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by Chambler
Has Ofcom gone too far with this one in "destroying" the history integrity of these cartoons ...?

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Bloody right it has. Fascism for your own good is the worst kind, even when it involves pugilistic cartoon animals.

I remember when I was a kid, trying to make a straw look like a cigarette and cigarette-holder, cos that's what the Pink Panther smoked... I'm not sure if that's a good example of why this sort of thing should be banned or why it should be kept...

I'm in two minds about this, but I really don't think it's that bad what they're doing. These are cartoons aimed at children and aired during kiddies timeslots on TV, and they're editing out scenes that they consider unsuitable for children. Surely there's nothing new here? There's no outcry when swearing and violence are edited out of films or TV programmes to make them suitable for a pre-watershed screening.

And it's not like they're destroying the originals, never to be seen again. They'll probably release them on DVD boasting a big "UNCUT" sticker. Or show them on some late night Channel 4 theme night.

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by PictureOfFlowers
Surely there's nothing new here?

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In one sense you're right. Taboos change, and society seeks to protect children from them. That doesn't mean it should go unquestioned. I find the health-dictator attitude to smoking just as bad as the demon fags. Schools are bursting with anti-smoking propaganda. No child can be unaware. I find it hard to believe a cartoon cat and mouse is going to swing it.

There's another issue. From an early age children learn the past had very different values. Huckleberry Finn is read in schools. It's a classic coming of age story. It also uses the word "nigger" more than a Snoop Doggy Dogg track. Should we Bowdlerize Twain? The black "mama" character in Tom and Jerry is, by any modern standard, an outrageous racist caricature. Ditto?

I find something inherently creepy in the idea of re-writing history, even when it's as seemingly frivolous as a Tom and Jerry cartoon. Children need to learn the idea of context from an early age. Why not enlist the greatest cat and mouse double-act in history towards this end instead of chopping it up in a futile effort to protect them from something they already know?

Besides, if we're getting pro-censorship, surely the fact Tom and Jerry kick the crap out of each other with Jacobean inventiveness every episode is more of a concern? Itchy and Scratchy satirise it for a reason!

The Dutch news this morning was already talking about ideas to impose an age limit of 16 years+ for everything, be it tv shows / movies etc, in which people smoke.

What worries me is that at the complaint of 1 person history apparently gets altered. If you should worry about something in Tom & Jerry it would be the violance in the cartoons than anything else, in 99% of the cases a character smokes something bad happens to them with the exception of a few scenes originally created in the 1940's - 1970's.

If Tom & Jerry actions make your kids smoke you are doing something seriously wrong as a parent. This also opens the flood gates for complaints about other shows aimed at both kids and adults. Take Knight rider, A-Team, Miami Vice and many many more, all "quality" televisino. You can't edit the A-team for everytime anyone smokes, you'll hardly have anything left.

For some reason editing 'history' like this gives me a very strong 1984 feeling.
"If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say this or that even, it never happened—that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death."

"And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. 'Who controls the past' ran the Party slogan, 'controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.'"

(Edited by Chambler 23/08/2006 08:08)

Unsurprisingly, another one who things that this position of 'Stylised Smoking = Bad, Stylised Violence = Good' speaks volumes about our society's values. And the mess we're in.

We're so busy protecting ourselves and each other, airbrushing out that which some of us find offensive. It's no wonder no one takes responsibility for their own actions. 'It's not my fault I smoke, I watched Tom & Jerry as a kid'. Might as well say 'It's not my fault I ran that kid over, I watched Wacky Races as a kid'.

Can't we all just grow up? Just a little bit? We are who we are, and do what we do, because we chose to. We have no one to blame but ourselves. And stop trying to wrap everything up in cotton wool?

My kids love Tom & Jerry and have several DVDs. I don't think they even notice that they're smoking. Besides they know smoking is dirty, disgusting and dangerous

*** DANGER WILL ROBINSON, DANGER! RAMBLE INCOMING! RAMBLE INCOMING! DANGER! ***

I have no qualms about saying that I was briefly almost on the fence about this, if only because of the incredibly low opinion I have (and that's putting it mildly) of smoking, generally because of the death and illness it's caused in my family (including one death by cancer) so I despise glamorisation of the habit in all its forms.

On the other hand I fail to see how the butchering of an animation classic is going to solve the problem; during the brief peer pressure I experienced at school to smoke I don't ever remember wondering anything like "What would Tom & Jerry do?".

As long as children are aware that smoking is a disgusting and dangerous habit then I can't see any problem with leaving pieces of TV history the hell alone, as long as it's explained to younger viewers in context; everyone here discussing this has long been aware that these cartoons were made in the olden days when smoking was more acceptable, and these days we know better. Younger less educated viewers, IMHO, ought to be made aware of this - just as the more sensible viewers (who're in the vast majority anyway) know, just as they shouldn't follow Tom's example and chase an annoying younger sibling round the house with a mallet the size of a small town, they shouldn't follow his example by setting fire to little pieces of paper, and then putting them in their mouths.

To sum up my point (yes there is one, honest!) I'd rather such cartoons be left alone as they are rightly classics - but dated classics at that, and as long as they're watched with the understanding that we don't condone that sort of thing anymore (and hypothetically speaking, any kid of mine who'd try it really would get chased round the house with a mallet the size of a small town ), I really can't see a problem with leaving them as they are.

(Edited by Alan 23/08/2006 23:32)

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by Alan
just as they shouldn't follow Tom's example and chase an annoying younger sibling round the house with a mallet the size of a small town

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Can someone please come explain this to my 9yr old?

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by Byron
There's another issue. From an early age children learn the past had very different values. Huckleberry Finn is read in schools. It's a classic coming of age story. It also uses the word "nigger" more than a Snoop Doggy Dogg track. Should we Bowdlerize Twain? The black "mama" character in Tom and Jerry is, by any modern standard, an outrageous racist caricature. Ditto?

I find something inherently creepy in the idea of re-writing history, even when it's as seemingly frivolous as a Tom and Jerry cartoon. Children need to learn the idea of context from an early age. Why not enlist the greatest cat and mouse double-act in history towards this end instead of chopping it up in a futile effort to protect them from something they already know?

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But Huckleberry Finn is read in secondary school (I think, I've never actually read it, in or out of school), and by that age you're right that kids should have a sense of context, and can understand that while it's an acceptable term in the book it shouldn't be used in modern society. But Tom and Jerry is watched by kids as young as 4 (again, I think, I don't claim to be a great parent ). Do you really expect a kid of that age to sit down and listen to an explanation of how society has changed over the decades..?

Also there is a big difference between censoring a book and creating an "edited for daytime TV" version of a programme. The latter happens all the time. I'd bet a pretty decent sum of money that not a single day goes by without a censored version of some film, tv programme or music video being shown on the telly. The former really is re-writing history.

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by PictureOfFlowers
(quotes)

But Huckleberry Finn is read in secondary school (I think, I've never actually read it, in or out of school), and by that age you're right that kids should have a sense of context, and can understand that while it's an acceptable term in the book it shouldn't be used in modern society. But Tom and Jerry is watched by kids as young as 4 (again, I think, I don't claim to be a great parent ). Do you really expect a kid of that age to sit down and listen to an explanation of how society has changed over the decades..?

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Huck was on the library shelf in my Junior school, and discussed in several lessons, but whether that's typical or not I couldn't say.

You do have a good point. Explaining, say, the historical context of racial epithets to a 4 year old might be a little advanced. (Although I think Labour are introducing that test in nursery schools next year. Fail and you're interned until "Ebony and Ivory" doesn't provoke urges of a homicidal nature.) But smoking isn't in the same league. Every kid knows what a cigarette is. Explaining that "people didn't know how dangerous they were back then" doesn't seem completely unfeasible.

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Also there is a big difference between censoring a book and creating an "edited for daytime TV" version of a programme. The latter happens all the time. I'd bet a pretty decent sum of money that not a single day goes by without a censored version of some film, tv programme or music video being shown on the telly. The former really is re-writing history.

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Don't like censorship full stop. DH Lawrence (OK, censor him, he's crap), James Joyce or Tom and Jerry, leave 'em alone. The distinction between books and other media has always felt arbitary and infused with snobbery. TV can produce masterpieces, literature can produce trash: worth is decided by the author, not the medium.

Running with the pro-censorship argument for a second: extreme violence and sex are taken out programmes because they're thought to disturb children. (Although children have a habit of enjoying them, so perhaps it's disturbed adults we're really protecting.) There's nothing inherently disturbing about watching a cartoon cat puffing away on a glowing bundle of paper and shredded leaves. The only possible argument for removing it is if it'll encourage kids to smoke. And as Chamb says, if Tom and Jerry can swing it, that's some mighty bad parenting.

Or put succinctly: let's cut out the smoking so kids aren't distracted from the gratuitous violence.

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by Jayjay
Unsurprisingly, another one who things that this position of 'Stylised Smoking = Bad, Stylised Violence = Good' speaks volumes about our society's values. And the mess we're in.

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A gem cropped up recently on the cable channel FX289. An episode of Highlander that was so violent the BBFC cut it for an 18 rating was shown completely unedited in the middle of the afternoon. Next up was an episode of Buffy from which the word "wanker" had been removed.

As South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut said, "Remember, gradituous violence is OK, so long as no one says any naughty words." Or, presumably, lights up. (Starts humming the pro-big tobacco song from the South Park series.)