Despite broad measures by the government to curb underage smoking, one in three French 17-year-olds smokes. And while all sorts of people have expressed outrage over an anti-smoking campaign equating smoking to coerced fellatio, we applaud the ad sponsors for being so forthright about the truths of tobacco use.

The three-part campaign, spearheaded by France’s Non-Smokers’ Rights Association (Droits des Non-Fumeurs, or DNF), depicts a teenager (two ads feature boys and one a girl) kneeling in front of an obscured man who appears to be directing the adolescent’s head toward his cigarillo region. There, protruding through the man’s zipper, is a cigarette, which the teenager has seemingly reluctantly placed between his or her lips. The captions read: “Smoking, it’s being a slave to tobacco.”

The leader of the DNF acknowledged the ads were meant to shock and said such provocative ads were the only way to reach young people. “Traditional advertisements targeting teens don’t affect them. Talking about issues of health, illness or even death, they don’t get it,” Remi Parola, director of the DNF, told the Associated Press. “However, when we talk about submission and dependence, they listen.”

Parola insisted the ads – which were prepared pro-boner, er, pro bono by the BDDP & Fils advertising agency – were designed to “start a discussion with young people to get them to understand the dangers of smoking.”

Unlike conservative family organizations, feminists, and the tobacco industry, which have all decried the campaign as outrageous for a variety of reasons, we see its literal in-your-face honesty about smoking to be as refreshing as a low-tar menthol. After all, tobacco can be so addictive, some smokers have been known to get on their knees and beg for a cigarette.

Moreover, while blow jobs may not cause cancer, there are several similarities between smoking tobacco and performing oral sex on a man: Sucking is involved; all the cool kids are doing it; it can leave a funky taste in your mouth; and the uninitiated sometimes gag when trying it for the first time.

Furthermore, the two ads featuring the young boys illustrate the British vernacular term for cigarettes: Both of them are seen preparing to smoke a fag.