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March 19, 2004
HONOLULU – O’ahu teenagers will be presenting
“Thumbs Up! Thumbs Down!” at the sixth annual
“Hackademy Awards,” an event featuring Hollywood portrayals
of smoking in top movies. The event will be held Friday, March 19, 2004
at 9:30 a.m. at the Ward Entertainment Complex.
Students critiqued Oscar nominated films as well as popular teen
movies. The review criteria is as follows: extent and type of tobacco
use, who used tobacco, specific brands shown, perceived messages of
tobacco use, special situations of tobacco use, and anti-tobacco
messages displayed.
Throughout the past year, students participated in the “Thumbs
Up! Thumbs Down!” project by viewing the movies nominated for
academy awards or movies popular with teens. “Thumbs Down!”
was given to movies that included and glamorized smoking, while
“Thumbs Up!” was given to movies that contained no smoking,
or anti-smoking messages. Students shared the information they gathered
in their classes and wrote articles in school newspapers.
The entertainment industry plays a significant role in influencing
young people in terms of tobacco use, both positively and negatively.
Actors or actresses on screen send a message to millions of young
people in theaters across the nation and around the world.
Last year, two out of three films rated G, PG, and PG-13 showed
smoking or tobacco products. In 2000, 89% of Hawaii high school
students and 81% of Hawaii middle school students who watch TV or
movies reported seeing actors using tobacco most or some of the time. A
longitudinal study carried out by researchers at Dartmouth Medical
School suggests that up to 52% of the initiation of tobacco use among
adolescents is directly attributable to tobacco use in movies. Children
who had viewed the most smoking in movies were three times as likely to
start smoking as those who had seen the least. The smoking rate for
major movie characters is 300 percent higher than reality as characters
in films tend to light up three times more frequently than do people in
America.
The “Thumbs Up! Thumbs Down!” Project is collaboration
between the Department of Health’s Tobacco Prevention and
Education Program, Consolidated Theaters, Signature Theaters, Wallace
Theaters, the Coalition for a Tobacco Free Hawaii, REAL Hawaii Youth
Movement Against Tobacco Use, and the Department of Education. This
year the schools that participated were Baldwin High School, Campbell
High School, Iolani School, Kapaa High School, King Kekaulike High
School, Konawaena High School, Pahoa High and Intermediate School,
Roosevelt High School, St. Joseph High School, Waiakea High School, and
Waipahu High School. The purpose of the project is to increase
awareness about the impact of tobacco use in movies, videos and TV on
young people.
For more information,
contact:
Kathleen Koga
Tobacco Prevention and Education Program
Phone: (808) 586-1430
Darcie Yukimura
Department of Health, Information Specialist
Phone: (808) 586-4442
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