The recent horrific incident of an actual fox attack on a pair of young twins in London spawned, according to Chris Atkins and Johnny Howorth, a media hysteria there disproportionate to the extent of the problem.

According to Atkins, the reporting, including by the BBC, was irresponsible and misrepresentative, and the reports never stressed that urban fox attacks were rare and that foxes were not dangerous.

To expose the “ludicrous media coverage” of the dangers of urban foxes, Atkins and Howorth produced a video satire as “ridiculously silly and Python-esque” as possible.

Their video, showing a fox being clubbed to death in a London park, was posted on Facebook and YouTube, resulting in complaints to the police and condemnation by animal rights groups.

Atkins apologized to those of the public who were upset by the footage, and assured them that the “dead” fox was actually a stuffed fox, and the live fox shown was actually a pet dog.

Part of the video is said to have been used by the BBC in a television report documenting the apparent practice of urban fox killing. The video had since been removed from Facebook and YouTube.

“I did not expect so many people to take it seriously,” he said.

BBC News has more.