Last time I checked, “porno” was a five-letter word, not four.

Some TV networks are making a big hullabaloo about Kevin Smith’s latest cinematic soiree, “Zach and Miri Make a Porno,” which opens Oct. 31. They are refusing to air the second half of the title in their TV spots, leaving it innocently enough as “Zach and Miri.”

I can sort of understand it being censored during morning and early afternoon programs, but after 7 p.m. “Make a Porno” should be bringing up the tail end of the title.

There also seems to be no rhyme or reason indicating which programs are going to be porno-less.

During Oct. 20’s “Monday Night Football” game, porno was dropped from the title because “football is ‘family-friendly entertainment,’ which is why you can see all manners of erectile dysfunction ads during the game,” said the movie’s director Smith in an interview with the Chicago Tribune.

However, the full title was shown during the final game of the Rays-Red Sox playoff game. And an ad for the movie, sans porno, ran during the episode of “Saturday Night Live” in which Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin made an appearance.

Smith said “SNL” simply received the wrong ad.

And the censorship isn’t just on TV. Originally, posters of stars Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks in “playfully risqué” poses were going to be the focus of the billboard campaign. But according to an Oct. 15 Associated Press article, the Motion Picture Association of America banned the posters.

Smith went to Plan B: Two stick figures of the stars with the tagline, “Seth Rogen and Elizabeth Banks made a movie so outrageous that we can’t even tell you the title.”

In trying to defend “porno,” Gary Faber, marketing boss for the Weinstein Co., said, “It’s a comedy. It’s a joke. We’re not advertising porno. It’s not a porno. The word ‘porno,’ it’s not supposed to turn you on. It’s supposed to make you laugh.”

I couldn’t agree more with Faber’s simply-structured sentences. “Zach and Miri Make a Porno” is an R-rated, dropped from NC-17, comedy aimed at adults. It’s not a stag film; it’s about two friends who are in desperate need of some cash and the hilarity that ensues trying to earn said cash.

A common argument for the deletion of “porno” is that kids will ask what it means. I’m sure most parents want to protect their children from porn, but I don’t remember hearing any complaints about the “Sex and the City” movie.

And I’m sure it’s just as terrifyingly awkward for a parent to explain sex as it would be porn.

Get over it, prudes. People have sex and sometimes they like to do it in front of a camera.

And if they want to include two other people, a fern and horseradish, that’s up to them.