About a decade ago, the federal Parliament enacted restrictions on tobacco adverts in Canada. The tobacco companies challenged the constitutionality of the law, alleging it violated their freedom of commercial expression.
Earlier this week, the SCC unanimously dismissed the tobacco companies’ challenge and upheld the law in its entirety.
I think that it only applys to Canadian published entities , but for magazines that are published in the US or abroad , they have entire pages devoted to one brand of smokes or another.
I think it’s a good thing. I was glad to see the SCC not bowing to weaselling when the evidence overwhelmingly says that cigarettes are pure, unadulterated evil that would never be approved by Health Canada if they were invented today.
ETA: Forgot to link that opinion to advertising. I think allowing advertising of pure, unadulterated evil is a bad thing, advertising being as powerful an influence as it is.
I’m inclined towards PArentalAdvisory’s position. featherlou is correct in that cigarettes are horrible, but they are in fact legal products, and the government’s position on the matter is almost ludicrously hypocritical so I’m quite at a loss to see any moral superiority held by Parliament here.
The ban on cigarette avertising is for the most part based on a definition of “false, misleading and deceptive” promition that the Supreme Court has interpreted in an extremely twisted manner; they’re saying, as near as I can tell from this, that advertising cigarettes as being cool - which is, basically, what all cigarette advertising is - is inherently deceptive. I’m not sure how that judgment can be fairly made, because to many people cigarettes ARE cool. The Supre eCourt is holding that tobacco advertising does in fact “Create an erroneous impression of the health effects” of tobacco, but provides no explanation as for why that is; perhaps the government provided that evidence in court, but I sure don’t see it. When did cigarette ads come out and actually say “Hey, this stuff is good for you!” Maybe 40 years ago, but today that’s simply not the case. In fact, in this decision the SCC speciically refers to the regulation that a certain percentage of the advertisement be dedicated to health warnings - which directly contradicts the notion that tobacco ads are deceiving. Unless the top half says “Smoke Players, and by the way, the health warning’s a lie” how can you say an ad that’s half a health warning is at all deceiving with regards to the health effects of tobacco? It’s preposterous.
Evil and unhealthy or not, they are legal products and this is a free country. The SC has really bent a lot of definitions and legal principles here to make a politically popular decision, and in every case simply said “Well, it’s all justified under section 1 because it’s important to stop people from smoking.”
The government’s (not the court’s) position is inherently absurd; they are arguing on one hand that they should be allow to prohibit free expression because it’s important to stop smoking, and on the other hand they are active participants in the tobacco industry, happily raking in millions in tax revenues and providing tobacco farmers with the various benefits affording agricultural enterprises in this country.
I hate smoking. I’ve never smoked and I think smoking is filthy and gross. I won’t allow it in my home and I think most smokers are dirty and smelly. But if it’s legal it’s legal. It’s ridiculous to allow someone to sell something but say they can’t advertise it.
Personally, I’m always glad when the SCC shows a certain grounding in reality, and I’m especially happy when their judgments reduce the chance of me having to re-draft the Smoke-Free Ontario Act.
So the supreme judgement had it have gone to the tobbacco companies would have made the du maurier jazz festival and the winston cup car race legal again.