Pitting the "Living with a hole in your throat" anti-smoking ads.

[Anne Neville]

Originally Posted by Makeitstop

I've met these types of people before. It's even more disturbing in person to see it.

Well, then, it sounds like you'd rather see these people on TV than in real life.

The CDC says these ads have prompted a huge increase in calls to their smoking cessation hotline and website. Calls to the hotline have doubled, and visits to their website have tripled, according to that data. It sounds like the ads are making an impression on smokers. According to this CNN story, the ads are primarily targeted at adult smokers. I suspect adult smokers do watch CNN, and do watch other shows that you watch.

Originally Posted by carnivorousplant

I cannot help but wonder how smoking causes one to lose both legs, or be immobile.

The print version of the ad with the guy who lost both legs said he had Buerger's disease, which is strongly associated with tobacco use. Most people who get Buerger's disease are tobacco users (smokers or users of smokeless tobacco).

[Makeitstop]

Originally Posted by Anne Neville

Well, then, it sounds like you'd rather see these people on TV than in real life.

I'd rather the diseases that cause such disabilities didn't happen, so that I didn't see them at all. I don't argue against the idea that these ads work(or that it is good that they do). I just wish I wasn't exposed to them. Hence why I made a pit thread. Frustrations vented. I feel a lot better. Still wish that they weren't on TV. But as life has said to me on numerous occasions: "Tough".

[Otara]

As people have pointed out they're trying to evoke disgust rather than fear. And they need to work pretty hard at it, because one of the primary selling points has become its cool factor - making it scary has been counter-productive at times, particularly with youth.

Fear of death can make something desirable or attractive - 'Im a risk taker' - disgust rarely does. They're trying to kill off the number one thing that makes them attractive to younger people, and over the years its been pretty effective.

Just a bit rough on those of us who are already pretty clear on the topic.

Otara

[Anne Neville]

Originally Posted by Makeitstop

I'd rather the diseases that cause such disabilities didn't happen, so that I didn't see them at all

So do I. And I wish people didn't die from smoking-related illnesses. Mr. Neville's great-aunt, who was a Holocaust survivor, died a couple of years ago from lung cancer. Her brother-in-law, Mr. Neville's grandfather, also died of lung cancer last year. He never smoked, AFAIK, but I'm quite sure he was exposed to passive smoke (and not just from her). He fought in WWII and was at D-Day. Smoking managed to do to at least one of them (and possibly both) what the Nazis tried and failed to do.

[Makeitstop]

Originally Posted by Otara

As people have pointed out they're trying to evoke disgust rather than fear. And they need to work pretty hard at it, because one of the primary selling points has become its cool factor - making it scary has been counter-productive at times, particularly with youth.

Fear of death can make something desirable or attractive - 'Im a risk taker' - disgust rarely does. They're trying to kill off the number one thing that makes them attractive to younger people, and over the years its been pretty effective.

Just a bit rough on those of us who are already pretty clear on the topic.

Otara

Never thought of it that way before. I got mostly the fear, with a side of disgust. And most of the smokers I know are fully addicted, so they smoke not necesarily becasue the want to, but becasue they have to(in their heads, mosly. But there are physiological reasons as well).

But those types of smokers aren't the only ones the ads are trying to reach. They're trying to reach the types who, as you say, are attracted to the dangers of smoking. Didn't think about that type, because I don't really know anyone like that. Completely missed that perspective.

............I did put this thread in the Pit, right? What are we doing having an honest discussion?

[Anne Neville]

Originally Posted by Makeitstop

But those types of smokers aren't the only ones the ads are trying to reach. They're trying to reach the types who, as you say, are attracted to the dangers of smoking. Didn't think about that type, because I don't really know anyone like that. Completely missed that perspective.

Incomprehensible as it is to some of us, risk makes things more attractive, not less, to some people. Intellectually, I know these people exist. I know I will never really understand them, though.

I suspect it does depend on "risk of what," though, at least for some of them.

[What the .... ?!?!]

Your tax dollars at work.........

[Cicero]

The anti smoking ads don't bother me as much as the ads about getting a lasting hard on.

In the ads they employ the most wooden actor (ha ha) and some guy dressed as the slow down police- it is really pathetic. At least they aren't on the radio anymore. I'd try and listen to a race and I'd get an ad about making a boner last.

[digs]

If you've QUIT smoking, can't you get a special pass that says you don't have to watch anti-smoking ads?

I've somehow managed to avert my eyes every single time those ads have come on... so I've heard them, but not seen them.

[jtgain]

Originally Posted by Anne Neville

So do I. And I wish people didn't die from smoking-related illnesses. Mr. Neville's great-aunt, who was a Holocaust survivor, died a couple of years ago from lung cancer. Her brother-in-law, Mr. Neville's grandfather, also died of lung cancer last year. He never smoked, AFAIK, but I'm quite sure he was exposed to passive smoke (and not just from her). He fought in WWII and was at D-Day. Smoking managed to do to at least one of them (and possibly both) what the Nazis tried and failed to do.

I don't discount the physical effects of smoking, but surely 65 years of time also contributed to their deaths. Many WWII vets have died in the intervening years from causes unrelated to smoking, and continue to die.

[gamerunknown]

Originally Posted by What the ... ?!?!

Your tax dollars at work...

To put it in perspective, more people die each year in the US from lung cancer than are run over, murdered, killed iatrogenically, suffer from lack of healthcare and were killed in 9/11 combined. Assuming smoking only contributed half of those deaths and one merely has to subtract the "iatrogenic" causes for that statement to be true - and it doesn't even consider the contribution smoking has to heart disease and other illnesses.

[BigT]

Originally Posted by Guinastasia

Aren't you the one always telling people they should have respect for others? So why are you defending the OP for calling the woman in the commercial "gross"?

Good question. The answer is because they willingly appeared on TV in order to give the message that they are gross. Just like when someone goes around throwing insults at people, they don't get to whine when people throw them back. The people communicated that finding them gross is acceptable.

Plus I will always have a problem with people who intentionally try to make people feel bad unless they are defending themselves or someone else against the same sort of thing. Smokers have not hurt you, so this sort of tactic should be off limits.

I might make an exception if smoking were this horrible problem that nothing else was working on. But it's not. The number of smokers is dramatically falling. The culture as a whole thinks that smoking is bad. Very few people are smoking because they think it is cool, so there's no reason to combat that idea. The tactics from before work. Use them, don't invent another tactic that causes more distress.

If they want to keep the crap that was going as it was when I was a kid, fine. Update the stuff that was made before. But don't hit below the belt like this. Not when it's completely unnecessary.

[F. U. Shakespeare]

"You Don't Always Die from Tobacco" (the one with the two cowboys singing in the street) is a hideously catchy one-note song. I have replayed it many times.

[MOIDALIZE]

She puts on her wig, inserts her voice box, and heads to her job at the abused animal shelter filming quivering dogs in slo-mo while Sarah McLachlan plays.

[WhyNot]

Originally Posted by BigT

The number of smokers is dramatically falling.

No, it's not. Not anymore. It was dramatically falling, yes. But then it got to around 20%, and we can't seem to move it down much, or quickly, from there. http://articles.latimes.com/2010/sep...oking-20100908

Very few people are smoking because they think it is cool, so there's no reason to combat that idea.

Do you have a cite for that?

The tactics from before work. Use them, don't invent another tactic that causes more distress.

If they want to keep the crap that was going as it was when I was a kid, fine. Update the stuff that was made before. But don't hit below the belt like this. Not when it's completely unnecessary.

I think this is an update of "crap that was going as it was" when I was a kid. This campaign looks like a direct descendent of Smoking Is Very Glamorous, which was put out in 1972, and on the walls of many of my classrooms in the 80's.

[What the .... ?!?!]

Originally Posted by gamerunknown

To put it in perspective, more people die each year in the US from lung cancer than are run over, murdered, killed iatrogenically, suffer from lack of healthcare and were killed in 9/11 combined. Assuming smoking only contributed half of those deaths and one merely has to subtract the "iatrogenic" causes for that statement to be true - and it doesn't even consider the contribution smoking has to heart disease and other illnesses.

I don't care for smokers or smoking either .... I just want the government out of their bedroom and any other room they might be smoking in.

[Tethered Kite]

Originally Posted by MOIDALIZE

She puts on her wig, inserts her voice box, and heads to her job at the abused animal shelter filming quivering dogs in slo-mo while Sarah McLachlan plays.

Oh, gallows chuckles here. I was thinking the same thing.

At least she is sharing her ailment of her own volition. These third world spots and mailings of children with birth defects/famine and tortured animals strike me as the worst exploitation. I think of them as victim porn.

Lest I'm thought heartless, I spend time weekly in nursing homes with sorely afflicted and dying people. Mainly I ask for people who never have any vistors.

And that relates to the OP. When I was a small child it was more common to see all manner of physical disabilities on the street. Although there were no Americans with Disabilities Act or education in the public schools to accept them as equals they were THERE. And it was just taken for granted that some people had misfortune.

Now, many are safely tucked away in care facilities, hospices and nursing homes and we don't have to be reminded so often that life is sometimes ugly and unfair.

So many people spend their last years alone and then die with strangers taking care of them I can't help but wonder if people are repulsed by visiting. Or afraid.

So, in a sense, I see that woman, disfigured by cancer and sense a certain brave defiance in her act of revelation.