Earth-worshipers' dirty marketing

The government of Ontario must have hired a team of professional marketers to design the "flick off" campaign. The climate change paranoia is marketed to teens under a short one-syllable name, which is easily turned into a slogan by adding an adverb like "off". To make things worse, the campaign name closely resembles a swearword and sometimes could be read as such.

Of course all that makes the campaign quite popular among teens who like being rebellious and obviously welcome the new word which looks quite similar to a famous dirty word, sounds quite similar, yet it's not the actual swearword and thus - could be said, written and worn on a t-shirt despite the objections from parents.

It's quite disturbing to see corporations resorting to such kind of advertising when marketing a gadget or a snack. But when such notorious methods are used by the government to market political message to teens - that's outrageous.

A swearword-like name lures teens to a site full of catchy slogans and political statements that nobody bothers to prove. "We only have 10 years to reduce emissions or we're screwed", shows the banner on a front page. The reader then finds out that in fact we only have 9 years, 3 months and so many days. But there's no article explaining how come we only have 9 years and 3 months, not 9 and three quarters and what exactly will happen on September 1st, 2016 if we don't submit to the "flick off" campaign.

So don't ask the flick fans about carbon trading or emission credits - they won't be able to answer. Don't try to explain them that since 1990 Canada's population increased by over 20%, which makes it impossible to bring emissions down to the 1990 level without a severe recession - they won't listen. All they know is that "if we don't act now - we're screwed" and those who think otherwise shall "go flick themselves".

These are becoming the dogmas of the new environmentalist cult for which "the inconvenient truth" is the Bible. This cult has nothing to do with science which shows no evidence of man-made global warming, it is based on nothing but beliefs that "global warming" exists and that developed nations are to blame for it.

Luckily, there are still young people smart enough not to fall for these dirty tricks. Jesse Fontaine, a 14 year-old homeschooled Christian teen from Timmins, Ontario wrote an open letter to the Ontario PM Dalton McGuinty where he expresses his discontent with the "flick off" campaign.

There must be a better way to relay the importance of conserving energy to young people without throwing our morals and values out the window to do so.

Regardless of what a person's religious beliefs or values are, surely the majority of Ontario's Canadians would not see the actions of your environment minister as wise or even as acceptable.

I am confident that the Canadian flag which currently flies from the flag pole that I set up in our yard, stands for a higher moral standard than those used by your Minister in establishing the method chosen to communicate with us in the "FLICK OFF" program.

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Well said!

Jesse's letter was published in The Timmins Press and hopefully will be noticed at Queen's Park. I also hope that the parents who are concerned about the values their children are taught at public schools also notice this letter and ask themselves: Is it a coincidence that most teenagers who retain independent thought and stand up for high moral standards are homeschooled Christians?