# thetruth.com - Go F\*\*\* yourselves!!!! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 28, 2002, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304 "2002-06-28T01:09:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![beagledave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@beagledave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beagledave)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/41 "2002-06-28T15:47:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by airdisc \* > \*\*As much as I hate smoking, I have to agree. The Truth ads are fucking obnoxious, and I’m sure if some independent group did a study, they’d find a rise in smoking since the airing of those ads. > \*\* Teen smoking has gone down in the past few years…I doubt you’d find any study that would support your assertion \*\* > [@](#): > > Although I do suspect that the tobacco companies are making these ads as horrible as possible, just to make non-smoking look bad. \*\* Ummm you **do** know that the tobacco companies did **not** make the “truth” ads, right? ---
**Author:** ![airdisc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e19adc/32.png) [@airdisc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/airdisc)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/42 "2002-06-28T16:32:02Z")
> [@](#): > > Ummm you do know that the tobacco companies did not make the “truth” ads, right? Well, I know that there were some anti-smoking commercials made by tobacco companies. Probably that’s what I was thinking of. But the reason I thought the Truth commercials were was that no genuine anti-smoking group would make commercials so damn irritating. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/43 "2002-06-28T16:53:32Z")
Airdisc, a couple points: 1. If you’re not a teenager, you’re not the target demographic. 2. Are the collect-call ads designed by anti-collect-call companies? Because I have trouble imagining ads more annoying than collect-call ads. A year or two ago, I heard an NPR report about how tobacco companies were trying to shut down the Truth campaign, because they said it violated the terms of the tobacco settlement. According to them, the settlement forbade funding any educational campaign that vilified tobacco companies or tobacco executives, and the Truth campaign obviously vilifies them. It requires a pretty big conspiracy theory to claim that the tobacco companies are delighted by this apparently effective ad campaign that they’ve threatened legal action against and that portrays them as utter villains. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![pepperlandgirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f17d59/32.png) [@pepperlandgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pepperlandgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/44 "2002-06-28T17:38:21Z")
Well, I am technically a teenager, and was the target audience when these ads started. They still annoyed the fuck out of me, and like others, I was _this_ close to starting, just to be contrary. I didn’t because I couldn’t afford an addiction… Does anybody else think it would be immensely satisfying to take a long drag off of a cigar and then blow it slowly, and directly, into that rat’s face? ---
**Author:** ![lenin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3bc359/32.png) [@lenin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lenin)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/45 "2002-06-28T17:51:05Z")
I remember awhiles back they used to have ads where they would actually harass the workers of the Tobacco company. I deeply pitied the man who came in through the doors and was told “Hey, tobacco contains some components that are also in dog urine, would you like a big jar of dog urine?” ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/46 "2002-06-28T18:20:55Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by beagledave \* > \*\* > Teen smoking has gone down in the past few years…I doubt you’d find any study that would support your assertion > \*\* My pet theory is that it has more to do with a general knowledge that smoking is bad, not Truth\*'s annoying commercials. I doubt there is a way to accurately measure where children learn of smoking’s problems, thus i can’t prove anything :(, but i’d wager dollars to donuts they all knew before they saw a dying rat on their TV. If Truth\* wants to self-delude itself into thinking they are telling people something new, more power to them, but they are living a lie (ironic for a group called Truth\*, eh?) ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/47 "2002-06-28T19:01:20Z")
Again, they’re not telling anyone anything new: they’re selling an image. The image is this: -Smokers=dumbass corporate tools -Antismokers=cool hip edgy xtreme pranking asskickers Whether they’re generally effective at selling this image is, I think, the best measure of their efficacy that we’re likely to get. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![El\_Elvis\_Rojo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@El\_Elvis\_Rojo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Elvis_Rojo)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/48 "2002-06-28T19:42:12Z")
Now, just out of curiosity, didn’t George Burns smoke about 8 cigars a day before he died around the age of **98**. EVERYTHING out there can kill you. Some friends told me at a barbecue that it was recently reported that fried foods can cause cancer. So, no more potato chips because they’ll kill ya. Eating anything, drinking anything, driving, even fucking breathing the air can fill your body with so many fucking pollutants that somewhere down the line you could possibly maybe kinda sorta get something bad. So, I guess we should all live in bubbles then, eh? I don’t smoke. I occassionaly have a cigar or pretend to smoke for the fuck of it, but it doesn’t bother me. And everyone I know understands the consequences of smoking. Why do people smoke? Eh, they just do. They know it can lead to serious problems down the line, but they choose to do it anyway, because they enjoy it and they don’t bother to live their entire lives in fear of every little thing out there that could possibly kill you. These ads are intrusive, abusive, and just plain dumb. I admit, one of their first ones with the bodybags pilled up outside the tobacco company was kinda neat, just because I could imagine being there and seeing this great big pile of bodybags. The image was stunning, but the message was dull. Everything else they’ve done is shit, and I agree that if any of them tried pulling that shit on a one to one basis with a smoker out in public, they’d get their asses beat, and well deservingly so. ---
**Author:** ![beagledave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6de8d8/32.png) [@beagledave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beagledave)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/49 "2002-06-28T21:40:07Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Tars Tarkas \* > \*\* > > My pet theory is that it has more to do with a general knowledge that smoking is bad, not Truth\*'s annoying commercials. > \*\* The “knowledge” that smoking is “bad” has been around for decades…teen smoking (self reported…that is) was still at 36.4% five years ago (see [here](http://www.cdc.gov/od/oc/media/pressrel/r020516.htm) …it’s now down around 28%. Whether that is attributable to advertising (by either the government or “truth”) or other factors like cig price increase, is up for debate…but the pre-existing “knowledge” didn’t really make a dent in the trend for awhile. \*\* > [@](#): > > I doubt there is a way to accurately measure where children learn of smoking’s problems, thus i can’t prove anything :(, but i’d wager dollars to donuts they all knew before they saw a dying rat on their TV. > \*\* Well of course teens (warning, big generalization here) are a cohort of individuals who tend not to be concerned about their own mortality. They may “know” that certain behaviors are “bad”, but still engage in them…more so, it seems, then when they get older. The question becomes, if society wants to change that (and of course some folks think that government/society should not be in the business of doing that), how do you convey a message to this kind of consumer? I suspect that the Phillip Morris/Nancy Reagan “just say no” method doesn’t work that well. \*\* > [@](#): > > If Truth\* wants to self-delude itself into thinking they are telling people something new, more power to them, but they are living a lie (ironic for a group called Truth\*, eh?) \*\* I think “truth” is trying (as Daniel suggested) to portray the tobacco industry as some kind of “uncool” industry run by corrupt old white businessmen trying to manipulate new smokers. There is a fair amount of hyperbole in their efforts, but at least some grain of truth also. **That** tactic is a realtively new one, in terms of **advertising**. Can you think of any other **advertising** campaign previous to this that took the same approach? So in that regard, they are trying something “new”. Again…whether they are being ethical in their approach is a different debate. ---
**Author:** ![whatami](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/85f322/32.png) [@whatami](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whatami)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/50 "2002-06-28T23:00:44Z")
I was just over at [thetruth.com](http://thetruth.com) looking around their website. Hey, what’s this? It’s a section on how to get involved in truth\*. Let’s see what it has to say! > [@](#): > > Forget grades and SATs – that stuff’s for suckers. The ticket to A-list schools these days is extra-curric’s. So if you’re not cut out for the glee club (or even if you are) try following truth’s three-step plan to a top-notch education. The three step plan includes putting stickers on things and then putting that down on your college app. Yeah. Colleges don’t care about grades or the SATs anymore. Shit, why even go to school. Just spend 18 years working on truth\* stuff and you’ll be sure to get into a good college, they’ll probably give you a scholarship! They may even PAY YOU to go! I’d like to disect the entire website and see how many falsehoods are on there. goddamn ignorant assholes ---
**Author:** ![whatami](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/85f322/32.png) [@whatami](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whatami)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/51 "2002-06-28T23:02:17Z")
I was just over at [thetruth.com](http://thetruth.com) looking around their website. Hey, what’s this? It’s a section on how to get involved in truth\*. Let’s see what it has to say! > [@](#): > > Forget grades and SATs – that stuff’s for suckers. The ticket to A-list schools these days is extra-curric’s. So if you’re not cut out for the glee club (or even if you are) try following truth’s three-step plan to a top-notch education. > > 1. Check out this section. > 2. Download some cool stickers and stuff. > 3. Describe in detail your extensive anti-tobacco industry activism on the Ivy League application of your choice. Be sure to use lots of strong, active verbs that begin with “i” – like initiated, instigated and impowered. Smart admissions guys eat that up. > > Best of luck. And if the plan doesn’t work for you just remember: it’s all politics. Yeah. Colleges don’t care about grades or the SATs anymore. Shit, why even go to school. Just spend 18 years working on truth\* stuff and you’ll be sure to get into a good college, they’ll probably give you a scholarship! They may even PAY YOU to go! I’d like to disect the entire website and see how many falsehoods are on there. but, I’m not that good… goddamn ignorant assholes ---
**Author:** ![whatami](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/85f322/32.png) [@whatami](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whatami)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/52 "2002-06-28T23:10:46Z")
Shit, is it just me or is **impower** really spelled **empower** … ---
**Author:** ![robertliguori](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/46a35a/32.png) [@robertliguori](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robertliguori)\ **Post date:** [June 29, 2002, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/53 "2002-06-29T03:14:42Z")
Hmm. Don’t know about most colleges, but I got into Virginia Tech with a GPA 3.76, SATs 1480, and 1 extracurricular activity. Which was also my 1 job. On the other hand, my friend with community service (ptui), SCA, and a SAT in the 1200 got in early admission. Oh, yeah, the OP. Really, people – is there anyone out there who didn’t know tobacco was bad for you? Why the smeg couldn’t the tobacco companies have said all along, “Yeah, we’re selling something that will kill you. So is McDonalds. So is Ford. You don’t like it, don’t buy it. Now, bugger off.” —Lizard, [www.mrlizard.com](http://www.mrlizard.com) ---
**Author:** ![E72521](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dbc845/32.png) [@E72521](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E72521)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2002, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/54 "2002-06-30T22:38:31Z")
I think you guys are way out of line here. The Truth ads are in fact well thought out and right on target. My kids were watching TV and a Truth ad came on. It showed a couple of guys in a pickup truck out in the middle of nowhere in some third world pus hole, dismantleing a Marlboro billboard. The narrator tells us that they’re taking it down while the President of the United States is in town. Then they show the two guys erecting the billboard after Limo 1 whizzes by. Twice they show full frontal Marlboro advertising on **Nicklefuckinlodeon**. You can’t do that within a mile of a fucking school yard, but go right ahead and place a thirty second Marlboro spot smack dab in the middle of Sponge Bob, and tell us your looking out for my kid’s best interests. So I guess it comes down to how you define “crappy” advertising. I think the piss drinking turd licking sister fuckers at Phillip Morris really are on to something. They beat the system and they’re doing it right under the States’ Attorneys General’s noses. I will bet anything that this ad recruits more smokers than it deters. And that’s good fucking business. I wouldn’t be surprised if the nanococks at Phillip Morris figured out a way of writing the expense of the ads off of their taxes. And fuck Nickelodeon and The Cartoon Channel for taking money indirectly from the tobacco companies and airing this subliminal fucking propaganda. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2002, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/55 "2002-06-30T23:05:06Z")
I hate smoking, and I’d love to personally kick the asses of all the tobacco executives for being the lying, soulless, criminal drug-pushing pieces of shit they are… But I hate those ads. Nobody likes to be preached at by undergrads. ---
**Author:** ![Critical1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/3e96dc/32.png) [@Critical1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Critical1)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2002, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/56 "2002-06-30T23:07:04Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Kaotic Newtral \* > \*\*I’m on your side **Hail Ants** those fuckers should die. I do smoke, I’ve smoked for a long time and those ads don’t make me want to stop, they make me want to grab one of those sumbitches and stick a carton of smokes up each of their asses. \*\* my question here is how many asses does ONE of them sumbitches have? purely for future reference dontcha know. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2002, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/57 "2002-07-01T02:53:49Z")
truth™ does have its enemies. Believe it or not, one of them is one of the companies that gives them some of the money in the first place. > [@](#): > > It has become abundantly clear that ALF’s “truth” campaign is not about conveying the truth about tobacco products to the American public, so much as vilifying and personally attacking tobacco companies and their employees…in large part the message [of “truth”]…is that the participating manufacturers [i.e., participating in the settlement of the tobacco lawsuit] and their executives are dishonest…malicious, or otherwise unscrupulous. This is precisely what is forbidden in [the agreement]… Letter from the Lorillard Tobacco Corporation ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2002, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/58 "2002-07-01T03:00:06Z")
**E72521** seems to believe the tobacco companies furnish these ads themselves. They don’t. Well, they do in a way, but they’re done by the ad agency working for ALF, not Philip Morris. Philip Morris does have their own anti-smoking campaign, but it doesn’t mention their famous products by name-even though for some reason, they have to put a Surgeon General’s warning on them. ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2002, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/59 "2002-07-01T03:05:55Z")
Wow. [According to ALF](http://www.americanlegacy.org/section.asp?Page=41&id=63), the _American Journal of Public Health_ found out that whereas the truth™\* campaign makes children want to smoke less, Philip Morris’ “Think. Don’t Smoke” campaign makes children want to smoke _more_. Ironically, both ALF and Philip Morris bought ad time during the Super Bowl this year. [sub]\*The name of the campaign, truth™, is uncapitalized[/sub] ---
**Author:** ![Tars\_Tarkas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Tars\_Tarkas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tars_Tarkas)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2002, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304/60 "2002-07-01T03:31:37Z")
> [@](#): > > Ironically, both ALF and Philip Morris bought ad time during the Super Bowl this year. Yes, but ALF and his 10-10 ads are…what? Different ALF? nevermind… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/thetruth-com-go-f-yourselves/116304.md?page=4)