Want to smack your co-habitant around a bit?
Fine.
Do you want to watch the torture of a small animal?
Go for it.
Would you like to see two animals fight each other?
No problem!
You want to watch someone smoke a cigarette?
Are you some sort of fucking deviant?!
It appears that Tom & Jerry, the staple of many a childhood evening in front of the television in the days before Xbox, is to be edited to remove any scenes that show people (or cats and mice) smoking a cigarette. Now, I hate smoking, but removing any smoking scenes from a fucking cartoon?! Are they mentally unstable?
In fact, if you’re going to ban just the smoking bits, then the message you are actually sending out to the kids is that everything else in the cartoon is model behaviour. This means it is perfectly acceptable to hit someone in the face with a frying pan, you can become an amateur rodent executioner with nothing more than a broom, and pitting two animals against each other in a fight to the death, purely for entertainment purposes, is to be positively commended.
In essence, we’re telling tomorrows adults (who will one day rule the world) that cats and mice are merely instruments for torture.
Is this what we want for our children? Well, perhaps it is. I mean, cats are fucking shits. Whenever I’ve been told I have the morals of an alley-cat I don’t think it’s ever been meant as a compliment. Even though Top Cat was a pretty nice guy.
Does this ban mean we now assume Osama Bin Ladens fascination with explosives is the result of a childhood spent watching the exploits of Wyle E Coyote? Or that shoplifters around the world are basing their defences on the influence of Yogi Bear and his picnic basket stealing tendencies?
On the plus side, if torturing animals is now OK, I guess that any new drugs will get tested a lot quicker in years to come?
** UPDATE **
The Devil himself predicted this. THREE whole months ago! Everyone, go over to his kitchen and ask him for the next set of Euro lottery results. He is clearly some kind of scary clairvoyant.
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US · August 23, 2006 at 8:56 am
Next thing they’ll be telling us that fantasising about Jessica Rabbit is wrong…..
Shamash · August 23, 2006 at 9:35 am
I wrote about this in my blog. Pure and utter ridiculousness.
Meanwhile, I have a fetish for buying stuff from the Acme corporation, that hasn’t been safety check and is prone to blow up when you are in the middle of sailing off a cliff. Ofcom’s vast resources and financial clout could be used to banning this nefarious corporation
Banana · August 23, 2006 at 10:18 am
I can’t wait for all the Disney characters to get outed. I’ve always believed that Mickey is a transsexual.
TJ · August 23, 2006 at 10:23 am
They will be banning spinach from supermarket shelves next after what it did to Popeye – clearly a victim of steroid abuse!
As for Penelope Pitstop, I’m sure she was on the game!
Rachel · August 23, 2006 at 10:42 am
Pure lunacy!
I watched Tom & Jerry as a child and it did not make me think oh look that cartoon cat is smoking quick someone give me one of those!
Polititcal correctness gone wrong!
Admin comment by Mr Angry · August 23, 2006 at 11:15 am
US – No chance, she was hot…
Shamash – American Company that Makes Everything (ACME). Aren’t they called GE nowadays?
Disney – It as the voice that gave it away wasn’t it…
TJ – “Hayy..ulp”. Definitely the cry of a whore.
Rachel – Hello. Do you still think cats and mice can talk though?
Rachel · August 23, 2006 at 11:22 am
You mean they can’t talk!
Next you will be saying Father Christmas doesnt exist….
Dr Clip · August 23, 2006 at 12:27 pm
If we kill all smokers now (they will die early anyway)then the kids will have nobody to copy, tobacco industry goes bust, voila, problem solved.
I think this policy alongside the Tom and Jerry campaign would be more effective.
Oh, and we could also make kids watch Ren and Stimpy to warn them away from mind altering drugs.
….. and banana man, young boys deep throating bananas will make you big and strong. At least that what my uncle told me in 1982.
Banana · August 23, 2006 at 12:46 pm
Dr clips
bananas come in different sizes. The very small ones are more expensive than the big ones. hahhahahha
Alex · August 23, 2006 at 10:13 pm
“You mean they can’t talk!”
That’s what smoking did to their voices.
Did you ever notice when Tom quit smoking how irratable he got. Jerry just had to do one thing and he’d lose it completely!
Murphy · August 24, 2006 at 7:11 am
“cats are fucking shits”
Bravo, my son! My Hero! A Wildean epithet of genius!
Mind you, when Suggs complained about it, it was a case of Madness gone Politically correct!
doctorvee » Smoking? Never heard of it · August 24, 2006 at 12:31 pm
[...] Yesterday it was announced that Tom & Jerry cartoons are to have smoking scenes edited out after an investigation by Ofcom found that the scenes were unsuitable for children. (Meanwhile, the manic violence goes ahead uncut.) This just reminds me of that episode of Itchy & Scratchy where they are reduced to making each other lemonade: “I made it ’specially for yooou!” [...]
Sooz · August 24, 2006 at 12:37 pm
I sat down to watch a couple of old Tom and Jerry cartoons with a pair of children aged 6 and 3 who’d never seen the cartoon before.
I was shocked at how I had to explain things to them! They really didn’t ‘get it’!
(they love it now though…) Shows how fast our viewpoints become ‘diluted’ by this editing doesn’t it?
I found myself cringing slightly though when Hardy began to set someone alight….
It pisses me off that they’re spoiling our history – what next? Winston Churchill holding a lollipop? (or are they banned too by the dental watchdogs?!)
(Blimey. Sorry. That was a rather long comment.)
Oh and Mr Angry – sometimes I like you. Then you say horrible things about cats. *sigh*
Sooz · August 24, 2006 at 12:38 pm
Err no – Hardy wasn’t in a Tom and Jerry cartoon. It was Hardy of Laurel and Hardy fame…