Love Us or We’ll Sue
By Jeffrey Page
According to a breathtaking story in The Times, Philip Morris International is suing the nation of Brazil because the government had the temerity to take measures to protect the health of its people.
Brazil did this by requiring that cigarette manufacturers print stark illustrations of the effects of smoking. Where? Right on the outside of the package where smokers could get a good look at what they inflict on themselves.
PMI contends that this serves to “vilify” – their word, The Times reported – it and other cigarette makers.
Smoking has decreased markedly in the United States and Western Europe, and to make up for their losses in those markets, Philip Morris International and other manufacturers are bringing legal actions against nations whose rules make it difficult to sell tobacco products.
Uruguay, for example, has a regulation that health warnings must cover 80 percent of the exterior of a pack of cigarettes. Other nations have rules governing the advertising and promotion of cigarettes.
I think back several years to when it was revealed that some cigarette makers boosted the nicotine level in their product as a means of hooking people more quickly and effectively, and I congratulate myself on breaking my nicotine addiction.
How insidious Big Tobacco has been. How devious.
I remember when the maker of Camels used to advertise that a survey – did such a survey really exist? I have no idea – indicated that more doctors smoked Camels than any other brand.
The Old Gold brand used to bill its line as “a treat instead of a treatment,” and I wonder how many Old Gold smokers over the years have had to undergo treatments such as chemo, surgical and radiation. I wonder how many have died before their time.
I remember the line “Luckies taste better. Cleaner, fresher, smoother,” and the invitation “Light up a Lucky. It’s light-up time.”
The ads were happy, colorful portrayals of life in post war America. Everything was clean, everything was sparkly. And just to make it perfect, we were advised to light up, sit back and enjoy life. We were killing ourselves of course, aided every inch of the way by the cigarette makers.
And thus, getting back to Philip Morris International’s weepy complaint that it is being vilified by having to follow certain rules, let it be noted that to vilify is to defame, to revile, to speak contemptuously, to speak ill.
Was there ever an industry more deserving of vilification than one that sells a product it knows to be lethal?
Jeffrey can be reached at jeffrey@zestoforange.com
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