# Nationalize the Tobacco Industry **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 28, 2003, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912 "2003-05-28T00:51:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/41 "2003-05-30T00:04:47Z")
Actually, I’d argue that the VAST majority of the American electorate want to make decisions for others. They just don’t want people making decisions for THEM. Hypocrisy? Yes. Human nature. Even more yes. I think when RT is discussing the limitations on advertising he’s implying that the ability to make decisions is compromised by advertising, especially in the young. Advertising, by its very nature, seeks to impose a control on the buyer. You might say that it’s passive control that can be easily overridden. But it’s not. Advertising (especially in a ‘hot’ medium) can be enormously powerful. Frankly, it’s something I do every single day. But only on adults. I don’t work on Tiger Beat or 16. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/42 "2003-05-30T00:06:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gadarene \* > \*\*I really don’t want my government to be in the business of knowingly preying upon people’s addictions and, y’know, killing them. Thanks but no thanks. \*\* Yeah, it’s not like states are jumping on the gambling bandwagon or nothing. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/43 "2003-05-30T01:22:34Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by xtisme \* > From RTFirefly: > > “I’ll just point out that I’m very much for the freedom of adult, legally competent individuals to make such choices for themselves.” > > To paraphrase from the Princess Bride: I dinna think that that word (‘FOR’) means what you think it means. > > If you are FOR adult freedom, why are you trying to deny that freedom? Huh?? People can’t make free choices about smoking **without** the help of Big Tobacco telling them they should smoke??? Funny, I’d have thought the Ayn Rand crowd would give people more credit than that. Either that, or write such people off as losers, one or the other. Pardon me, but I’m missing something here. > [@](#): > > Your obvious goal, under all your other pious claptrap, is the destruction of the tobacco industry. Ah, the Psychic Hotline contingent arrives. Always good to have a mind-reader on the SDMB. Nah, as **JC** implies, I simply want to get tobacco advertising out of kids’ heads, while they are (by this society’s judgment) too young to make such decisions for themselves. > [@](#): > > Why else Nationalize it?? Regulation is ineffective in this regard over time, since Big Tobacco will find ways around the regs, or flat-out disobey them (as they have been doing already, since the big settlement), or (inevitably) lobby to have the regs undone. Yet at the same time, I don’t want to interfere with any personal freedoms. I don’t want people to be unable to buy cigs; I think it’s essential to do this in a manner that _doesn’t_ deprive any citizens of any freedoms. Seems the simplest way to do all this is to just buy up the tobacco companies, at their fair market value, and have government simply continue letting them do what they do, minus the ads. There are other ways, but they’re all more complex and less effective. I’m a mathematician; I like elegant solutions. > [@](#): > > So, you want to destroy the industry because YOU don’t believe in it I’m not sure what you mean, “believe in it”. I believe in it, in the sense that I believe it exists. I don’t believe the industry is a Good Thing, but few do, and most of those are in its pay, and the rest are surely addled. Selling addictive, deadly drugs with no positive purpose is really Not Good. So no, I don’t believe in the mission, if you want to call it that, of the tobacco industry. Who in his right mind would?? I’m just puzzled by whatever Deep Principle people here seem to feel is violated by the tobacco industry being run by government. I’ve got this mental vision of the larger-than-life Ayn Rand hero standing up to the Oppressive State to keep the right to hook kids on drugs firmly in corporate hands, where it belongs. Yeah, baby! > [@](#): > > …to save us all from ourselves. No, again. I don’t want to save you from you; I can’t do that, and won’t try. There is nothing more futile than trying to rescue someone who doesn’t want to be rescued. But what government _can_ do here is block the seduction and exploitation of children by corporations who are quite willing to start them on a lifelong addiction when they are still underage, in order to perpetuate their revenue stream. If a person did that, it would be evil. If a corporation does that, it’s _still_ evil. (OK, I **do** believe in saving minors from themselves, but that’s the entire logic of a legal minority, and is a subject for another thread.) And I also have this weird notion that adults, too, can better make a free choice without being continuously deluged by propaganda, in the same manner that it’s easier to steer your boat where you want it to go if you’re not buffeted by a strong wind. That hardly constitutes saving people from themselves; rather, it’s giving them a bit of room in which to find themselves, if they so choose. And it’s their choice. > [@](#): > > You have proof that the MAJORITY of Americans feel this way about tobacco and the tobacco companies? You have unbiased polls? [How’s this?](http://tobaccofreekids.org/Script/DisplayPressRelease.php3?Display=248) It’s from 2000, but opinions haven’t changed _that_ much. > [@](#): > > By a three to one margin (75 percent to 22 percent), voters want Congress to pass a bill that would give the FDA the authority to regulate tobacco products, including 61 percent who strongly favor congressional action. This support crosses all geographic, demographic, gender, and political lines, with majorities of voters in every region, age bracket, income group, education level and political party favoring FDA regulation. Even 60 percent of smokers favor congressional action. > > Congressional action is supported by 78 percent of Independents, 77 of Democrats and 70 percent of Republicans (including 65 percent of conservative Republicans). > [@](#): > > You have cites that the MAJORITY of the people that smoke are underage?? Gave the linky earlier; [here it is again](http://tobaccofreekids.org/reports/smokescreen/marketingkids.shtml), with the quote. > [@](#): > > Almost 90 percent of adults who have ever been regular smokers began smoking at or before age 18.[sup]5[/sup] > Footnote: > 5 “Preventing Tobacco Use Among Young People,” A Report of The Surgeon General, 1994 > [@](#): > > “John Galt is a character in an Ayn Rand book. 'Nuff said.” > > Maybe you should of READ the book. I’ve read enough Ayn Rand that I don’t need to read the whole shelf. > [@](#): > > You are almost the same kind of caracature that she protrays of those who want to help their brother…to be their brothers keeper. Just following a Biblical injunction; don’t mind me. There’s also something in the Constitution about we, the people, establishing our government, in part, to “promote the general welfare”. If that bugs ya, feel free to debate a Constitutional amendment to have that phrase lifted. > [@](#): > > RTFirefly…let the people make their own choices. Let them be responsible for their actions. If they CHOOSE to harm themselves, so be it, as long as they don’t harm others by doing so. Funny, that’s exactly what I thought I was making room for people to do. > [@](#): > > Why do you want the GOVERNMENT to be responsible fro the peoples actions…why isn’t it up to the people to be resposible for their own actions? Covered this, too. Once again, damned if I see how I’m getting in the way of that. > [@](#): > > You are looking down the same road that brought us prohibition and this insane war on drugs… By killing off \*advertising??? Please.\* Surely you believe that people can freely choose to smoke without being told to do so by their corporate masters, and that they might even still be able to find their way to the store without a prompting from a billboard, magazine ad, or sticker on a race car. [Speaking of free choice:](http://www.harrisinteractive.com/harris_poll/index.asp?PID=220) > [@](#): > > Most smokers (80%) say they have tried to stop smoking, and have done so more than a few times. On average, people who are still smoking say they have tried to stop, and failed, as many as eight times. They just could not break the habit. Now _there_’s the “free choice” you’re fighting for. > [@](#): > > But thats just my opinion…I could be wrong. Can’t argue with that. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/44 "2003-05-30T01:33:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by John Mace \* > “What, the vast majority of people in the US think it’s a good idea for people to keep smoking, and for tobacco companies to keep working as hard as they can to hook our kids on tobacco?” > > RTF: The vast majority of the people in the US think that adults should be able to make that decision for themselves. They don’t want someone like you to make that decision for them. **John** : _which_ decision? The one about people believing it’s a good idea for people to keep smoking? As my last cite from my previous post shows, even most smokers want the hell out of their habit, but can’t quite get there. Or the one about it being good for tobacco companies to keep getting our kids hooked on tobacco? The polls I cited didn’t have a question with quite that wording, but I’m sure they’re definitive with respect to such a question anyway. > [@](#): > > I’m done with this lame thread. Sorry to provide such lame rebuttals to your arguments. I’ll try to do better next time. ---
**Author:** ![Gadarene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Gadarene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gadarene)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/45 "2003-05-30T13:25:09Z")
**Jonathan:** > [@](#): > > Yeah, it’s not like states are jumping on the gambling bandwagon or nothing. I’d rather not have them do that either, but at least death isn’t a proximate cause of state action in that case. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/46 "2003-05-30T21:22:15Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RTFirefly \* > \*\*I must admit it was easily misinterpreted as being nothing more than a snide remark. \*\* Fair enough. > [@](#): > > \*\* > That would be hard, since I didn’t offer any logic. \*\* Well, you seem to be saying that when enough people think a business is causing a net harm to society, the government should confiscate all of their property, take the business over, and run it into the ground. So, why couldn’t that apply to breweries? Gun manufacturers? etc. > [@](#): > > \*\* > I certainly don’t think it’s modest. Reasonable, yes, due to the specific nature of this one industry. But hardly modest. > > Part of it, of course, is a plain philosophical difference. I believe that there are instances where government can and should act powerfully to promote the common good. You don’t. You may not even believe such a thing as the ‘common good’ is even worth discussing. \*\* That’s a pretty assumption on your part, I think. I’m not opposed to government acting in the common good - but forcibly confiscating the private property of a business because someone has a pet issue against that business - is way beyond the role of government. The tobacco companies are commiting no crime - people voluntarily burn their lungs out. If it were necesary to have legislation involved, I would think that it could be accomplished with less invasiveness with simply a ban on advertising for those companies. Still beyond what I think is acceptable, but less egregiously so. > [@](#): > > \*\* > > Getting children hooked on an extremely addictive drug, and eventually causing them to die at much earlier ages than would have otherwise been the case. > > No, really. The ‘hard work and investment’ you see here takes on a somewhat different moral tinge in most people’s eyes when we’re talking about the tobacco industry. \*\* What about breweries and gun manufacturers? They only make stuff that causes people to get in drunk driving accidents and to shoot toddlers. > [@](#): > > \*\* > Besides, I’m not saying they shouldn’t be rewarded for their efforts; I certainly don’t think it’s reasonable to carve out an exception to the Takings Clause here. Those who have built up the industry would, under my plan, be paid the market value for their investment. \*\* Well, better than nothing. > [@](#): > > \*\* > The deal here is that, like most Americans, I’d like to see fewer and fewer young people get hooked on tobacco over time. I don’t want to punish the tobacco industry; I just want to buy it. I don’t want to punish tobacco users; I want to continue to make the products they’re using available to them, as long as they want/need to keep on using them. > > And I’m aware that some young people will keep on starting to smoke, no matter what we do. \*\* Why not, then, propose an across the board ban on tobacco advertisement? It’s certainly less drastic, and just as effective for your stated goals. > [@](#): > > \*\* > But I want to pull the plug on the forces that profit from new addicts, and will always find new and subtle ways to promote their products to young people, to influence them to light up for the first and second and third time. I can’t think of a better and fairer way than this to rid the country of the tobacco business as what you might call a pro-addiction lobby, perpetually fighting for the right to plant their product in the minds of teenagers. As long as there is a for-profit tobacco industry, it will inevitably be trying to do that. \*\* From a strictly practical perspective - I think that if we let the government handle such things, even with the intent of running them into the ground - they’re going to realize that the businesses give them money and power. When no one is looking, they’re going to make exceptions to their no advertising policy, and such, and try to milk as much money as they can from the business. You can’t wave the carrot of money in front of government and expect them to give that up. It’ll probably become a state-run for profit industry. Of course, they might fuck it up anyway. Government is good at that. > [@](#): > > \*\* > > That may be OK with you, but it’s not OK with me. I have the wacky belief that grownups shouldn’t prey on minors, not just sexually but in general. And that goes double, triple, whatever, when addictive substances are involved, as they are here. \*\* I guess you have a lesser view of human beings as I, and/or a greater view of the influence of advertising. I soaked up as much advertising as anyone, but chose not to smoke. Fundamentally, I think people make a choice when they start smoking. They’re not just programmed like robots by advertising. I don’t think advertising is the primary drive behind kids starting to smoke anyway, but I could be wrong - it’s the idea of smoking being an adult thing to do, having all the cool kids do it, and the peer pressure associated with it. I don’t think advertising would affect that, really. Even if we were to agree that the tobacco companies were preying on kids - I think the minimally invasive solution would be the best, such as an advertising ban. All out confiscation of a business is a very drastic step. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2003, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/47 "2003-05-30T21:44:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RTFirefly \* > \*\*Just following a Biblical injunction; don’t mind me. There’s also something in the Constitution about we, the people, establishing our government, in part, to “promote the general welfare”. If that bugs ya, feel free to debate a Constitutional amendment to have that phrase lifted. \*\* I hate when people use selective quoting of the Constitution in order to try to push an agenda that they probably know is completely antithetical to the spirit of the Constitution. The “promote the general welfare” clause is part of the preamble. It does not do anything to empower the federal government - it is entirely descriptive. There is no provision in the Constitution for the nationalization of businesses - there’s eminent domain, but clearly it doesn’t apply to this sort of situation. The state has no compelling need. Anyway, the nationalization of businesses as a way to engineer society is completely against the spirit of the Constitution. For you to selectively quote what is a powerless phrase as some sort of appeal to authority regarding the Constitution is regrettable. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2003, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/48 "2003-05-31T06:05:57Z")
The Founders felt that protecting the general welfare meant maximum personal freedom. Freedom has a tendency to promote the general welfare on its own. When the state gets bigger, the general welfare tends to suffer, because it infringes on our freedoms. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2003, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/49 "2003-05-31T11:21:20Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SenorBeef \* > Well, you seem to be saying that when enough people think a business is causing a net harm to society, the government should confiscate all of their property, take the business over, and run it into the ground. > > So, why couldn’t that apply to breweries? Gun manufacturers? etc. I dealt with that above: net harm isn’t enough. But the tobacco industry’s nationalization can be _tolerated_ - not _justified_, mind you, but _tolerated_ - because in its fundamental mission, if you will (i.e. what the industry consists of, as opposed to any Good Works individual entities associated with the industry may or may not do with their profits), it does **no** good and **all** harm. The _justification_ is that the tobacco industry is fundamentally driven to try to hook kids on smoking before they reach the age where they’re entitled to make that decision on their own, and realistically, there’s no other way of stopping them from pursuing strategies that are proven successes at hooking minors on tobacco. If the industry were a person, it would have long ago been spending life in prison due to the “three-strikes” laws. I think some of the same moral reasoning might should apply to corporations every once in awhile. > [@](#): > > I’m not opposed to government acting in the common good - but forcibly confiscating the private property of a business because someone has a pet issue against that business - is way beyond the role of government. Actually, it isn’t. Governments don’t need to even give particularly good reasons for using their eminent domain powers; all they need to do is recompense the owners. The current President owes his political career to exactly such a governmental action against property owners in Texas that principally benefited a private group that included him. Whether or not such use of governmental power _should_ be more restricted is a question for another thread. > [@](#): > > The tobacco companies are commiting no crime - people voluntarily burn their lungs out. I covered this earlier. > [@](#): > > If it were necesary to have legislation involved, I would think that it could be accomplished with less invasiveness with simply a ban on advertising for those companies. Still beyond what I think is acceptable, but less egregiously so. That’s a non-starter due to the First Amendment. Especially as the Supremes have, in recent years, pretty much erased the last vestiges of the old distinction between commercial speech and issue-related speech. At this point, you’d need a Constitutional amendment in order to ban tobacco advertising. I guess you have a lesser view of human beings as I, and/or a greater view of the influence of advertising. I soaked up as much advertising as anyone, but chose not to smoke. [/quote] Advertising’s influence on _individuals_ is not predictable, but its effect on _populations_ is. (Where’s Hari Seldon when you need him? :)) > [@](#): > > Fundamentally, I think people make a choice when they start smoking. They’re not just programmed like robots by advertising. Like I said, it’s not a robotic sort of force - the predictable effects are on _populations_, not individuals. And when the population the industry chooses to influence in a predictable manner includes millions of juveniles, who are not entitled to make such choices, that’s the problem. Just like if a 14 year old girl chooses to have sex with me, I’m bound to say no, no matter how free her choice is. She’s got no business making it, and I’ve got no business seducing her into making it. Ditto the tobacco companies’ seduction of minors into trying a very addictive drug. > [@](#): > > I don’t think advertising is the primary drive behind kids starting to smoke anyway, but I could be wrong - it’s the idea of smoking being an adult thing to do, having all the cool kids do it, and the peer pressure associated with it. I don’t think advertising would affect that, really. There’s what you think, and there’s what the research I’ve cited in this thread has demonstrated. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by adaher \* > The Founders felt that protecting the general welfare meant maximum personal freedom. Cite? > [@](#): > > Freedom has a tendency to promote the general welfare on its own. Then they wouldn’t have needed to say anything about the general welfare, just about expanding freedom. I’d also claim that given the relationship between juveniles, tobacco advertising, and tobacco addiction, the nationalization of the tobacco industry would in fact expand the freedom of adult citizens in a real and practical sense. Not all limitations on freedom reside on the pages of statute books. Personally, the freedom I’d be interested in would be the freedom of parents from having corporations seduce their kids into harmful behaviors (or into anything else, really) behind their backs. But that’s just a liberal pipe-dream, I guess. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2003, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912/50 "2003-05-31T15:17:11Z")
People mentionned banning advertisment for tobacco products. Whether or not it would be constitutionnal in the US, anyway, it’s not likely to have much of an effect. Here, this advertisment is banned (except in the shops were cigarettes are sold, which means in France a limited number of licensed outlets, where they can display advertisment. But this very limited in scope, especially since you have to come to buy cigarettes at the first place to see said advertisment and even then with the usual “This is going to kill you” kind of stuff printed on it). And nevertheless, people still smoke. So, I would suspect that would have little positive results. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/nationalize-the-tobacco-industry/177912.md?page=2)