June 30, 1997
Editor's Notebook
Are we snuffing out problem or freedoms?
Tobacco industry's settlement touches more than a bad habit
Thomas York Business Journal Editor
I've got grave misgivings about the $360 billion settlement OK'd two weeks ago by the tobacco industry.
The behind-closed-doors pact reached with the nation's anti-smoking forces has wide-ranging implications--most notably in the area of First Amendment freedoms--for other out-of-favor industries and businesses.
The pact strikes at the heart of those liberties, and opens the door for similar attacks on other, less popular enterprises that constitute our free-enterprise economy.
Before I continue, let me add my usual caveat: I'm no apologist for the cigarette industry.
Smoking is a filthy, despicable habit. And it's highly addictive.
I should know; I was a smoker from ages 12 to 22. It took me well over a year to quit, and even then I had to keep fighting the urge to resume.
I think most people take up the habit with full knowledge of the dangers of cigarette smoking. I did.
Indeed, we've known since the '50s that cigarettes are hazardous to our health. The famous 1964 U.S. Surgeon General's report came as little surprise, given that the subject was as much a part of the public debate 33 years ago as it is today.
That's why I find the anti-smoking forces' position regarding cigarette advertising's impact on consumers a little disingenuous.
Would-be smokers--even 13-year-old hero-starved kids--aren't all that influenced by Joe Camel and his dromedary deadbeats.
Youngsters take up smoking because of a complex set of forces--many understood, some not, but few related to the mesmerizing abilities of Madison Avenue.
Young people smoke because there is a subculture in our society that says smoking is cool, pleasurable and rewarding.
And that subculture believes smoking is not as threatening as adults say it is.
Thus, more than anything else, smoking is a statement of rebellion.
Kids smoke because so many adults find it so disgusting and dangerous.
Fortunately, the false assumptions of that subculture are eroding.
Unfortunately, smoking as rebellion soon becomes habit, and habits are hard to kick.
Nevertheless, anti-smoking advocates argue that advertising is the root of all evil in the industry, which is why they pushed for a strict ban on all forms of advertising in the pact.
True defenders of the Bill of Rights are sparse these days, and no one's rushing to the defense of the tobacco tycoons.
Remember, this is a crusade of righteousness as much as it is a campaign to stamp out a societal health problem.
Now that the heavy heel of government regulation has come slamming down on cigarettes, the crusaders will point their toes at the new forces of evil, wherever and whatever they might be.
To be sure, pornography will be high on the list, because it is so pervasive--and such a compelling target.
Like cigarettes, porn is disgusting, and injurious to health--in this case, the mental health of our children.
But after porn, what next?
One day, the thought police are telling us what we can and can't look at.
The next day, they're telling us what we can and can't say.
And don't say such societies don't exist.
You don't need to read George Orwell's "1984" to get insights into how such a society operates.
The People's Republic of China has been a proud booster of this form of management for the past five decades.
In their rush to snuff out cigarettes, the zealots have crushed free expression.
Don't forget: The free market depends not only on a free flow of goods and services, but on a free flow of ideas, no matter how unpopular or distasteful they may be.
Cigarette smoking may be hazardous to our health.
But this cigarette settlement is even more threatening.
© 1997, The Business Journal
