PETA picks a lot of small fights with celebrities over things that seem pointless and a often trite. Like they went after Sharon Stone for insisting that a live spider have its pincers removed before filming a scene with it in some B horror movie in the early 80s. PETA said she had a “heart of stone” for forcing the spider to be an “amputee,” calling it a “tiny insect” even though it probably looked like one of those spiders that’s as big as your hand. They partially make up for their insistence on even arachnid’s rights by also issuing amusing press releases, like one in which they ooffered to give Stone a free brain scan to see if she had some abnormality that was causing her to completely lack empathy for people and animals.

There are plenty of other groups that could get publicity for their cause by calling out celebrities on bad behavior, but they usually take the high road, or just don’t bother, assuming that they’ll come off as radical and reactionary as PETA usually does. The American Cancer society is definitely an organization that could get plenty of well-deserved press. They could issue statements pointing out the various celebrities puffing away and discussing the damage they’re doing to their health, the environment, bystanders and their skin. They could say how counter productive and hypocritical is to smoke and then to turnaround and spend thousands on high end skin care, botox, and dermatology procedures.

Instead they’re going after Michael Jordan for smoking cigars. Maybe the people at the American Cancer Society are old and think he’s still a major celebrity. I mean, he is, but let’s pick on the constant smokers instead. They seem to be taking offense because he’s an athlete, but the little ash-dropping starlets need some smack-talking too. They’re missing a real opportunity here.

The ACS is fuming over several photos TMZ posted earlier of MJ playing softball with a fat stogie hangin’ out of his mouth. Now, the ACS has unleashed a mouthpiece of their own, their former president Cary Presant MD, who told us, “When high profile athletes publicly display unhealthful habits they can mislead young people to emulate their behavior. According to the American Cancer Society tobacco use in this country is responsible for 1/3 of all cancers and remains the most preventable cause of death in our society. 8.6 million Americans suffer from chronic smoking-related disease. Since 1964 smoking has cause more than 12 million premature deaths in the U.S.”

[From TMZ]

Katherine Heigl, Jennifer Aniston, Mary-Kate Olsen, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears, Lily Allen – they’re all smokers, and they’re all a lot more visible than Michael Jordan at this point in time. Maybe not Lilly Allen, but you get my point. American Cancer Society staff could definitely take some lessons in self promotion from PETA and start targeting some more talked-about celebrities. Unfortunately those lessons also come with a heavy dose of humility and some snickering when those organizations seem to overstep their bounds.

Update: The American Cancer Society doesn’t normally comment on celebrity smoking, but they were asked specifically by TMZ what they thought of those pictures, which were pointed out to them. They say someone from TMZ called them, a volunteer gave a pretty low-key standard response that smoking is bad for your health, and it turned into this big thing. I would credit peachfish but she/he wasn’t that gracious at pointing out the error, which was TMZ’s, not ours.

Lilly Allen is shown smoking a joint or hand-rolled cigarette at Glastonbury on 6/29/08. Lindsay Lohan and Samantha Ronson are shown taking a cigarette break on 8/15/08. Britney is shown smoking on 8/9/08. Amy Winehouse is shown smoking on 6/9/08, but that’s the least of her problems. Credit: Fame