# Will ugly pics on cigarette packs make you stop? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 21, 2011, 8:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342 "2011-06-21T20:56:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Duke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e8c25b/32.png) [@Duke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duke)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/21 "2011-06-22T14:26:05Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > We’ve had those in France for a while. One thing I find particularly funny is that, alongside the gruesome shock shots of meth mouthes, tar-ridden lungs and the like and the helpful little messages like “smokers die sooner”, there’s one that says “smoking can cause impotence & decrease libido”. > You know, just in case the threat of gruesome painful death wasn’t scary enough 🙂 Having spent a lot of time in France, I’m fairly certain that the threat of impotence is going to be far scarier to a good number of Frenchmen than the threat of painful death… ---
**Author:** ![Minnie\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4bbf92/32.png) [@Minnie\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Minnie_Luna)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/22 "2011-06-22T15:14:47Z")
I smoked from age 18 to 34. I quit when I was ready to quit. I started smoking in '94, so it’s not like I didn’t know what I was doing was bad for me. I don’t think adding the graphic pics on the packs would have stopped me any sooner. When I started smoking in '94, you could go to 7-11 or Wawa and get a pack of Marlboro Lights for $2.00, $1.75 if they were on special. I remember going around the floor of my dorm and asking who needed smokes and collecting $2 from those wanting them. I always said I would quit if the pack cost $3, then $4, then $5. I remember paying $5.75 for Parliament Lights at the Newstand outside my building before quitting. I think I paid close to $8-9 for a pack in NYC quite a few years ago. ---
**Author:** ![Swords\_to\_Plowshares](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b38774/32.png) [@Swords\_to\_Plowshares](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Swords_to_Plowshares)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/23 "2011-06-22T15:59:00Z")
I am on my phone so I can’t provide the cite, but an article I read said the images alone would decrease smokers by 231,000 in the US over time. Sounds like a lot but there are 40 million or so smokers right now. Still, that number is significant for such an inexpensive change. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/24 "2011-06-22T16:14:23Z")
> [@Duke](#): > > Having spent a lot of time in France, I’m fairly certain that the threat of impotence is going to be far scarier to a good number of Frenchmen than the threat of painful death… Of course it is (and not just to Frenchmen 😉 ). I’m just tickled by the fact that it is. Call it item #7812 on the “We humans are really messed in the head, aren’t we ?” list 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/25 "2011-06-22T16:42:10Z")
> [@Minnie\_Luna](#): > > I smoked from age 18 to 34. I quit when I was ready to quit. I started smoking in '94, so it’s not like I didn’t know what I was doing was bad for me. I don’t think adding the graphic pics on the packs would have stopped me any sooner. > > When I started smoking in '94, you could go to 7-11 or Wawa and get a pack of Marlboro Lights for $2.00, $1.75 if they were on special. I remember going around the floor of my dorm and asking who needed smokes and collecting $2 from those wanting them. I always said I would quit if the pack cost $3, then $4, then $5. I remember paying $5.75 for Parliament Lights at the Newstand outside my building before quitting. I think I paid close to $8-9 for a pack in NYC quite a few years ago. They’re over £7 now here, which is, what, $12-$13? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/26 "2011-06-22T16:58:41Z")
Smokes were like 75 cents a pack when I started. I was annoyed when they went over a buck. Cigarette vending machines were ubiquitous and easily accessible for kids. Cartons and loose packs were displayed right out on the shelves in grocery stores. You could smoke in most stores. You could smoke on the bus. On my first try at college in 1984, you could smoke in college classrooms (they had ashtrays built into the desks), and i had teachers who smoked while they were lecturing. Everybody knew smoking was bad for you, and it made no difference. Addiction is addiction. What finally stopped me wasn’t the increasingly strident warnings, or the commercials or gross pictures or any of the other propaganda. What sealed it for me was the prices. It just got to be too expensive a habit for me. I don’t think these kinds of pictures stop anybody from smoking.Smokers have seen them all. I had a grandmother who died from smoking and it didn’t stop me. Addiction is addiction. The images might possibly stop kids from _starting_, but I’m not even sure about that. I seem to remember that when this was first tried in Canada (years ago, like back in the 90’s), it actually had the effect of making kids want to collect all the pictures, and were even trading them like baseball cards. ---
**Author:** ![Lionne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Lionne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lionne)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/27 "2011-06-22T17:26:35Z")
I’m reminded of the Denis Leary skit from “No Cure for Cancer” [QUOTE=Denis Leary] It doesn’t matter how big the warnings on the cigarettes are; you could have a black pack, with a skull and crossbones on the front, called TUMORS, and smokers would be lined up around the block going, “I can’t wait to get my hands on these fucking things! I bet ya get a tumor as soon as you light up!” [/QUOTE] ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/28 "2011-06-22T17:31:57Z")
I also smoke cigars, so I don’t care, but this whole thing strikes as silly. Would people eat less if they put a photo of a huge fat-ass on the box of Dunkin Donuts? ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/29 "2011-06-22T17:43:31Z")
They did before. Back when I was a young smoker working in the oil field, someone had a Hustler on the rig and the centerfold reverse was a public health announcement; a disgusting color photo of a long time smoker’s lungs. I wadded up my pack and threw it away. I started again later but for awhile it got me off 'em. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/30 "2011-06-22T17:46:57Z")
> [@BMalion](#): > > I also smoke cigars, so I don’t care, but this whole thing strikes as silly. Would people eat less if they put a photo of a huge fat-ass on the box of Dunkin Donuts? That’s a good idea! Obviously someone with a hardcore food problem wouldn’t be deterred, but it just might sway a few young people away, or think twice about overindulging. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 5:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/31 "2011-06-22T17:55:26Z")
Quoth **Kobal2** : > [@](#): > > Of course it is (and not just to Frenchmen ). I’m just tickled by the fact that it is. Call it item #7812 on the “We humans are really messed in the head, aren’t we ?” list No, it’d be a sign we were messed up if we _didn’t_ care more about impotence than about slow death. We’re the end result of billions of years of evolution directed towards reproduction at all costs. What would you expect? And the purpose of these things isn’t to let people know that smoking kills. Everyone knows that already, but it doesn’t matter. At the age when most people start smoking, they by and large don’t care about their own mortality. The purpose of these things is to let people know that smoking is _ugly_. “Live fast and die young” doesn’t have nearly as much appeal when you won’t leave a beautiful corpse. If these pictures help current smokers quit, well, that’s a bonus. But the main goal is to make smoking less glamorous, so fewer people will start in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/32 "2011-06-22T19:14:19Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Quoth **Kobal2** :No, it’d be a sign we were messed up if we _didn’t_ care more about impotence than about slow death. We’re the end result of billions of years of evolution directed towards reproduction at all costs. What would you expect? Nonsense. Thought trumps evolution and the reproductive instinct. If it did not, I would be fucking my secretary _right now_. (I don’t have a secretary. More’s the pity.) Nor does the thought process that is invoked with the “causes impotence & decrease of libido” line has anything to do at all with reproduction. The only fear that is tugged here is “you might never have another orgasm”. The fear of which _is_ paradoxical when compared to “you might never have anything of any sort ever again”. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/33 "2011-06-22T19:56:17Z")
I doubt it, I am probably one of the few people in the USA that has never even tried smoking, but I have seen hard core smokers, my dad was one. A REAL chain smoker, he’s light a new one with the butt of the old one. He was TOTALLY controlled by tobacco. I must say I have no first hand experience, but from what I’ve seen is, it must be one of the hardest addictions to break. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/34 "2011-06-22T20:00:25Z")
> [@Markxxx](#): > > I doubt it, I am probably one of the few people in the USA that has never even tried smoking, but I have seen hard core smokers, my dad was one. A REAL chain smoker, he’s light a new one with the butt of the old one. > > He was TOTALLY controlled by tobacco. I must say I have no first hand experience, but from what I’ve seen is, it must be one of the hardest addictions to break. Ozzy Osbourne said it was the hardest of all of them for him to quit, and he’s quit them all. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/35 "2011-06-22T20:35:18Z")
Mark Twain said it was easy to quit smoking - he did it thousands of times. I doubt the pictures will make much difference. The old smokers will die off, and hopefully there will be fewer younger ones who start. Regards, Shodan the Cigar Smoker ---
**Author:** ![Candyman74](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ad7895/32.png) [@Candyman74](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Candyman74)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/36 "2011-06-22T20:51:46Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Mark Twain said it was easy to quit smoking - he did it thousands of times. Me too! Well, a few times, anyway. > [@](#): > > The old smokers will die off We pin our hopes on unrealistic dreams of revolutionary medical advances. ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/37 "2011-06-22T20:55:46Z")
Why can’t they invent anabuse for nicotine? I could probably quit a lot easier if I got sick and threw up every time I smoked. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f8ce5/32.png) [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Peyote_Coyote)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/38 "2011-06-22T21:06:05Z")
I don’t smoke tobacco, but I doubt it’s going to do a damn bit of good. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/39 "2011-06-22T21:06:44Z")
> [@](#): > > Nor does the thought process that is invoked with the “causes impotence & decrease of libido” line has anything to do at all with reproduction. The only fear that is tugged here is “you might never have another orgasm”. The fear of which _is_ paradoxical when compared to “you might never have anything of any sort ever again”. And why do you think we like having orgasms so much? ---
**Author:** ![scruffycat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scruffycat/32/200_2.png) [@scruffycat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scruffycat)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2011, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342/40 "2011-06-22T21:24:35Z")
I quit smoking a short while ago. As Candyman74 has pointed out we have had these sort of ads on boxes for a while. They made no difference to me to be honest, I just ignored them. It was simply cost in the end that did it for me, that and the hacking early morning cough. Still if it keeps a few people from starting up and makes a few others think twice, I don’t see a problem. I still think the price is the main factor. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-ugly-pics-on-cigarette-packs-make-you-stop/586342.md?page=3)