Watch and Discuss: The Onion News Network Covers CDC's "Don't Be Gay. Don't Smoke" Campaign

Posted by

on October 6, 2009

I might have treated these warnings like baseball cards - Collect 'em All!

Let me start off by saying I love The Onion, and I've loved it since it was a single print piece per day. Their satire is pointed, and their attitude is that no cow is sacred. These are things I enjoy in my humor.

But their latest clip is a faux interview with the Centers for Disease Control about a new campaign to keep kids from smoking by telling them it will turn them gay, complete with extremely sexy imagery. Warning: imagery and language is mildly NSFW.

New Anti-Smoking Ads Warn Teens 'It's Gay To Smoke'

Now I'm all for keeping kids from smoking - stopping after 17 years was one of the hardest things I ever did. But considering that we have Senatorial aides telling people that Playboy will turn you gay, and GLSEN spending money to get kids to stop saying "That's gay" as lame, do we really need something like this?

Are our detractors smart enough to get the joke, or is this something I'm going to see quoted back to a Value Voter's Summit as fact?

(via Towelroad)