Joe Camel (My Hero)

A long time ago in a place that takes about fifteen minutes to get to, my brother created an image that inspired me. That image was crafted for "Life Skills" (read Liberal propaganda), a class required in high school to make sure you know that drinking is bad, smoking is bad, date rape is bad, men have no sympathy for pregnant women, and so forth... Anyway, for his "smoking is bad" project he decided to create a poster of Nancy Reagan striking off the head of Joe Camel with a lightsaber. It was cool.

Anyway, after watching my billionth "Truth" commercial I decided I was very sympathetic to smokers. Basically, they are shunned in America for a choice they have made that barely (if at all) affects other people. At worst a person has to smell a puff every now and again. Most smokers I know are very considerate about that sort of thing... Basically, I figger that it is their choice, and although it does probably lead to all sorts of health problems later, it is their choice.

I am a libertarian, btw, just without the odd neo-Nazi bent...

Anyway, I decided that Joe Camel was one of my personal heros. Really, I always thought he was cool. That didn't make me want to smoke. As far as I care, only really stupid people are suckered in by ads. In my experience most people (by the time they can legally smoke) have already decided if they will or will not smoke. Any smoking that happens before that point (I.E. in the teen/child years, when you are stupid and easily swayed by commercials) is already a crime. In come a bunch of self righteous bastards decided that smoking was evil and that Joe Camel is also evil... So the natural thing to do was force the government to ban it... Anyway, a bunch of lawyering later Joe Camel is the enemy and Tobacco companies are paying shitloads of money to people...

It is all very depressing... Particularly when the same logic got used against fast food...

Anyway, often in my life (particularly in school) I have felt that the bad decisions of my peers and some really stupid bastards have made it necessary to create bad and constraining rules that only make my life more difficult.

Basically, the connection I try to make is that Joe Camel got fucked by the system, I got fucked by the system. Also, Joe Camel is cool.

Now, for the pictures below I figgered that Joe is cool, and Jedi are cool, so Joe as a Jedi is super cool. Now to go dick around on Ebay for some memorabilia.

Also, I need to get around to finding some better source images for lightsabers... freehanding them sucks. But I did buy the new Paint Shop Pro (version 9), so I get to have fun.