To build and keep brand-name recognition, which something like RC Cola doesn’t have much of. I.e., so you buy a Pepsi instead of a Coke.
I think all the anti-drug advertisements are silly. I don’t see why the government should care if kids are smoking. The Truth ads are especially irritating because they use ill-formed logic (especially the anti-marijuana ads, which fail to draw a very straight line between marijuana use and killing people) and try too hard to appeal to their target audience (being on the outside of society, I find them annoyingly presumptuous). And thanks to Channel One News and their lousy contracts, I get to have my intelligence insulted nearly every day.
I’ve never smoked beyond puffing on one or two at a bar in college.
I hate the smell of smoke in people’s hair and clothes and I think the habit is expensive and stupid.
That said, watching the “Truth” ads make me want to take up smoking. What a bunch of nazis.
Yes, the Florida government (partially), which is especially gauling. IIRC, the Florida Health and Human Services Department helps fund these ads, and basically amounts to government bashing a legal substance.
I have the same reaction to people on this board and in my circle who hate the Truth ads as I do to those who hate what MTV has become. That is, I have to agree with the sentiment, but it doesn’t matter, because neither is supposed to appeal to me. I’m way too old. In fact, any anti-smoking ads aimed at someone my age would be a huge waste of time, since most 27-year-olds either don’t smoke and never will or do smoke and are either comfortable with it or would quit if they could. Better to aim the efforts at primary prevention.
I can see how this appeals to the young rebellious teenager. “These people want you to start smoking. They think you’re stupid. They’re lying to you. You’re playing right into their hands.” I don’t think teenagers care all that much about the short- or long-term health benefits, so this is a good angle.
I was thinking about this just last night. They claimed in one of the new anti-pot ones that there’s four times as much cancer causing something or other in each joint than a cigarette. Since I learned this in a college class, I’d hazzard a guess that it’s close to the truth. However, some people smoke more than 2 packs of cigarettes a day, how many could afford a pot habit that’d be the daily equivalent of that?
I find that talking to someone who is extremely anti-tobacco’ is like talking to a friend of mine who’s a “born-again” Christian. Whenever you point out something that COULD considered a flaw, or just something that doesn’t make much sense in his pitch, all he can say is; “Just because”.
I would imagine it would be the same if talking to a tobacco company rep.