Smoking Ban Hits Toon Town

Gregory Mottola
Posted: August 24, 2006

The pervasive smoking bans sweeping the globe have now affected the cartoon world as well. British children's channel Boomerang, run by Turner Broadcasting's British division, has agreed to edit out any puffing cartoon characters in nearly 2,000 episodes of classic Hanna-Barbera cartoons, including "Tom and Jerry," "The Flintstones" and "Scooby Doo."

"Turner recognizes that it is not suitable for cartoons aimed at children to portray smoking in a cool context and has additionally pledged to review the entire Hanna-Barbera catalog to remove scenes that appear to glamorize or encourage smoking," said Cecilia Persson, a Turner vice president. The re-cuts were initiated after U.K. watchdog group Office of Communications (Ofcom) received one complaint over two Tom and Jerry cartoons believed to be potentially corrupting, although Boomerang maintains that the edits are voluntary. Both episodes were created more than 50 years ago.

For more on this story, see the next issue of Cigar Insider.

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