I Don't Believe thetruth

In My Humble Opinion
1

I make a living off of cigarette smokers. I don’t intend to debate the evils of tobacco abuse with die hard smokers here, I’ll deal with you guys in the ICU.

I have a problem with thetruth. They are the people financed by the tobacco companies as part of their punitive damages in the big tobacco settlement.

Tonight at the dinner table, I asked my two teenagers what they thought about thetruth’s ads on TV. Specifically I was interested in their preceptions of the actors that go into the big tobacco companies headquarters to give silly awards and get thrown out. They thought the characters in the ads were kind of nerdy and uncool.

I wonder if there is some sort of subliminal message being sent to our kids that only nerdy, geeks are against smoking?

What about the ad that shows the guy driving around town tossing out eyeballs into the street to the tune of the worst elevator muzac you could possibly imagine? Is there a hidden message telling the little ones the not smoking is associated with bad music and eyeballs in the street?

On the surface, their message seems honorable enough. But does anyone see any dark motives? After all, tobaccco is paying for these ads. Anyone with a psychology background care to comment?

I smell a rat.

2

I believe that some studies have been done, which show that teen smoking is going down. I think that you underestimate the intelligence of teenagers if you think they’ll decide about smoking based solely on perceptions of which characters in commercials are ‘nerdy’. I think that the ads do hit home in a rather powerful way, compared to most of the nosense that passes as commercials. Just my 2 cents.

3

I hate big tobacco a lot, because I just don’t like an industry thriving on killing thousands. It’s not to the point where I alienate smokers, but I dislike the mentality of “someday I’m gonna die anyway,” or “I’m doing my part to solve the population problem” bullshit. If you were doing something for that, you could be smart and finding out how we could live on other planets or build effecient fuel or something like that. Otherwise, you’re just being a jerk about it. But they can kill themselves, fine with me. But I know people who smoke who I sincerely care about. Argh, I’m gonna get so mad. I’m gonna stop here before I rant and rave for another ten pages.

4

Interesting analysis. I’m almost a teenager (I’m 20) and I find the “thetruth” ads pretty good.

The ones that really such are the ones that are explicitly funded by the tobacco companies. I’m sure they researched those to death to make them as ineffective as possible. I mean “Think, don’t smoke”? That’s about as useful as “Just say no.” Or the reasons the kids give for not smoking? Notice that they’re all real lame reasons? Nothing like “I don’t want to get emphesyma and die a horrible painful death” or “I don’t want to spend a bunch of money to smell like my grandfather and get my fingers and teeth stained brown.” Probably the worst one is where the guy lights up a cigarette and the girl looks at him and in her eyes he looks like a fish. Then they flash some corny message like “Think smoking makes you look cool? It doesn’t.” Right. We all know that smokers look like big blue fish.

Ooooh! I take that back. I just thought of an even worse commercial. The one where the kid is asked why he doesn’t smoke and he says something like “I don’t need to smoke to be cool.” Not “Smoking isn’t cool,” just that he doesn’t need to smoke to be cool. In other words, smoking is cool, but certain people can be cool in other ways without smoking. But if you’re coolness-challenged and need a little help… The tobacco companies should be sued again for making such crappy ads when they’re supposed to be trying to reduce teen smoking.

5

I’ve never smoked. Ever.
But TheTruth’s commercials sucked so bad I almost started just out of spite. I’m serious.

I haven’t seen any of their commercials recently, so maybe is was just their first few that were horrible. The entire “Us vs. Them” motif is trite and silly. The commercials give the impression (or at least they try to) that those who know about and can resist the tobacco industry’s tactics are some form of “elite”. That is, the hippest/wisest/best people are those who are wise to how they are being manipulated by the tobacco industry and resist. Anyone who smokes obviously wasn’t strong enough to resist the onslaught of vicious advertising, while on the other hand you too can be cool and reject smoking!

Don’t get me wrong here. Smoking is, IMHO, a very bad thing. It’s just that by using tactics straight from the tobacco industry itself, TheTruth misses the chance to take the high road and let people make their own decision. Make no mistake about it: TheTruth is about getting people to stop smoking. It is not about giving people information so they can make an informed choice on their own.

The commercials are real big on demonizing their enemies, a tactic I’ve never liked. I don’t believe that corporate executives sat around a huge table cackling maniacally at the thought of killing teenagers. Nor do I think that said executives are the spawn of Satan’s and Cthulhu’s unholy coupling. The commercials would have me believe otherwise. No doubt there are members of the tobacco industry who are bad people, but by making evil caricatures out of them, TheTruth undermines itself by losing credibility (IMHO).

Also, the commercials (from what I’ve seen) try to make it clear that any teenager who smokes does so because the tobacco industry coerced them into doing so. Yet, every single teen smoker I’ve spoken to claims to have started smoking as a conscious choice. Yes, some did it to “fit in”. Some were bored. In no case that I know of did anyone start smoking because of advertisement that targeted teenagers (or anyone else).

Finally, for a group called TheTruth, they seem far more interested in rhetoric than in facts. We hear all about the evil, vicious tobacco industry, but the commercials are nearly barren of facts. I don’t expect an encyclopedia listed on the screen for my benefit. What I’d like is to see, instead of seeing ostensibly “cool” teenagers stick-it-to the tobacco industry, a set of truly good (and factual) reasons not to smoke. There are plenty of such reasons to choose from. TheTruth does not have to resort to “Don’t smoke, because that’s what the Evil Tobacco Company wants you to do and you don’t want to be a pawn and have someone control you do you?”

6

I’ve got news for you BlackKnight: nobody consciously does anything because of advertising. If you had a nickel for everyone who saw a McDonalds ad and then said to himself “Hmm. That sounds good. I think I’ll drive out and buy myself a Big Mac right now,” you might have enough to get a Big Mac yourself, no fries, no drink.

Advertising works by instilling an idea in your subconscious so that next time you’re at the supermarket trying to decide between two dozen nearly identical brands of toilet paper, you’ll pick the one whose commercials you remember most, without even realizing that you’re doing so.

All companies–including “Big Tobacco” knows this–and does tons of demographic research indicating what type of advertising is most effective. Evidence shows that the tobacco companies did this sort of research with underage children, unless you believe their nonsense about numerous typos and whatnot. As such, they deserve a large amount of blame for teen smoking, even if there’s not a teen in the country who’ll say “Yeah, I saw a billboard for Camel a few years ago. It looked neat, so I decided to buy a pack of Camel cigarettes and start smoking.”

P.S. It’s been shown that an effective advertising technique is to set up an “enemy,” be it crummy old brand X that doesn’t get those grass stains out of your kids’ jeans, or the evil executives at the tobacco companies. So the “thetruth” people are using a good strategy, regardless of the veracity of their claims. That’s sort of a morally ambiguous issue, and one that could definitely backfire, but it could also prove very successful.

7

Incorrect. If I see an ad for something I like, I generally think, “Hey, there’s something I like.” If it’s something I like sufficiently well, and if I have sufficient funds, I will purchase it. Consciously.

The ad’s effect was to inform me or remind me of the product’s existence.

This may be how advertising is supposed to work. I remain skeptical.

I’m unconvinced that people (in general) buy anything because some ad is influencing their subconscious. When picking out toilet paper, like picking out any product, I look at both price and quality, and keep in mind how I liked a particular brand in the past. That’s it. If a commercial convinces me that Brand X is super-absorbant, then maybe I’ll buy Brand X. Because it’s super-absorbant, not because of their commercial having some subconscious controlling affect on my mind.

Besides, the toilet paper example is a false analogy in this situation. Imagine saying instead that the reason I use toilet paper at all is because of advertisements. This would be a valid analogy, but is quiet obviously false. Or to use a more fair analogy, imagine saying that the reason I buy peanut butter is because of advertisements. This is also incorrect (I buy peanut butter because I like peanut butter).

Seems to me that if nearly everyone says, “I smoked because I wanted to, not because of some advertisement” we should take seriously the idea that they started smoking because they wanted to, and not because of some advertisement. I’m operating on the principle of Occam’s Razor here.

The main problem I have with your suggestion is that it seems to be unfalsifiable. If I buy something and say I bought it because of a conscious choice, you could say that I really bought it because of an ad that influenced my subconscious. I wouldn’t be able to prove you wrong. Of course, you could instead claim that I purchased the product because aliens from the Horse-Head Nebula zapped me with a mind-control ray. I couldn’t prove that wrong either.

IMHO, the most common reason teenagers smoke is because other teenagers smoke, and they want to fit in. Tobacco companies’ ads don’t make children smoke if the children do not already want to smoke; they may have some influence on what those children smoke, if the children decide to smoke. Most likely though the children will smoke whatever their parents or friends smoke. Easier to bum cigs that way.

8

BlackKnight:

I assure you that my theory is indeed falsifiable. Here’s a simple experiment. A large company, such as Coca-Cola, could cease all advertising for a lengthy period of time. I guarantee you that no company will ever do this, because they know that their sales will slip substantially. Former Coke drinkers will switch to other beverages in droves. This, despite the fact that Coke is the same old great beverage it always was.

Now, in case you’re going to dismiss this by saying “Well, maybe the people at Coke know wrong!”, I’ll point out that many, many academic studies about advertising have been done which reveal that people are often influenced by subconscious factors. For example, here’s a study showing that people report shopping longer when they hear familiar music, but that they actually shop longer when they here unfamiliar music. But I’m sure BlackKnight shops for how ever long is necessary to get the products he requires, and is totally unaffected by music, right?

The bottom line is that companies spend billions of dollars every year testing ads to see which will be the most effective, and it’s not just the ones that extol the virtues of the product the best. I understand the desire to think that we’re not influenced by our subconsciouses in any way, shape or form, and that all of our decisions are based upon a completely logical analysis of all relevant factors, but it is simply not the case.

Look at the rise of commercial advertising in the 1920’s. A major theme back then was the idea of social acceptance and etiquette. We see all kinds of ads with slogans like “The Eyes of Men…the Eyes of Women Judge your Loveliness every day” and “Critical Eyes are Sizing you up Right Now.” People started buying all sorts of personal hygiene products that they never felt they needed before. I’m sure that many of them, like BlackKnight, said to themselves “I’m not influenced by the ads. I really do need this product. It’s a good price, good quality, etc.” But, the fact remains that millions of people were buying products that they weren’t buying a decade earlier, so clearly they didn’t need the products, but were instead convinced by the advertising, as much as they hated to admit it.

Hell, look at all the celebrities that companies use to endorse products. Is there anyone out there who consciously says to him/herself “Well, if Britney Spears likes Pepsi, then I guess I’ll go buy some”? Of course not! (Well, maybe a handful of highly suggestible infatuated teenagers, but I digress.) Is there anyone out there who hasn’t heard of Pepsi? Nope. So why does Pepsi give Britney millions to sell their product? It’s because they know that doing so will increase or at least maintain sales.

The evidence that advertising works is overwhelming. Good ad campaigns skyrocket sales, even if it’s a product that everybody has already heard of like Burger King, Budweiser, or Isuzu. Bad advertising diminishes sales. This, despite the fact that the product is unchanged. Companies invest much time and money in this. Denying that one is affected by advertising is vaguely reminscent of creations insisting that they couldn’t possibly be descended from apes, no matter what the experts say.

9

Those ads are pretty bad, but the worst is this one ad against drugs. The one where the kid comes into the garage, and passes around a joint but nobody takes it, but they’re having the kind of conversation you can only have when you’re high. “Do you have an innie or an outie?” “Would you rather go naked to school or eat a maggot-filled pie?” Yeah. Sure. Obviously, they’re way too high already and that’s why they’re passing on the joint.

10

http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~taflinge/advant.html

“This is the text to Taking ADvantage, a book on the physical and cultural evolution of human beings, how that evolution has affected human subconscious processing of stimuli, and how advertising takes advantage (thus the title) of that processing by creating stimuli.”

From the conclusion:
“Our intelligence is imperfect, surely, and newly arisen; the ease with which it can be sweet-talked, overwhelmed, or subverted by other hardwired propensities – sometimes themselves disguised as the cool light of reason – is worrisome.”

11

Well, leaving the issue of efficacy for others, you can count me in the “hate smoking and hate the ads” camp. Remember the first few ads they did? 'Splode, the exploding soft drink, and a few others? Those were good ads. I remember the impact of the first time I saw them. They were entertaining, funny, and got their point across very well.

I agree that the tactic of demonizing the industry is a poor one. The current ads make the antismoking camp out to be rabid zealots. Kind of a big turnoff, if you ask me.