Recent anti-tobacco radio ads. (Bozeman: fit in, insurance, promotional)

[Timberwolf232]

A Bozeman based radio station has recently been running ads, with a kid (with a CA accent ) talking about how "corporate tobacco" has been targeting teens as customers, and then providing the contact information of an organization to donate money to.

As an ex smoker and also a guy who has been trying to convince a couple family members to quit, I find this interesting...

When is the last time you saw a cigarette or chew ad on TV or in a publication? I'm not trying to make a stand for tobacco companies, I just simply can't remember the last time I saw a tobacco ad. Are they still in magazines?
No ads in the ones I read, and I haven't seen a tobacco ad on TV, a movie preview, or a magazine in what seems like at least a decade or more. Am I missing something?

How exactly is "corporate tobacco" targeting kids in Montana these days?

[happiness is]

CA accent? The ads area actually made by Montana teenagers.
Here is the web site:

REACT MT
reACT! Against Corporate Tobacco - Montana’s teen-led movement against Big Tobacco | Teen Anti Smoking Campaign | Teen Anti Tobacco Campaign

This is a quote from the RJ Reynolds tobacco company:
"Young adult smokers are the only source of replacement smokers. If younger adults turn away from smoking, the industry must decline..."
– RJ Reynolds

The ad campaign is supported by the Montana Dept of Health & Human Services
Here is a page describing a youth conference on tobacco use education
from 2006:
Department of Public Health & Human Services - Anti-Tobacco Program Invites Teens to Attend Summit (http://www.dphhs.mt.gov/newsevents/newsreleases2006/may/antitobaccoprogram.shtml - broken link)

[Timberwolf232]

Originally Posted by happiness is

CA accent? The ads area actually made by Montana teenagers.
Here is the web site:

REACT MT
reACT! Against Corporate Tobacco - Montana’s teen-led movement against Big Tobacco | Teen Anti Smoking Campaign | Teen Anti Tobacco Campaign

This is a quote from the RJ Reynolds tobacco company:
"Young adult smokers are the only source of replacement smokers. If younger adults turn away from smoking, the industry must decline..."
– RJ Reynolds

The ad campaign is supported by the Montana Dept of Health & Human Services
Here is a page describing a youth conference on tobacco use education
from 2006:
Department of Public Health & Human Services - Anti-Tobacco Program Invites Teens to Attend Summit (http://www.dphhs.mt.gov/newsevents/newsreleases2006/may/antitobaccoprogram.shtml - broken link)

The kid in the radio ad does have an accent.. I doubt that he has lived here most of his life, but not a big deal... Like I said, I'm not advocating tobacco use, I just want to know what specifically, these companies are doing, as accused in the ads to Montana kids. (I'm a parent too.)

I looked at the ReACT website and I still can't find anything that these companies are doing to encourage tobacco use to kids in Montana. I don't see anything written there other than opinion articles by kids and a story about one guy living in Montana, originally from Indiana who died due to " a cancer almost always found in smokers". It just makes you wonder why... Could it have been due to something else? : Mine waste, CFC's, RF exposure.. etc ?

I'm not saying that smoking is good for a person, I quit myself not too long ago. However I don't think that all these cancers are necessarily related to smoking. Lots of my relatives have smoked throughout the years and most of them have lived to be 90-100 years old. My Great uncle passed 2 years ago at the age of 104 and smoked WAY more than I ever had. (1.5 to 2 packs a day, filter-less lucky strikes)

It really bugs me that this radio ad says "corporate tobacco is targeting teens in Montana", and I can't find any evidence of that as fact. Personally I haven't seen a new tobacco ad that I can remember while in the US for some time now.

[Reziac]

The RJ Reynolds quote is something like 30 or 40 years old. And Big Tobacco recognised decades ago that it was a declining industry in the U.S., and that there was no profit in fighting that. The vast majority of their tobacco production now goes for export, mainly to Russia, Asia, and Africa, where everyone smokes like stacks. (Europe is pretty durn smokey yet, too.) And in America, they've become highly diverse companies with tobacco as only a small part of their business. Frex, Kraft Foods is one of many subsidiaries of Philip-Morris. RJR has a long list of non-tobacco subsidiaries and spin-offs. And so on. What really keeps them hanging on is U.S. gov't subsidies for tobacco farmers, who therefore can make more money at growing tobacco than other crops. If the subsidy went away, so would American-grown tobacco almost overnight, because tobacco farming is too hard on the soil to be sustainable without being propped up financially. (Last I heard, Africa doesn't yet grow enough to take up the slack. Nor will it ever, because without modern ag methods it's essentially slash-and-burn agriculture.) One could guess that the tobacco subsidy is lobbied for by Big Tobacco, not for U.S. use (no longer a big factor financially) but rather, to let them continue their export business.

As to the cancer issue -- there are always a few exceptions who are either lucky or have extraordinary immune systems. But any repeated irritant (especially mechanical irritants like asbestos fibres, coal dust, or cig smoke) or toxic exposure in sensitive tissues can and will cause cancer (and other problems -- emphysema is essentially black-lung for smokers) in a large percentage of the population. While it's hard to point at a single cause (human bodies and lifestyles being so complex), the interaction and correlation across the human average is pretty durn clear. And insurance companies have noticed too... they don't give a damn who smokes or not, they only care what impacts their bottom line. If behaviour-X is risky, it will be reflected by insurance rates even if society doesn't believe in the risk.

Of course the final effect comes down to your genes but you can't KNOW your risks because for most cancers, we can't yet lay out a gene chart and say "this person is susceptible and this one is not" (tho we CAN do so for a few, mammary cancer is one of them). You can guess based on granddad, who contributed only 25% of your genes. What about the other 75%? do you really know your pedigree that well, including all siblings through at least 4 or 5 generations back**?? not a good bet.

** Speaking from 14 generations' experience as a livestock breeder, I can attest to the importance of knowing that information if you want to have half a clue about your present genetic risks.

.

[Timberwolf232]

Originally Posted by Reziac

Of course the final effect comes down to your genes but you can't KNOW your risks because for most cancers, we can't yet lay out a gene chart and say "this person is susceptible and this one is not" (tho we CAN do so for a few, mammary cancer is one of them). You can guess based on granddad, who contributed only 25% of your genes. What about the other 75%? do you really know your pedigree that well, including all siblings through at least 4 or 5 generations back**?? not a good bet.

** Speaking from 14 generations' experience as a livestock breeder, I can attest to the importance of knowing that information if you want to have half a clue about your present genetic risks.

.

I really have no idea about my own genetic risks.. Way to many unknowns there. I'm not sure I'd want to know either.

All I know is I quit because it's not only expensive, but was taking a toll on me when I go hiking or climb towers at work.

Wasn't as hard as people make it out to be, just lost the desire for the most part. I must be lucky, because I know people who try to quit and end up acting like they are crack addicts of something..

Sometimes the craving does comes back if I have a beer or two, or sometimes if I go for a long drive...

As for the radio ads, the kids says "Corporate tobacco is targeting Montana teens.." I still haven't seen any evidence of that in recent years. I wonder how they get away with running those ads? How are they funded? Where does the donation money go?

I don't know why, but it just peaks my curiosity.

[Reziac]

Originally Posted by Timberwolf232

As for the radio ads, the kids says "Corporate tobacco is targeting Montana teens.." I still haven't seen any evidence of that in recent years. I wonder how they get away with running those ads? How are they funded? Where does the donation money go?

In my observation, how easily someone kicks an addiction is largely based on whether they have an addictive personality. If they do ... it seems easy but they actually go from one addiction to another (that's why so many ex-drunks become bible-thumpers; I know someone who went from an addiction to smoking to an addiction to computer programming, I kid you not!) For more-normal personalities, what you relate seems to be more the case -- mostly just pulling up your socks and resisting the urge. (Oversimplifying I know, but that's the broad brush.) The more you resist a habit, the more broken it gets.

As to "targeting MT teens" -- the problem is there's no rule that you have to state how OLD a quote is, and that RJR quote is downright middle-aged. Tobacco isn't allowed to be advertised in any medium that minors frequent, and that's been the case for a couple decades. I think it's most likely taking advantage of an old old quote to get people in an uproar, so they'll donate to the cause. Most people aren't really aware of the realities of the tobacco industry today, that it's focused on exports, not domestic sales.

The real problem is that the best way to suck well-meant donations out of average folks is to create an uproar even if there's no basis for it, and the conflict/charity industry (which in recent years are moving toward merging into a single force) understands this very well.

[happiness is]

Advertising is not the only way a company promotes products.
The tobacco companies moved to other ways of marketing when they could no longer advertise as they used to.

They now target marketing with promotional products like CD players, tee-shirts, backpacks, and sportswear, specifically aimed at younger people.

Here is a link:
Behind the Smokescreen: Tobacco Marketing to Kids (http://www.tobaccofreekids.org/reports/smokescreen/marketingkids.shtml - broken link)

"The development and marketing of “starter products” with such features as pouches and cherry flavoring have resulted in smokeless tobacco going from a product used primarily by older men to one for which young men comprise the largest portion of the market. Nearly sixteen percent of high school boys are current smokeless tobacco users." 2009

[Reziac]

Makes 'em no different from purveyors of beer and fancy tennis shoes -- ads are good for name-recognition, but they're not usually what generates the actual sale. And late-teens now have enough money that they're a profitable target demographic, no matter what you're hawking.

My observation has been that looking kewl to your peers is the biggest factor with kids and tobacco (or booze and certain drugs, for that matter), and you look kewl by aping whatever you think "rebel" adults do (as contrasted with boring responsible adults, like your parents). That way you get to feel both grown-up and rebellious, very attractive to teens still groping their way toward maturity.

Maybe what we really need are more "rebel" adults who are good role models. That used to mean your unmarried uncle who was footloose and fancy-free (at least in a kid's eyes), but now it usually means someone seen in a movie or on the concert stage.