I agree that smoking shouldn't be banned and that propaganda isn't a mind control ray, but fucking hell did cigarette advertisments work well. They worked so well that even though they're mostly banned, the effects are still rippling through our society via generational transmission.
Cigarettes have lore to them in working class communities. Everyone has a brand they smoke and it becomes a part of your identity. More than anything else I can think of except maybe a car. I know dozens of people with Camel Cash stories they got from their grandparents and shit.
So yeah, the marketing worked insanely well. It helped that the product was addictive, but I really don't think it would have been the same without the pervasiveness of the advertisement and branding.
I fully agree in that it's more of a generational thing and working class association moreso than outright people "falling for advertising" that has been illegal for years that seems to be the angle being peddled a lot in this thread. My smoking habit came from being a cook and that's the only way you can get breaks. I'd never defend smoking but a lot of people here seem to to be using the same late 80s just say no kind of logic towards smoking or acting like adults who made a decision knowing the consequences were manipulated by tobacco ads that were outlawed before most of us were born, smoking is bad and Id prefer not to but the moralizing here is sickening
Oh no I've been TRICKED into smoking!
Sorry, I forgot that you were immune to propaganda.
Propaganda isn't a mind control ray.
Propaganda is peepee poopoo.
I agree that smoking shouldn't be banned and that propaganda isn't a mind control ray, but fucking hell did cigarette advertisments work well. They worked so well that even though they're mostly banned, the effects are still rippling through our society via generational transmission.
Cigarettes have lore to them in working class communities. Everyone has a brand they smoke and it becomes a part of your identity. More than anything else I can think of except maybe a car. I know dozens of people with Camel Cash stories they got from their grandparents and shit.
So yeah, the marketing worked insanely well. It helped that the product was addictive, but I really don't think it would have been the same without the pervasiveness of the advertisement and branding.
I fully agree in that it's more of a generational thing and working class association moreso than outright people "falling for advertising" that has been illegal for years that seems to be the angle being peddled a lot in this thread. My smoking habit came from being a cook and that's the only way you can get breaks. I'd never defend smoking but a lot of people here seem to to be using the same late 80s just say no kind of logic towards smoking or acting like adults who made a decision knowing the consequences were manipulated by tobacco ads that were outlawed before most of us were born, smoking is bad and Id prefer not to but the moralizing here is sickening