Smoke Signals
Elizabeth Woodham Guest BlogA femme fatale is defined in many ways: low voice, an air of individuality, mystery and masculinity together with flawless femininity. She smells uniquely delicious. Her lips and hair colour are true and bold. She is set apart.
She smokes.
She’s the kind of woman others want, but shouldn’t have. Is the femme and her cigarette seductive? Are the two irresistibly linked? Is smoking sexy?
The first advertisement for snuff and tobacco products was placed in the New York Daily in 1789. Advertising was an emerging concept, and tobacco-related advertisements were not seen as any different from those for other products. The World War One Tommie would smoke in the trenches. During World War Two, cigarettes were included in soldier’s rations and tobacco companies sent soldiers their smokes for free. Specific brands used macho imagery and found a new loyal group of customers when soldiers who smoked their cigarettes returned from war.
Today, the nanny state treats us as if we are unable to resist temptation by prohibiting tobacco companies from sponsoring sports, music and other cultural events, and prevents the display of tobacco product logos on clothes. A moral war is being fought on the back of scientific research, which proves that smoking kills. Eventually. A factor unlikely to concern the combat soldier.
Uber-hot motor racing isn’t quite as sexy since the ban on advertising those sexy brands we love to smoke and in the British supermarket, the tobacconist is concealed behind a sterile, ugly façade, like a flasher’s cock hidden by a raincoat. Sliding doors are opened a crack revealing an array of brightly-packaged products akin to a tantalising glimpse of stocking tops on a breezy day. The aromatic, inviting, TARDIS-like purveyor of all things smokey, formerly housed in a Tudor building in London’s High Holborn, vanished in a puff.
Ad-Men Madmen
On re-reading Truman Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s, one wonders if Holly Golightly’s provocative me, me, fragrance is channelled through her impossibly long cigarette holder? Is Cool Hand Luke as sensuous without a dangling cigarette? Heartbreakingly hip smokers Amy Winehouse and Janis Joplin, two interchangeable femmes, sans fatale, but fatal, seem naked without a cigarette held in fingers or lips. Even super-shiny Gwyneth Paltrow enjoys a sly fag; confessing a Saturday night inhalation after a hard week’s Goop. Somehow, images of Gwynnie, or the equally goodie-two-shoes, Jennifer Aniston, with a smoke don’t have the same impact as modern femme and unapologetic smoker, Scarlett Johansson.
And yet, there’s vanity. Even if you don’t care about your hidden organs turning black with tar, take a look at your bewitching skin and come-to-bed ultrabrite smile. You’ll say goodbye to both and hello to smoker’s face after a couple of decades’ nicotine addiction. Just sayin.
Perhaps all smokers want to quit eventually, after all, shelling out for a pack of twenty erodes your funds, as well as your lungs. Maybe a cigarette has become an anachronism? Enter the not cheap, not big, not clever, electronic cigarette. Manufacturers have attempted injecting sex and sense appeal into the unerotic e-cig, ‘totally wicked liquid.’ Er, no. At present, you’re allowed to drag on your e-fag here, there and everywhere, but they’ll ban it everywhere. Eventually. Nanny doesn’t like citizens to enjoy sex, fags, drugs and/or rock-n-roll. They conjure up wet rock festival weather out of spite. They will have you quit the weed if it’s the last thing they do, and collect their sex kills tax via something else you love to love.
#mc_embed_signup{background:clear; clear:left; font:10px Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; }
/* Add your own MailChimp form style overrides in your site stylesheet or in this style block.
We recommend moving this block and the preceding CSS link to the HEAD of your HTML file. */
Add Your Name to the Mailing List for occasional Updates - Chloe
* indicates required
Email Address *
'+msg+'
The post Smoke Signals appeared first on Chloe Thurlow.
