Cartoon Violence In...Smoking Out

[brunota2003]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/eo/20060822/en_tv_eo/19822

Why? Man, whats next? Banning these cartoons altogether? Maybe, just maybe, they need to look at todays cartoons harder instead of the classics...so there is some smoking scenes...in todays cartoons there is witchcraft and other things and most of them are just plain retarded...now they want to ruin the classics Popeye without his pipe? That just wouldnt be Popeye...Sucks...I would be more worried about the kids trying to reenact the violence than smoking...how many kids can get ahold of a frying pan and hit their siblings or someone else with it? now, how many kids do you know that could get their hands on a smoke? if the parents are smart, they keep the smokes out of reach of the children or locked up...does anyone else agree with me?

[James]

What a load of nonsense. Don't get me wrong, being politically correct is good in certain situations, but editing classic cartoons is just ridiculous. I fail to see how young viewers are going to be any more influenced into smoking through momentary glimpses in one or two cartoons than they would be through any other source. Surely most of it gets picked up through other people, rather than from an animated cat and mouse.

I think it was in "Nineteen Eighty-Four" that they practised changing things from the past to suit the needs of the the present. Orwell would have a field day. (OK, maybe a little dramatic but you get the idea).

[HurriCat]

Not dramatic at all. We are seeing Orwell's "Newspeak" in the form of our politically-corrected speech. Instead of a "manhole", it's now "maintenance access hatch" or something so as to make it gender-friendly. Policemen are now "officers". It goes on and on. With cartoons, good ol' Ted Turner has the rights to a ton of the golden oldies (Bugs Bunny, etc). His people have been going through these and sanitizing them. A barrel marked "TNT" is now just a barrel. Explosions are gone, and sometimes the character is just suddenly all blackened and spiky-haired. Or the cartoon is just cut to the point of senselessness. A recent DVD "treasury" of Warner Bros. cartoons OMITTED some of the Bugs Bunny ones from the WAR YEARS because they showed the Japanese military in a NEGATIVE way. Are you kidding me? By the way, those cartoons were created as pre-movie entretainment for adult theater audiences. They were never intended to be kiddy-TV. Yes - there is a real and ongoing agenda to "clean up" and re-write history. Most folks believe that slavery was the only reason we had a civil war. See? It's "working".

[Pburgh]

Well there goes the film Heidi too. Grandfather, grandfather, don't smoke that pipe!! Forget about Alice in Wonderland and that smoking caterpillar!!!

How ridiculous!!!!!

[kevin]

Freaking crazy.

[streetsoldier]

Most of the cartoons ca. 1930-1965 are classics...Popeye, Bugs Bunny, Cecil the Seasick Sea Serpent, Woody Woodpecker, Mickey Mouse, etc., etc.

With the exception of Pixar computer amination, the craftsmanship of the old cartoonists in animation is beyond question, YET...because Ted Turner decides that watching a pipe, cigar or cigarette being puffed is unhealthy (but graphic violence, sex, language in the more "modern" offerings isn't), his people are slicing and splicing these treasures?

May Elmer Fudd mistake him for a widdwe wabbit.

[brunota2003]

shhh...be wery wery quiet, I'm hunting wabbit... oh the good old days...you know I only see Tom and Jerry on once a day if that much? I love them, I dont understand how people could hate them or want to change them...

[Audrey2Katrina]

I remember reading a book, several years ago, by Arthur C Clarke--(author of 2001 A Space Odyssey), but this one was something about the Titanic, or something in deep water--(completely forgot the name).. but what I DID recall was his prediction that the time would come when people would take all the old movies, and digitally remove any/all traces of cigarette, or tobacco smoking from them--I think that's why I said "Titanic" because they were working, at the time, on remastering the old classic "A Night To Remember"... and were busily removing the cigarettes and holders from folks hands/fingers--and commenting on how it looked a little silly in places; but unless one was looking for it, it pretty much went unnoticed. I remember thinking to myself that with the current trends (I don't even know if the term politically correct had taken root yet--but I know that people were making jokes about what were then called "silly" terms like spokes"person" and chair"person"... which of course are common staples of today.

Well that sure did a lot of good for my sense of how old I feel right now!

A2K