Smoke-free Air Is Not Enough

Anti is compelled to air-brush history as well. The Nazi and Soviet governments were famous for removing images of dissent and dissenters from historical photographs. The news article linked with below recalls particularly a circumstance noted by Christopher Snowdon (in Chapter 3 of his book Velvet Glove, Iron Fist: a History of Anti-smoking) regarding a move made by antitobacco hysteric Adolf Hitler: "The 1939 peace treaty with the USSR and the heavy-smoking Stalin posed a PR problem that was overcome by airbrushing the pipe from his mouth in billboards celebrating the accord."

Anti, the philosophical inheritor of oppressors past, goose-steps right along. Today’s empowered prohibitionists have been air-brushing smoking implements from historical photographs, including on US postage stamps, for many years.

Now we see another such move directed against a beloved French film character. Monsieur Hulot, the amiable oaf portrayed by film-maker Jacques Tati in movies produced between 1953-1971, will be deprived of his trademark pipe in billboard advertisements for a film retrospective.

Costa Garvas, president of the Cinémathèque Française, says, “It’s absurd and risible. I think it would have made him [Tati] die of laughter.”

The laughable edict is explained by an official of the Paris transport network, amongst whose stations and vehicles the billboards will appear, as necessary for compliance with laws banning advertising of alcohol or tobacco.

The pipe in Monsieur Hulot’s mouth has been replaced on the billboards with “a yellow children’s windmill.” There is evidently no ban on encouraging children to put toys in their mouths.

We have two suggestions. The next French child who chokes on a windmill should sue the transport authority for a bundle, and as we’re told Monsieur Hulot’s bicycle will appear uncensored on the billboard, the inevitable accident victims of the next Tour de France should sue en masse.

Here’s hoping these litigants put the transport authority into bankruptcy. They’ve got it coming. We do not need to suggest that incessantly vilified French smokers keep on smoking. They do that on their own.

Parental advisory: should your Anti-indoctrinated child complain about the uncensored photo of Monsieur Hulot on this page, shut the kid up according to legal precedent, by inserting a windmill into his mouth.