Plato (and/or Socrates) was the first person to describe a movie theater, yet he couldn’t wrap his mind around fictional stories. Not only do they lie, they don’t hold up high standards for people to live up to. Fortunately Aristotle came along and pointed out that we don’t just need role models, we need catharsis. Stories take us through experiences that might be we’d rather not have in reality, but whose lessons and emotions help us grow into stronger, more complex creatures.
These thoughts run through my mind when I think about the debate over whether people should smoke in movies. Or drink. Few characters are presented as absolute icons of goodness anymore, and real people smoke and drink. I do get tired when drinks are used as shorthand for relaxation, celebration, or moral decay, but there are so many other elements that are used as shorthand for this and that. If you want to do real stories about real people, or even really fake stagey caricatures with real characteristics, you can’t rule out smoking. Besides, even as an ex-smoker, I was pretty excited by the scene described by Rob Lowe in Thank You for Smoking. You know the one.
But there are other things that are bad, things we shouldn’t do, but everyone absolutely does anyway. Should we show people doing these things on film? Would that be an acknowledgment that these things are done? Possibly even an approval of sorts? The top five things we shouldn’t do, but do, include:
- Eating off the floor (5 seconds or not)
- Sticking Q-tips in our ears
- Spraying sunblock and bugspray out our faces, while holding our eyes closed
- Picking or scratching at sunburns and bug-bites
- Eating raw hotdogs