Dear Santa, it's time for you to quit smoking in front of my kid...apparently
KarenYesterday morning, I saw this status from the National Post in my newsfeed on Facebook and tapped the link (on my phone) for reading after I had a moment to sit down. What did it say?
‘[Santa] doesn’t go around killing kids. He doesn’t leave them bombs. I just think starting to rewrite and revise all of our history leads to something even more meaningless than even Disney’
Oh yes, clickbait for sure, right?
The actual headline of the article is:
After 200 years, Santa kicks a bad habit: Publisher, activist edit Twas The Night Before Christmas, take away St. Nick’s pipe
Now THIS is progress, don’t you think? For nearly two centuries we’ve been damaging kids with these words and mental images of jolly, old St. Nick with his pipe standing beside the Christmas tree propped up with dozens of presents. The article is accompanied by this picture:
Source: National Post
Source: blindgossip.com (click on image to see original)Yes, the part of the picture that kids are paying attention to is the pipe, especially with the exaggerated cloud of smoke circling his head. In reality, most pictures of Santa don’t even have a pipe, and the ones that do - like the one to the right - certainly don’t make it a centerpiece of the image.
I don’t like smoking, so I don’t. I wish other people didn’t and I’ve made my fantasy of a cigarette ban well-known. But the fact is that what I want isn’t even close to realistic - not as things currently stand. While I have expressed frustration at being forced to inhale second hand smoke, I honestly try not to berate, belittle or otherwise condemn smokers for their unfortunate and unhealthy habit. But I am not anti-smoker, I’m anti-smokING.
That doesn’t change the fact that it is a habit that affects others and I will always maintain that quitting is the best thing you can ever do for loved ones. Many smokers realize this and it is a constant struggle to quit, one that grows more and more difficult the more taboo it is to smoke in society.
So, of course it really helps smoker shame for Pamela McColl to remove Santa’s pipe. Because pipe smoking is such a common problem. I see pipe smokers everywhere. Don’t you?
Will she re-write Frosty the Snowman and take away HIS corncob pipe?
Source: Unknown
As much as I dislike smoking, I like the smell of pipe smoke. I always have. I have fond memories of going to a few different houses of family friends growing up and listening to their stories as they smoked a pipe. It was rare. I don’t remember their names or why we were there, but I remember liking the pipe smoke. It was better than the smell of cigarette smoke (other than my grandmother’s cigarettes - somehow hers smelled good. How do grandmothers do that?)
This classic Christmas poem has been in the public domain for quite a while and these kinds of revisions are permitted as the rights have expired (along with the author). The problem is that it’s an unnecessary. How many people do you know who’ve taken up pipe smoking because Santa influenced them?
This sort of revision of a classic that generations have grown up with is ludicrous. It’s erasing a portion of history that kids generations from now should learn about.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” (George Santayana, Life of Reason I)
If we ever get to the point that kids don’t know what smoking is (please, please!), would we actually want to omit that lesson from their knowledge banks only to have them “discover” the joys of smoking again? That would be such a shame. Just as it’s a shame that Ms. McColl is wasting time and effort thinking about a poem that isn’t even about smoking. If kids walked around quoting that stanza, I’d possibly have a different view. But that’s not my experience.
To me, this is a waste of time, money, effort and smarts that could be expended in a far more useful way to give help to people struggling to stop smoking.
It’s just one more case of political correctness going too far and highlighting a non-issue in a way that may not accomplish what she intends.
Reader Comments (3)
Argh.
I'm reasonably sure Santa has zero impact on the decision to start or not start smoking.
Pretty soon somebody'll have him doing yoga, going to Weight Watchers, losing the beard, getting his hair cut and dousing himself with Purell before he hits each living room. ; )
(Ho Ho Humbug... : D )
In 1998 the United States Goverment had finalized the Master Settlement Agreement and one of the three provisions was the prohibition of cartoon characters smokiing in promotions. Joe Camel is illegal everybody and back then you thought that was great. !!!
Do some reading - The Cigarette Century, The Journal of American Medicine studies on young children 3-7 and the influence of cartoon characters smoking, go read World Health Organization, Center for Disease Control, Smoke Free Movies, The 905 pages of the Surgeon General's Report on the status of youth and smoking.
This is not about censorship but freedom of speech and I am trying to talk about tobacco prevention and it is my right to artistic license or whatever else you want to call it to take a piece in the public domain and do this.
It is choice which edition you want to give your young child. Frankly if you are 65 and want to read an edition with even all the reindeer smoking go at it but please lets try and protect this next generation of children.
One billion people will die in this century from tobacco use and you want to argue over a verse in a poem that was written in 1823 by a man who hated smoking ?
Lets get serious and get on the same page.
The Centre for Disease Control issued a study that shows pipe smoking increased by 583% since 2008 - it is cheaper than smoking cigarettes.
It will take one generation to not start smoking to strangle tobacco and that is what we need to be talking about.
25% of smokers had their first cigarette by the age of 10.
35% of current smokers age 15 will die a premature death.
1 in 3 24 young women ( in their child bearing years) are smoking.
Smoking rates have stalled over the past few years - they are not declining.
i don't care about Frosty I care about Santa - the most influential character of them all - why do you think Coke has been usiing him since the 1930's.
I need help here not criticism that I truly believe is shallow and not well researched as I must say this book most certainly was.
The Kirkus Review - reviewing children's books for the past 80 years calls the deletion of smoking a "legitimate" edit.
Visit my website for more, www.twasthenightbeforechristmas.ca
I must say the tone of your comment and insulting me doesn't help your argument at all. And just as you have the right to create your version, I have the right to criticize said version.
I clearly stated that I don't like smoking. I've made my views on that very clear in my forum here.
Thank you for allowing me the choice of which version of this I will expose my child to. I can assure you that it won't be yours, Ms. McColl.
But thanks for stopping by.