The Manly Smoke

When I walked through the door of the premium tobacco “industry”, I was made aware under no uncertain terms that I had entered a “man’s, man’s world”.  [James Brown may have had a point…]   But what, exactly, does that mean to the male smoker?  Established alongside the industry itself, the gender roles of the smoking man seem stubbornly imbedded in the very definition of a tobacco purveyor.

 

The cigar smoking man.  He is usually portrayed as a suave and debonair part of society, a James Bond for the real-world if you will.  Hollywood plays a large role in this association, serving up helping after helping of well dressed, dangerous-yet-successful men blowing smoke rings into the interior of their European sports cars as they race around some city I have yet to experience as they do.  These men are silver tongued with their women, usually just as sleek, fast and European as the cars.  These cigar smokers are tan, buff, well accessorized, dressed to the nines and always smoking the finest of top-dollar cigars.  Tough act to follow, no?

The pipe smoking man.  While a wholly different character for the role of smoking man, the shoes of this industry-designed man are no simpler to fill.  Pipe smoking man is sophisticated:  he has travelled the world, has solved major worldly problems with ease, is an accomplished author/PhD/mathematician, and speaks four languages fluently.  The pipe smoking man also averages 65 years on earth, sports at least a hint of silver or white in his hair, and loves his smoking chair.  This stereotype, while less aggressive, is nonetheless unattainable for 99% of tobacco smoking men.   

The real life male tobacco smokers are too varied to label.  They are anywhere from 18 to 88 years old.   Students, factory workers, professionals, artists, and the unknown all find pleasure in a carefully blended pipe tobacco or a hand rolled cigar.  Sometimes it is the pipe smoker with the silver tongue and the cigar smoker with the PhD.  Oftentimes you simply can’t tell, when popping into our lounge, just who is who. 

When it comes down to it, smoking man is simply that.  A man, tobacco in hand, creating a small cloud of enjoyment in his midst.

–Miss T

Want more?  Check out the “other perspective”, the female-smoker stereotype at www.myspace.com/uhletobacco (where you can find this blog’s original author)