[attempt 2: my mum manged to kick the powersupply for my laptop across the floor, disconneccting it, and causing the frustrating loss of an entire diary entry; I really ought to get a battery for my laptop, but while the screen disppears into flickery greyness regularly there’s not a great deal of enthusiasm for that as a concept]
There’s been some discussion in the media about the smoking cesation programmes – and anti smoking advertising in both the US and here; people saying that they believe that government’s should not be involved in the health of the citizens of the nation (which is a concept I find bizarre) – indeed one person today was decrying the laws which say people have to wear seatbelts, and crash helmets; I ask him to work in A&E for a while and watch the destruction of families when someone does fly through a screen; or comes off a bike wearing the bear minimum bike gear; and see whether he feels so certain that individual choice is the correct decision after that.
Anyway, I come from a generation (odd phrase that) where smoking still hovered very gently on the boundries between stylish and stupid. In my brain it occupies a highly contradictory space; somehow it’s still cool to smoke in my head, whilst simultaneously being phenominally stupid. Watching my father die of cancer ensures that I’m fully aware that increasing your risk of cancer is ultimately one of the most foolish things you could possibly do; when already something like 1 in 4 people experience cancer, why would you want to up your chances?
But I’ve noticed what I can only describe as a disturbing trend in the LGBT media; the portrail of smoking as both cool, and the norm. Recently, particularly noticable in The L Word, I’ve noticed a very distinct increase in the numbers of characters who smoke. We went through a phase, certainly in the UK, where it was extremely uncommon to see smoking on tv, except during old films and 70’s TV series. But it’s risen again; and I find that distasteful.
I’m not one of the ‘no smoking anywhere ever’ brigade; it doesn’t hugely bother me either way, but seeing it portrayed on screen I find somehow uncomfortable. Particularly when it appears to be targeting a group traditionally neglected and disenfranchised by health care services. Past research has shown that LGBT people are less likely to access health care – and their experiences are poorer (I’ve experienced this myself). And so, yes, to target them (us) with messages to promote smoking… I find that… wrong.
It is, perhaps, another sign of the cigarette manufacturer’s desire to sell their product which they know harms people – and provides no benefit, as their direct advertising is curbed, so their more subtle methods of manipulation are increased.
So yes, that is something that occured to me. Time to think, that I have plenty of whilst I am sat at my parents.
The other thing is… my… american accent. I’ve talked in an odd way for a long time. Depression and illness left my voice flat and monotonic. Seriously; completely flat. No expression at all. Horrendous. Bah. My childhood, which was spent mostly on my own, well, that lent me a certain – probably unique – phraseology. I have a style to my speaking; a style and phraseology which leads me to speak in a very distinctive way.
So anyway, I saw a speech therapist and I got ‘my voice’ back; although I still drift back at times to a sort of monotone; particulary when I’m doing technical stuff, it’s way better, and it’s distinctively me.
But I’m told, I’ve developed an american accent; not so much an outright accent, but a gentle slide towards it. I knew I was doing it deliberately on occasion. Wahder and budderfly were things which caused amusement twixt me and my girlfriend; as did an americanised ‘y’re meean’; but now it’s started to happen without me thinking about it. And apparently it sounds quite natural.
And then bloody Kara said that she prefered it when I did an American accent. Nyargh. Help me!
Now I find myself wondering where my accent lies; and what I sound like; and I listen to myself intently trying to hear the american sounds… Bloody cofa, that’s what I say.
