a statement on the issue, if you haven't seen and wish to see it, you can find it at http://www.1010global.org/uk/2010/10/statement-1010-uk-director. As it says, we are taking the matter very seriously and will be reviewing our processes and procedures to identify how we made the mistake.

We sincerely apologise for the offence the film has caused, and hope you will stick with us.

10:10 team

I suspect that this is a generic reply that will have gone out to everyone who wrote to them. Here is my reply today:

Dear 10:10 Team

Thank you for your email, in reply to my complaint of 1 October about your 'No Pressure' video clip. I appreciate that you have taken the time to respond.

However, I feel you have slightly missed the point. I was not offended by the clip in the slightest, and even if I was I don't regard offending me as a crime. You have the right to express your viewpoint, and I wouldn't stand in the way of that. I am aware that the film was intended to be funny, and to the extent that I understand modern humour, I 'get' what you were trying to do. I laughed at Sam Peckinpah's 'Salad Days', and Mr Creosote too.

However, the film revealed a totalitarian mindset which I found profoundly disturbing. The children who were exploded, remember, were not against the idea of 10:10 - they were merely insufficiently enthusiastic. Healthy scepticism is obviously not part of the 10:10 creed - it's 'believe or be marginalised'.

Since I believe that you are all well-meaning and fundamentally decent people, I would ask you to consider seriously the following:

Look at the reaction of the children and office workers who were not exploded. They were not portrayed as cheering happily as their colleagues were disposed of - they were shocked and terrified. That - and I use this word deliberately - is a fascist method for the control of a population: go after dissenters with extreme violence, and the rest of the population will be frightened into compliance. They will say anything, and agree to anything, as long as they are not next. Hitler used it; Stalin used it; Pol Pot used it. Is that how you want us to think of the climate change movement? Seriously?

I don't think for one moment that you wish to exterminate all those who disagree with you, and it is unfair of you to characterise anyone who disagrees with you as unimaginative, or not 'getting the joke'. But the film did reveal a very nasty subtext to the climate change movement's attitude, and I suspect that you have done more harm to your movement then you realise.

We shall see.