come on. people who smoke most likely know that isn't good for you. They don't smoke because it makes them healthy. They most likely smoke because they couldn't handle peer pressure when they were young and the chemicals hooked them on it. Now they are too weak to kick it and come up with excuses to not quit. Anything that warns death may be a side effect on the side of the box is pretty much bad. I don't wish death on anyone but if someone goes b/c of a reason that could have been caused by smoking, I wont feel bad.

@albokay: Or they grew up with parents that smoked, and realized that smoking was an easily accessibly form of self-medication (because that's what it really is), and are now too addicted to quit. Addiction is not as simple as strength v. weakness.

Overly simplistic views do no one any favors.

albokay, I don't agree with you in the least. I am in full support of 'personal responsibility' so long as both sides are playing fairly. Plenty of research and court cases have shown that the cigarette companies have been been actively deceiving the public and adding chemicals to increase the potential for addiction. They're intentionally changing our brain chemistry and you blame the smoker. Of course, the smoker isn't innocent but the major fault lies with the drug pushers.

@albokay: Considering how many pharmaceuticals are advertised on television which include warnings that fatal side effects have been reported, yet Ambien, Cymbalta, and so many others are still selling quite well with the FDA, doctors, and consumers on board in spite of such warnings. I think it's safe to say that the attitude that "it won't happen to me" is alive and well in our culture.

Speaking as an ex-smoker (over 11 years now) and who's husband just quit on May 1st. I can vouch for the difficulty in kicking the habit first hand. Starting smoking is still relatively easy--though nowhere near as glamorous as it was 50 or even 20 years ago (dancing cigarettes on tv or Joe Camel) I still see plenty of teens puffing away today.

With a pack a day and about 10 hits per cigarette, that's a habit that's reinforced 200 times a day! So when people talk about how much more difficult it is to quit smoking that drinking or even shooting heroin. Consider that even 50 drinks or shots of smack in a day would kill most everyone who tried, and hospitalize the rest. Add to that how nicotine reprograms the release of dopamine in the brain, and yes, there is severe physical withdrawal (headaches, nausea, irritability, etc.) involved along with the habits and rituals that have intertwined themselves with one's daily routine usually for many, many years.

That Big Tobacco has been aware of these factors all along, and yet manipulated even its government mandated anti-smoking PSAs to encourage kids to smoke on top of manipulating nicotine levels to better hook people; you can't pin all the blame on the consumer.

Here's my question..why is TAR even an ingredient in cigarettes?.

Also, having the words "Low-Tar" and "Light" is the exact same as having "Low-Fat" or "Light" on food. People will have more of the product, foolishly thinking that it is 'healthier' for you, when in fact, you're doing more damage to your body.

I live in New Jersey. On newer cigarette packs it is now written on the plastic wrapper that the terms light or ultra light refer to taste, not safety.

But there IS a difference between light and regular cigarettes. Not that one is any less bad for you than the other but that light cigarettes are "diluted" by the filters they have and thus don't pack as much of a punch as a regular cigarette, and also don't tend to be as irritating. I imagine most people, myself included, who smoke lights do so as a matter of preference and not because we harbor any delusions that they are somehow going to give us less cancer than regular cigarettes. So why not just make a new warning label for the lights for the sake of the ignorant few rather than forcing the companies to change the name of the product? What would they even change the name to? "Extra Filtered?"

So does this mean those sugar-free candy cigarettes Phillip/Morris donates to middle schools are off the table too? Because I VASTLY preferred the sugar ones.

@albokay: It's unfortunate because in most cases, the person CHOOSES to start smoking. You CAN turn down peer pressure, you choose NOT to. I turned it down, I never got hooked to cigarette's. If smokers want 'rights', then my right is to not be around your smelly smokey ass. Take your habit elsewhere.

Cigarette smoking = Inhaling the smoke from burning leaves. The smoker is actively putting a flame to the cigarette and sucking down the smoke. The smoker needs to bear most of the responsibility for the health hazards of smoking.

@albokay: I completely agree and go even further: If you started smoking since 1966 when they started putting warnings on the packs, you are fully responsible for whatever happens to you and you should be barred from any lawsuits against tobacco companies.

@Trai_Dep: I always had to buy mine. I'm jealous because I want free candy like anyone.

@SilverBlade2k: That's really what we ought to be going after. What they make the product out of, not how they label what they make the product out of.

Honestly, smoking will never be -good- for you, but we could make it a lot better by cutting down on all the chemicals and just plain -crap- in your average cigarette.

It's always amazed me how anyone thought LIGHTING SOMETHING ON FIRE AND PUTTING IT IN THEIR PIEHOLE was somehow conducive to a healthy lifestyle...

Granted they pack these things with more addictive chemicals than your friendly neighborhood meth dealer, but hey it's legal.

Makes you wonder why they don't make pot legal already, they obviously have no scruples about allowing addictive drugs to be sold at every corner store. I wouldn't touch it myself, but America would have so much positive cash flow we wouldn't know what to do with it all.

@edrebber: Get over it, It's been proven time and time again that Cigarette companies have been doing everything they can to hide the dangers of smoking and doing everything they can to make it more addictive.

Did you know people used to think that tobacco was like a vitamin and was a cure for the cold?

@fatcop: Even further: You should be deprived of the right to purchase health insurance. If that's a problem, let the tobacco companies offer them a plan. Separate arrangements for spouses and children.

i used to smoke, and nothing soothes a sore throat like a newport light.

What about promoting cigarette brands as 'organic'? Seems at least as misleading as 'low-tar' and 'light'. Hope the courts get on that one next.

@Shoelace: how so? It's conceivable that they grew the tobacco with natural ingredients no insecticides and when they package the tobacco they don't use any additives...kinda like a person rolling their own cigarette like old school style

@Clobberella: Exactly! I've never seen an ad for light cigarettes touting some sort of health benefit. They're called "light" because they don't taste as harsh going down your throat.

@snowburnt:
if it's honestly un treated tobacco leaves and paper I have no problem with the labeling either but I think we need the USDA to certify "organic" or "all natural"

I think anyone producing consumables should pay the government a fee to keep an inspector on site at all times. Wages would be paid by the Federal government, not by the manufacturer to avoid bias.

If I were producing anything I would welcome an on site USDA inspector because I know I could proudly say my product passes under the watchfull eye.

Any manufacturer opposed would likely be so because they had something to hide and didn't like the cost of running things the right way.

@snowburnt: They're still deadly. The tobacco company may be using the term 'organic' correctly (as it's defined) but the public has been trained to think organic = healthier. I imagine there might be some small benefit of no insecticides, etc., but there's still tar and nicotine.

Can anyone answer this for me?

If I make a popsicle with battery acid, rat poison and tar, I'd go to jail.

Why can cigarette co's make a stick with all that+ tons more and get away with it?

@wcnghj:
checks, dollarinos, amercian cashito, payola, big bucks, hookers & blow, etc.

payoffs

@snowburnt: All of the smokers subjected to those advertising campaigns are dead. The advertisement strategy of pharmaceutical companies and makes those campaigns seem quaint.

@YoHenYo: Ditto California, at least for Philip Morris brands... I wonder if it's a national thing?

@wcnghj: I think it's something like this: The tobacco companies made a shitload of money and helped produce a lot of addicts before evidence regarding cigarette deadliness surfaced. Money was used to create a very powerful pro-tobacco lobby, to advertise, and to squelch (as much as possible) building evidence and reports on the dangers of tobacco use. Politicians were 'influenced'. Tobacco farmers told their sob stories and wanted subsidies when the tobacco market declined. Talk of outlawing tobacco gets met with arguments about Prohibition and whining about other products and activities that are unhealthy but aren't being banned. Too many young people, despite regular drilling about the dangers of smoking, get bought into the 'cigarettes are cool and help you lose weight and not everyone gets sick from them' message and become the next generation of addicts that subsidize the activities of the tobacco companies.

@allnighter:

You don't see them because they were forced to market by "taste" by the time you were smoking, which meant all the ads said they were "milder".

However, go back far enough (1940) and you'll find that camels are milder, don't irritate your throat as much, are preferred by doctors, and contain 28% less nicotine than other cigarettes.

@wcnghj: If the popsicles were sold to attract and kill sweaty vermin in the summer they would be perfectly legal. Cigarette companies aren't trying to kill their customers, they want to make them happy, just like doughnut companies.

In Canada cigarettes haven't been allowed to be marketed at light or similiar terms for quite a while.

Here's a great documentary on cigarettes from history channel:

@albokay: You're all wrong, it's because it makes you look cool!

@albokay: So use your brain for a sec here: people know how awful cigarettes are and they STILL CAN'T QUIT.

Does that give you a teensy clue as to just how addictive cigarettes are?

Big Tobacco spends untold millions of dollars to make a highly addictive product that's marketed to children. If you're wagging fingers at people for not being able to single-handedly overcome all of that any time they want, you're a self-righteous moron.

@morlo: Problem is that the product does, in fact, sicken and kill their customers.

Surely I can't be the only one who remembers that "Shards o' Glass" ad.

@YoHenYo: Noticed this on my brand too somewhat recently. I never assumed it was safer in any way prior, I just always smoked lights.

Even in this age, not everyone who starts smoking realizes the addictive nature of it, or are in denial because they don't understand it fully. Nobody reacts the same. Some physically feel ill, gain weight due to it messing with your metabolism, become depressed, and so on. Only the ignorant say, "just quit", like it's the easiest thing to do. Those people just don't get it, or perhaps were one of the lucky few for which it was easy to do.

@mianne: At least with pharmaceuticals people are looking to ease some pain or help with something. Not to say its the right way to go or its not habit forming but smoking doesn't benefit someone at all. No one starts smoking because of a medical problem then becomes addicted. They choose to smoke mostly based on social pressure.

I know tobacco companies are to blame for putting this crap out there for people to buy but as long as people buy it, why wouldn't they sell it. The human race is are not simple minded fools who need to be looked after. We should all be able to see the crap that is going on.

Im so tired of these truth commercials telling everyone the hazards of smoking. Who do they think they are getting to? People are choosing to inhale chemical laced smoke into their lungs. They don't care! Plenty of people make money off people who don't care. I highly doubt that will change.

So my point is I can blame the consumer. Its not like tobacco companies put nicotine in baby formula to make people addicted. People are gullible. It doesn't matter if its big tobacco or some Nigerian guy saying he needs help getting money from a king, they both make money off people who are gullible. They do not need to ban cigarettes, people just need to wake up and realize they are paying people to make fools of and them. Stop buying cigarettes and they will go away.

@fatcop: Even before the labels came out, how could anyone have though inhaling smoke is not bad in some way. No one starts smoking and it feels great. They usually hack and cough after the first puff. Signs of the body saying that isn't what you should be doing.

@SilverBlade2k:

Tar isn't an ingredient in cigarettes. When you burn something smoke is released. What is smoke? unburned sticky particulate resulting from incomplete combustion. Thats why you can see smoke. When you breath smoke in your lungs do their job and filter particulate out of the smoke. The particulate is sticky and clogs up the cillia in the lungs allowing it to build up. When it builds up you have "tar".

What always made me laugh is doctors that smoked.

People who spent a good part of their life and money learning about the body and health choose to smoke.

@Neil Clark: Like curing a hangover with a beer.. rock on dude

@mythago:
I always liked the Happy Fun Ball© [www.happyfunball.com]

Maybe I'm just weird, but as a smoker, I never considered lights or low tar as a healthy cigarette. When I smoke a light, I just considered it lighter on my throat, versus what I usually smoke (menthol.)

But one big qualm I have about people that are vehemently against tobacco those truth commercials and such is that, IF I want to kill myself/give myself lung cancer, why not just let me? I'm completely aware that they are HORRIBLE for you, and I do it anyway.

Honestly, I think people should just let people who want to smoke cigarettes, since it is a rather stupid decision, should just be able to.. I mean, if we're most of us are gonna die from it anyway, wouldn't that be cleansing the gene pool?

Also, you guys should totally see/novel "Thank You For Smoking." Brilliant movie and novel. Srsly. Albeit fiction, still has a lot of truth to it. (Mainly about the tobacco lobby.)

@Jessica Haas: Replace novel with read. Man I suck at grammar tonight.

@snowburnt:

How is that possible when they've been known as coffin nails for almost a hundred years? You might argue that people thought smoking was beneficial at first, but we're talking the 19th century here. Anyone alive now has almost no justification for claiming they thought smoking isn't harmful.

I'm not calling all smokers stupid(that would be absurd), but if you smoke and think some cigarettes are ok just because it says light or low tar, then you are doing the world a favor by killing yourself off.

I just wish the FDA regulated the labeling of cigarettes like they do with food: including all additives and whatever the tobacco's been sprayed with on the package as an ingredients list. Instead of a ton of inflated warnings, just an honest account of what's in the things. Then, you can let people determine for themselves what's in cigarettes.

@lawnmowerdeth: I smoke 10 cigarettes at a time becuase it's ten times as cool!

Seriously, though, I actually used to be in the "blame the smoker" boat. And to an extent, it's true; they started smoking knowing that it's bad for you.

I used to have no pity on people who couldn't stop smoking, until I tried to quit drinking soda (caffeinated soda, especially). I know that soda is bad (especially for one trying to lose some weight) with its high sugar (of HFCS, as it is) content and acidic properties that are bad for the teeth. Yet it's hard to quit -- sometimes when I'm having a stressful day or I'm really tired, I just need to have a mountain dew. I've tried alternate sources of caffiene as well (I like tea a lot) but they just didn't work for me.

So while I cannot argue that my experience is universal, I guess there's just something to be said for addiction. It's not as easy to quite as it sounds, for me at least (never smoked, just a dew-a-holic).

@Jessica Haas: Because they affect everyone around you when you smoke them. You're inflicting a dangerous substance on people who don't have any choice in the matter when they might have the same right as you do to be where you are.