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A faceful of hot, wet ugly

I know, I know — all the cool kids have blogged this PSA already.

It’s an eco fantasy snuff film, where true believers calmly murder those not willing to cut energy consumption by ten percent. And it’s an extraordinarily ugly piece of work. That’s my favorite bit up there — right at the end, when they blow up Gillian Anderson and her eyeballs slowly squee down the glass.

The blowback was instant and HUGE and not all from the right. They’ve pulled it down already. Repeatedly. As of now this copy is still working and, if all else fails, I’ve downloaded the .flv (drop me a line if you want it — my blog uploader choked on it).

I think I can explain where this thing comes from, though. I mean, besides scary evil eco-psychosis. Raw, ugly and in your face is a very common style of charity and public service advertising in the UK.

There was that anti-smoking TV ad I found so hard to watch; dragging a guy down the steps and out the building by a giant fish-hook stuck in his face (“hooked” on cigarettes, uh-huh uh-huh). Or the man slumped bleeding in the driver’s seat while his wife screams his name down the phone (cell phones distract drivers, see?).

Because of my IP, I even get British adverts while surfing my good old true-blue American web sites. Most common are the tragic children; the perennial starving African babies, the tight close-up of an Asian child with cleft palate, the little girl with the stumps for legs. Picture of sad-eyed child with horrible parental insults superimposed in text. Scared teenager on the streets with shadowy figures closing in. Oh, and the animal charities — ye gods! All those filthy one-eyed puppies and mangy bears.

I’m sure the advertising agencies would say that shocking imagery is real and we should be forced to confront it — and that awful images get the desired response. But there are two huge disadvantages to this approach.

The first is for me, a consumer of media. It makes my world a relentlessly horrible place; a place of perpetual emergencies and nagging ugliness. It is, in a word, a downer.

And the second flows from the first: I get jaded. To shock me, agencies have to up the ante continually. Dream up more and more horrible imagery. This isn’t the first time green campaigns have evoked jihadi/September 11 imagery to sell the urgency of their cause. To the people who made the “No Pressure” video, this seemed like a perfectly natural next-step progression in the ratcheting up of edginess.

But to all of you who aren’t exposed to this ugly shit all day, it was like, WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THOSE PEOPLE?!

Comments


Comment from XBradTC
Time: October 1, 2010, 9:18 pm

Ah, Dear Stoaty One, the question isn’t what is wrong with them. It is instead, what is wrong with you?

Why aren’t you willing to kill your fellow man to achieve a pointless goal, one that serves no better purpose than to make you feel good about yourself.


Comment from Some Vegetable
Time: October 1, 2010, 9:18 pm

WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THOSE PEOPLE?!

pretty well sums it up.


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: October 1, 2010, 9:18 pm

That sucks. I LIKE Gillian Anderson, although I admit that her political views have always been severely Hippyish.

I actually wrote an idea for a PSA once, with a young black teenager on “Death Row”, being taken for execution. His family was crying an protesting in the hallway, a Priest was lamenting about how he tried to steer the kid the right way, a mixed group of prisoners was pointing and laughing, etc….

When he gets into the execution chamber, he is strapped in (except for his arms), and is then handed a loaded crack pipe. The PSA ends with the kid looking at the pipe deciding if he wants to live or die…..

I USED to doubt that anything like that could ever get made…..


Comment from Can\’t hark my cry
Time: October 1, 2010, 9:38 pm

And the second flows from the first: I get jaded. To shock me, agencies have to up the ante continually.

A phenomenon closely related to charity fatigue: we rush to the aid of the first battered woman, starving child, crippled puppy, family with no home. But as the 200th or so repetition of the problem knocks on our door with a hand out, we start ignoring the doorbell. There is more than enough need to go around–we can’t fix everything, we can’t make sure all lives are safe and satisfactory. It’s really hard to find a balance between impoverishing yourself and turning your back. We all know about the horrors of the world, and can only survive sanely if we don’t revel in them; it helps if we are occasionally reminded of them (so we don’t get too complacent), but as you note, the point of diminshing return is reached rapidly when our noses are rubbed in them.

Woo Hoo! Personal best! First time I remembered independently and for sure (but I still checked. . .) that it is blockquote, not quoteblock!

What? never mind, then. . .


Comment from EW1(SG)
Time: October 1, 2010, 9:39 pm

I used to work around weapons of mass destruction. And not so mass destruction. Tools of warfare, whose primary purpose is to do gruesome things to people and their belongings.

So it isn’t as if I wasn’t constantly reminded of ugly shit like, constantly! So, I really only have one thing to say~

WHAT THE FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THOSE PEOPLE?!


Comment from Elphaba
Time: October 1, 2010, 10:07 pm

That is utterly repulsive. What the fuck, indeed?! These people need to be living in padded rooms.


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: October 1, 2010, 10:32 pm

I would recommend that EVERYONE download a copy of it, so that when the left DENIES that it ever happened (and they will), we can toss it back in their teeth……


Comment from Ric Locke
Time: October 1, 2010, 10:33 pm

EW1(SG), years ago I was down the passageway and a bit to port, figuring out which people and their belongings were most worthy of attention. I do know what you mean.

Regards,
Ric


Comment from Argentium G. Tiger
Time: October 1, 2010, 10:48 pm

I’ve also archived the video in .flv format and stored a copy away to make sure this doesn’t fall down the memory hole.

I don’t want these people censored. I want this video to come up every time someone puts their group’s name or site into a search engine.

I want EVERYONE to see what a modern day brownshirt thinks like.


Comment from Gromulin
Time: October 1, 2010, 11:20 pm

They went for shock value and got near universal disgust instead. Serves the psychotic bastards right. I hope this thing lives for a LONG time on the net. Timing couldn’t be better.


Comment from QuasiModo
Time: October 1, 2010, 11:28 pm

I was on WUWT most of last night commenting on this (thanks for the link btw, S.Weasel)…there were those who kept insisting that it was British Humour and we just didn’t get it…it was much too real to be taken humourously.

– most of the people who found it funny seemed to work for the government

– they weren’t laughing at a joke, they were laughing in agreement.

Anyway, faced with a tsunami sized backlash they took it down and gave their non-apology. I also made a copy…I wish I had also made a copy of British PM Cameron and his Energy Minister endorsing 10:10…that added a whole other level of sinister to it that the British Government was onboard.

I didn’t even know that was Gillian Anderson till much later and I was a big fan of the X-Files…she doesn’t look anything like her old self and it wasn’t from age…more like facelifts gone wrong or something.


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: October 1, 2010, 11:32 pm

yup. Just another blatant reminder of how many in society are afflicted with Stercorem pro cerebro hippy syndrome


Comment from Skandia
Time: October 2, 2010, 12:13 am

Did you say this was a PSA? I’ve been skipping over this story trying to ignore all the trash that’s going on for the next month. Also trying to steal my resolve for what comes next.

A ~4 Trillion dollar budget buys a lot of PSAs, buys a lot of votes too.


Comment from Mark
Time: October 2, 2010, 1:20 am

I think that it might be appropriate for them to understand that IF THEY EVER TRY to implement their agenda, this is FAR MORE LIKELY to be how THEY end up. Maybe not over there in the land without a Constitution. But stateside? You betcha! THEY may be able to get away with one or two, but after that…


Comment from jwpaine
Time: October 2, 2010, 1:40 am

It wasn’t until the text at the end that I realized it wasn’t a sick parody.


Comment from Scubafreak
Time: October 2, 2010, 2:43 am

Oh, it was sick, alright. Snuff Porn ala AlGore….


Comment from Randy Rager
Time: October 2, 2010, 3:10 am

What I simply cannot believe is that anyone would be surfing with a browser that showed advertisements in this day and age.

Firefox + AdBlockPro works wonders.


Comment from Monotone (The Elderish)
Time: October 2, 2010, 4:08 am

ahhh, more proof al gore is a sick bastard that wasn’t hugged enough as a child… (and yeah or adthwart with google chrome, it works.)


Comment from Monotone (The Elderish)
Time: October 2, 2010, 4:14 am

or, hugged too much.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: October 2, 2010, 7:07 am

LOL… Red Eye with Greg Gutfeld just led off with the vid. I can’t say that they got it from this site, but I DID email the link and your site to thedailygut.com.


Comment from See-Dubya
Time: October 2, 2010, 1:18 pm

Leftist Terry Jones made “Brazil” to satirize exactly this sort of callous attitude toward snuffing your political enemies or torturing them. That was back when the Left thought kill-crazy police states were bad things.


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 2, 2010, 3:05 pm

One of the missions we got tagged with in RVN was to fly NGOs around to see how “Vietnamization” was working (it was doing pretty well in the Delta, actually).

One NGO (which shall remain nameless, because it’s cleaned up its act since then) decided to turn one flight into a photo-op for fundraising. We were always surrounded by kids when we landed. NGO guy handed one of the kids a bowl of rice and veggies, while the photog snapped his happy face. NGO guy then took the bowl away, while the photog snapped the bewildered, very unhappy kid.

Me: “WTF did you do that for?”

NGO guy: “Fundraising pix — we’ll use the second as the ‘Before you give’ pic and the first one as the ‘After you give’ one.”

Me: “Give the bowl back to the kid.”

NGO guy: “No, it’s the only food we brought, and we have to take a lot of pictures of different kids.”

Me (drawing and pointing my M1911 at his face): “Give the kid the food or I’ll blow your fucking head off.”

The kid got the food.


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 2, 2010, 3:06 pm

Some of us still do, See-Dubya. That film was appalling (I finally went and looked at it, having initially reacted like Skandia), both indefensible and inexcusable.


Comment from Steve Skubinna
Time: October 2, 2010, 4:55 pm

The real question is, if anyone picked Gillian Anderson for the Celebrity Death Pool, does this count?


Comment from JeffS
Time: October 2, 2010, 5:33 pm

Kudos to you, Bill. I wanted to stick my Baretta in the faces of more than one government employee during my tour, I’m here to say.

Although an M1911 would be much more intimidating.


Comment from JeffS
Time: October 2, 2010, 5:35 pm

The real question is, if anyone picked Gillian Anderson for the Celebrity Death Pool, does this count?

I’d nominate her for the next Death Pool, if she weren’t so young and healthy. I want that spotted dick, I do!


Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: October 2, 2010, 7:51 pm

Good for you, Bill!

We need a lot more of that.


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 2, 2010, 8:25 pm

Um, veering off topic for a second, Stoaty, you have a fascinating spammer who just posted on the Bad Bad Dog and Panties of Liberty threads. . .Abraham Lincoln, no less. No links in the text (presumably why Akismet let him pass), but not quite what he pretends to be. . .

Back to regular programming. Have to agree–Bill’s stand was admirable.


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: October 2, 2010, 10:02 pm

I know, Can’t Hark. He posted several more that DID end up in the filter. I can only think it’s his website, so I pulled the link. <shrug>


Comment from Pavel
Time: October 2, 2010, 11:20 pm

That there’s a textbook example of the “Persuasion by nuanced appeal to reason” debating technique, Bill. Probably the best “How to Use an M1911 As a Gigantic Fucking Cluebat” tip I’ve read all day. Thanks for the happy ending.


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 3, 2010, 12:03 am

Stoaty–Well, that’s what I loved about it. I did follow the link to the website, which is called “abrahamlincoln-dot-info,” and it looks like a genunine website devoted to Lincolniana, only developed by someone with fewer website development skills than I have (which is saying a considerable mouthful). I mean, it has a picture of the statue from the Lincoln monument, and links titled things like “law” and “presidents” and “American civil war”; but if you click any of the links, you get links to ads of a vaguely related nature (“law” takes you to various lawyer sites). Looks like a placeholder website for an unclaimed domain name, only WAY more sophisticated than any I’ve ever seen before. Maybe I’m just naive about spammers, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite like that one.

Maybe I’m just easily amused.


Comment from SCOTTtheBADGER
Time: October 3, 2010, 2:39 am

Jeff, a .45 ACP is intimidating! My duty weapon is a Heckler & Koch USP45F. One night, after a High Risk Vehicle Stop training session, I mentioned to another guy in the class that the hole at the end of his 9mm looked 6 inches across. His reply was, ” Yeah, but what about that oil drum you pointed at me?”


Comment from JeffS
Time: October 3, 2010, 7:32 am

Scott, I started out with a M1911A1 as a second looie, lo these many years ago. I personally witnessed the transition from the .45 ACP to the Baretta 9mm, and cursed every minute of it.

When I deployed in 2004, I seriously considered packing along my personal .45, but decided not to, given how little of a sense of humor ARCENT and CENTCOM had then (and still lacks, it appears).

And, yes, I sorely missed the comfort of my .45 during that tour.


Comment from scubafreak
Time: October 3, 2010, 10:12 am

Truthfully, I never had alot of faith in the 9mm as a quick manstopper. I cursed the day that the DOD went from .45 to 9mm.

Right now, my favored self defense pistol is an EAA/Tanfoglio poly-frame Witness .40. I also have a Llama .45 with a double stack mag, but that handle is too damn fat to hold comfortably….


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 3, 2010, 10:12 am

”Yeah, but what about that oil drum you pointed at me?”

Seeing tracers from it are even more intimidating, evidently. Before I left, I gave it to a collitch classmate who’d gone the Green Beanie route and wound up in charge of the ARVN fort about six miles down the road from us. He wrote later that they’d been hit sometime around midnight and he got caught between the latrine and his bunker — he popped off the mag of tracer I’d given him along with a couple hundred rounds of ball and the platoon or so of VC did a 180 back into the treeline.

I loved that pistol…


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 3, 2010, 10:17 am

Truthfully, I never had alot of faith in the 9mm as a quick manstopper.

I got the .45 after I’d hit a sapper three times with my .38 and he kept on running. Hit one with *one* round of the .45 a month later and he flew sideways and dropped like a cinder block.


Comment from SCOTTtheBADGER
Time: October 3, 2010, 11:21 am

I can see where .45 ACP tracers would nake the VC think, “GADZOOKS! Methinks yon American has a phaser! To the rear, my brave lads!”


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 3, 2010, 1:56 pm

Yup. Flares from a pen-gun had the same effect.

Interestingly enough, the Marines guarding the Embassy in Tehran in ’79 would disperse the mobs when they got too close by popping off a single pen-flare over the crowd at just above head-level. The ambassador told them to stop, because he’d told the WH how they were keeping the mobs at bay. Carter screamed that some “innocent Iranian” was gonna lose an eye, or something, and ordered the flare-popping stopped.

Two days later, the Iranians crashed the gates.

Thanks loads for your concern, Jimmeh…


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: October 3, 2010, 4:34 pm

Well, I’ll be damned. I’m Blog of the Day at Legal Insurrection.

It would be a Sunday 😛


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 3, 2010, 4:49 pm

Yay! A “Blog of the Day” brag is a “Blog of the Day” brag!


Comment from EW1(SG)
Time: October 3, 2010, 5:30 pm

Weasel:

It would be a Sunday

Oh, don’t mind us…a few of us swing through to straighten up pillows and empty the ashtrays on weekends just in case we have unexpected visitors.

Not that we’ll put any spotted dick out with the teabags, mind you, after all…it’s just minimal hospitality we’re talking here.


Comment from Duke
Time: October 3, 2010, 10:10 pm

Revised global warming mantra:
The science is settled, and if you don’t agree we’ll kill you.


Comment from Nina from GCP
Time: October 3, 2010, 11:09 pm

Legal Insurrection is one of my must-read blogs, too!


Comment from jelly
Time: October 4, 2010, 5:55 am

oh, what the fuck, indeed …


Comment from Bill (now the .000357% of your traffic that’s from Iraq) T
Time: October 4, 2010, 8:26 am

Heh. The 10:10 parodies are starting — this one’s at Jo Nova’s place:

http://joannenova.com.au/2010/10/the-parodies-of-the-1010-eco-attack-dogs-begin/


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: October 4, 2010, 12:29 pm

New favorite spam:

I am wondering exactly what Marylou will say with that???

Francine

ZOMG! I don’t know!


Pingback from Tweets that mention S. Weasel — Topsy.com
Time: October 4, 2010, 4:34 pm

[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Alessandro Vicini, Stoaty Weasel. Stoaty Weasel said: The pedigree of that 10:10 PSA http://bit.ly/d49f0O […]


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 4, 2010, 9:28 pm

Francine–I was wondering the same thing myself. . .


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 4, 2010, 10:40 pm

I swear, I meant to shut up about spam, but there’s a hilarious one on the Christopher Hitchen thread, July 2, 2008. . .

is it new spam or something?

Talk about metafiction.

Stoaty, you now officially have not only the best commentors but also the best spammers in the universe. How do you do it?


Comment from S. Weasel
Time: October 4, 2010, 10:48 pm

Heh. That just turned up.

Most comment spam tries to hump my leg. You know, “this is a wonderful post and I shall certainly visit this weblog often.”

I’m guessing the vanity of bloggers means a certain percentage of that is allowed to stand.


Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: October 4, 2010, 11:38 pm

[snort!]


Comment from Number 6
Time: October 7, 2010, 1:39 pm

Well, ladies and gentlemen write/email and tell any of the fucking idiot companies that support this shit (hello 02) where they can poke the pound coins they used to get from you. Greenshirts is the best discription for these latter day heirs to the Nazi party. Can’t wait to meet some little dreadlocked cunt soliciting funds for greenpuke on my local high street – is he going to get it.

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