Watching the 2005 movie Thank You for Smoking made me think a lot about the relationship between advertising, ethics, and personal responsibility. The movie follows Nick Naylor, a spokesperson for the tobacco industry whose job is basically to defend cigarettes in the media. Even though the film is a comedy, it raises serious questions about whether something being legal automatically makes it ethical. After learning about advertising law and public relations, the movie shows how complicated the real world of marketing can be, especially when it involves products that can harm people.
One of the biggest questions the movie raises is whether someone could actually do Nick Naylor’s job. His job is to go on television, debate critics, and convince people that cigarettes should still exist in the marketplace. Technically, what he does is legal because advertising is protected under the First Amendment as a form of commercial speech. However, knowing the health effects of smoking makes the job morally uncomfortable. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, cigarette smoking causes more than 480,000 deaths every year in the United States, making it the leading cause of preventable death (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). Because of that, it would be difficult for me to promote cigarettes even if the salary was extremely high. A job paying $100,000 or even $200,000 might sound appealing, especially for a recent college graduate, but at the end of the day I would still feel like I was helping promote something that harms people.
The situation gets even more complicated when it comes to newer nicotine products like vaping. In the assignment description, it mentions someone working on marketing for the Vuse vape product line instead of traditional cigarettes. At first that might seem like a better alternative because vaping is sometimes marketed as safer than smoking. However, there are still major concerns about how vaping affects young people. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration reports that millions of middle and high school students use e-cigarettes, and nicotine addiction among teens is a growing public health issue (U.S. Food and Drug Administration). Because of that, promoting vaping products could still raise similar ethical concerns.
Another interesting part of the movie is the journalist who tries to expose the tobacco industry. She is determined to reveal how tobacco companies operate behind the scenes and how they try to hide information about the dangers of their products. Even though some of her methods in the film are questionable, investigative journalism is important in real life. In the 1990s, leaked internal tobacco company documents showed that companies knew nicotine was addictive while publicly denying it (Brandt). Without journalists and researchers pushing for transparency, the public might never have learned about these practices.
The movie also made me think about whether the government should completely ban advertising for products that are harmful, such as cigarettes, alcohol, or gambling. Right now there are already restrictions. For example, cigarette ads have been banned from television and radio for decades. However, banning all advertising could raise First Amendment issues. Commercial speech still has legal protection, so the government has to balance public health concerns with constitutional rights.
Overall, Thank You for Smoking shows how powerful advertising and public relations can be. It also highlights the difference between what is legal and what is ethical. Just because a company is allowed to advertise a product does not mean that promoting it is the right thing to do. The movie made me realize that people working in marketing and public relations have a lot of influence, and with that influence comes responsibility
Works Cited
Brandt, Allan M. The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product That Defined America. Basic Books, 2007. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2598565/
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Smoking and Tobacco Use: Fast Facts.” CDC, https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast_facts/index.htm.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “Youth and Tobacco Use.” FDA, https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/youth-and
Brandt, Allan M. The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product That Defined America. Basic Books, 2007. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2598565/
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Smoking and Tobacco Use: Fast Facts.” CDC, https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast_facts/index.htm.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration. “Youth and Tobacco Use.” FDA, https://www.fda.gov/tobacco-products/youth-and-tobacco-use.
No comments:
Post a Comment