What Are They Smoking?

“(It) doesn't matter how big the warnings are. You could have cigarettes that were called the warnings. You could have cigarettes that come in a black pack with a skull and a cross bone on the front, called ‘Tumors’ and smokers would be lined up around the block going, "I can't wait to get my hands on these fucking things!” – Denis Leary ‘No Cure for Cancer’

There are certain areas of government hypocrisy that we as a society have come to accept as normal. These subjects are always met with a shake of the head and shrugged shoulders when brought up in conversation; the blatancy so obvious yet the priority not of high enough importance to register anything more than an ‘oh well, what can ya do?’ reaction.

The nanny state is active once again on the issue of tobacco. Canadian cigarette packs, already featuring an assortment of disturbing images and slogans, are going to undergo a redesign that will increase the size of the new, even more explicit images and text warnings.

The officials in charge have chosen to continue down the wrong path by pouring more money into scare tactics, ignoring some of the results from their first effort.

After the first redesign, statistics showed the gruesome pics had little or no effect on the

overall number of smokers. In fact, some studies saw a slight increase. Certainly the rate of teen tobacco puffers wasn’t affected, as the cig packs became something of a fad. Not only did the under-18 crowd get the thrill of obtaining smokes as underage, against-the-law smokers, but they also started collecting and trading the used packs like baseball cards.





The only person more out to lunch than the guy who figured putting scary pictures on cigarette packs would make them less attractive to teens is the guy who decided to make the pictures bigger and badder.

The hypocrisy of the situation is, of course, the fact that the federal government continues to reap the financial tax benefits of allowing smokes to be legal, all the while continuing their misdirected and useless efforts to get people to stop. It’s all for show.

Every so often the government will announce another tax increase on tobacco ‘to help our citizens beat the smoking habit’. Of course we all know this is a lie. The tax collected on a carton of Marlboro’s doesn’t go into some special health care fund, it goes into general revenue.

The government needs that money. They count on it to help pay for all of their pet projects.

If the government was serious about helping smokers not to light up, they would recognize cigarette smoking for what it is: an addiction. One that is more difficult for the average addict to kick than heroin.

The mindset has been, and still continues to be to a degree, that smoking is a habit. It’s like chewing your nails or tapping your pen on the desk. Just chew some gum or stick a patch on your shoulder. It’s mostly a ‘psychological thing’ anyway, right?

When a smoker is beginning the battle to quit and experiences a craving, it is like any other addict ‘jonsing’. You don’t think straight, and often justify the reason to yourself why you are driving to the store. Smokes in Canada may be expensive, and they are, but it is still cheaper to buy a deck of cigs than it is to buy most of the cessation products. In the grip of a craving, that makes it easier to jump off the wagon.

I should state that I am not advocating the criminalization of tobacco. Quite the contrary: you should be free to put into your body whatever you wish as long as it doesn’t affect me or mine.

But if those in charge of the anti-smoking brigade genuinely want to assist smokers in the difficult fight to kick the addiction, then instead of putting cartoonish pictures on cigarette packages, they should put that money into treatment centers, specialists, and other means as they do for hard drugs.

Or at least make it cheaper for tobacco addicts to buy the help they need.