Scenes of cigarette consumption, which continue to be the subject of great debate in movies and TV series today, came to the fore again today. United States Democratic Senators Ed Markey, Chris Van Hollen, and Richard Blumenthal sent an important letter to Netflix’s CEOs, Reed Hastings and Ted Sarandos.
Senators said in the letter in question to CEOs, “We urge your company to take more aggressive steps to limit these images and reduce young people’s consumption of this harmful substance.” made statements. The letter also included a striking research on Netflix’s smoking scenes.
Netflix featured more than 200 cigarette scenes in one season of its popular productions
The Truth Initiative report, which included letters from the senators, is Netflix’s last four revealed that it showed more depictions of cigarettes or electronic cigarettes on content over the years than any other channel. Netflix’s most cigarette productions were The Queen’s Gambit and The Umbrella Academy. This good production featured more than 200 cigarette smoking screenings in total in its 2020 episodes.
In 2019, Netflix had previously promised to reduce depictions of cigarettes and end them entirely in productions for younger audiences, in response to criticism of the issue. Senators, on the other hand, said the number of cigarette images has increased since this Netflix commitment. While Netflix has not yet made a statement on the subject, the senators stated that they expect a response by April 21.