Smoking Isn’t Sexy
Let’s say you’re watching a popular film and it opens with a close-up of a ruby-red pair of painted lips as they slowly take a long, sultry drag on a cigarette. The camera stays fixed in place as the lips purse and a stream of sinuous smoke spills out from between them. Sexy? If you are blissfully unaware of the tar, chemicals, and toxins that those lovely lips just pulled into the body of their owner then you might be deceived into thinking that it was sexy…otherwise, you are probably not impressed at all.
Sadly, few people will consider the implications of smoking during such a cinematic or television moment, and this is the reason that it is still viewed as acceptable and even “cool”. The thing is, smoking is far from sexy, especially when you consider the results.
How sexy is waking up to someone choking and coughing up wads of phlegm? This is known as “smoker’s cough” and it is never shown in the movies. It happens to most smokers, and is usually prevalent upon waking in the morning. It is the sign of their body trying to cleanse itself of toxins, but usually all that work is undone by the first cigarette of the day.
What about the smell? Smokers are often instantly identified by the distinctive odor of stale smoke. This stays in the skin, hair, and clothing and because cigarettes deaden the senses of the smoker they tend to become entirely unaware that they have such a recognizable aroma.
Of course smokers also have chronic bad breath too, and there are few societies that regard someone who smells and who has bad breath as sexually attractive. Of course with the bad breath of smoking also come the yellowed teeth thanks to the presence of toxic tar in the tobacco.
In addition to yellowing teeth, smokers will also have advanced aging in their skin too. Most smokers will deprive themselves of oxygen and this prevents skin cells from operating normally. This means that people who are in their twenties will begin to notice lines around their mouths and brows even before they hit the big three-zero.
Women who smoke also run the risk of developing facial hair too, and all smokers are far more prone to clogging their pores and developing acne than any non-smoker as well.
So, bad odors, yellow teeth, wrinkles, and this is all above the neck! Smoking also leads to a huge number of cancers that can totally disable the individual and leave them chronically ill and enfeebled. None of this adds up to sexiness, so the next time a scene like that described at the opening of this discussion appears on screen it is important to recognize it for what it is…pure fiction!
