The S Word

Okay boys and girls, I’m about to tell you a scary story, so you might want to read this with your eyes closed. In fact, if you’re under eighteen, might I suggest you don’t read this at all, or at least get your parent/slash/guardian to sign a release or something; if you go bonkers and start clubbing baby seals to death, I don’t want the blame. All sorted? Are we sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin:

Once upon a time, people smoked. And they lived, and died, happily ever after.

What? What do you mean that’s not that scary? It’s bloody terrifying! You’re telling me that the fact there’s smoking going on out there doesn’t make you fill your pants in the most pooey of ways? See, there’s a new swear word in town; it begins with S, and appropriately enough, it rhymes with joke. I refer, of course, to the new initiative set out by anti-smoking group SmokeFree Liverpool, who are pushing, with support from the city council for all movies with smoking scenes to be given an automatic 18 certificate. Call me alarmist, but doesn’t that seem a bit strong? It called to mind a story I read all the way back in 2003, when some unnamed US poster companies airbrushed a cigarette from the hand of Paul McCartney (yes, him again) on the iconic cover to the Beatles’ Abbey Road album cover. It’s one thing trying to promote a healthy smoke-free future – but denying a hoarse, phlegmy smoke-fuelled past is another kettle of fish altogether. People smoked. It’s a fact that’s not going to change with a fancy photoshopping job, and until cigarettes are banned outright, forcing them underground and turning nicotine immediately into the most-used illegal drug in the UK, people will continue to do so. It’s already illegal to advertise tobacco in the UK, which is directly promoting it, but in censoring the very act of smoking, are we not setting a rather dangerous precedent of not only what it is legal to do, but also of what it is legal to see?

SmokeFree Liverpool’s argument is that viewing smoking scenes at the cinema encourages the young to smoke. Dr Stacey Anderson, who carried out the new pilot study for SmokeFree Liverpool claims that ‘[i]n 2006, around 1650 11 to 17 year olds in Liverpool started smoking because of exposure to smoking in films’. Are young people in this country really so muffin headed that the sight of some Hollywood bimbo chugging away on the big screen is enough to whip them into a tobacco-hungry frenzy? Cigarette packets now come adorned with health warnings that take up around 50% of the packaging; why isn’t that enough? Does our every waking experience really need to be protected from the great smoky threat? Are we really that weak-willed, knuckle-dragging and downright thick? The smoking ban in England came into force in July 2007, forcing those who choose to smoke out of bars, clubs, cafes and bus shelters out onto the streets, and that’s just fine. Were it not for the smoking ban we wouldn’t have smokalising, or smirting, and nightclubs wouldn’t smell of wee and farts. I suppose the idea behind SmokeFree is that it paves the way for a genuinely smoke-free society, as opposed to a society where smokers are just the smelly grey elephants stuck out in the corner. In the rain. But unfortunately for those who seek to slap an 18 certificate onto films with smoking scenes, it’s a lot harder to censor real life. Take a walk through any given street in London today, and you will see swathes of smokers, huddled for warmth and acceptance, the new social pariahs, making their vice visible.

Disney have apparently declared that smoking scenes in their future family films would be ‘non-existent’. And why not? – no one wants to see Mickey and Donald sparking up after a heavy night on the tiles any more than they want to see Minnie’s drink getting spiked or Daisy Duck being slapped with an ASBO. That’s just common sense. It’s one thing declaring to cut smoking out of our future, but to censor it from the past is an entirely more scary prospect. Ignoring famous Disney chugger Cruella De Vil for a moment, let’s think back to a little puppet boy who made some stupid choices. The 1940 Disney feature Pinocchio features a scene where the little wooden boy turns sickly green after a puff on a huge comedy cigar. Why not replace all smoking scenes with that? It’s hardly glamorising smoking, and, if I remember rightly, within the next five minutes, poor old Pinocchio sprouts a pair of ass’ ears, while his more nicotine-hungry chums go to full hog (so to speak) and transform into braying little donkeys. Daniel Craig commented on the fact that smoking scenes had been cut from the latest Bond movie Casino Royale that ‘I can blow someone's head off but I can't light a good cigar.’ But you can, Danny Boy, just as long as after that first puff you turn green and grow donkey’s ears, highlighting your foolishness and appeasing the hand-wringing anti-smoking apologists.

But why stop there? Mr. Craig has a point; why should we be able see him blow someone’s head off, but not see him enjoy a snout? Cut the bloody lot of it out. The violence. The swearing. The sex. The god-awful, unforgivable smoking! Sure the SAW films would be a lot shorter, and more than a bit pointless, but Bambi would have a far happier ending.

It’s a tough fact for the anti-smoking lot to deal with, that some people smoke, and some people look cool doing it. Some people look cool riding motorbikes, and some people die doing that. And, much like smokers, they have to do that outside in the rain, too. Here’s a suggestion, stop selling cigarettes to under eighteens, ask for ID if necessary, because the last time I checked, James Bond wasn’t working behind the counter in my local Sainsbury’s…