Should Cigarette company executives be executed?

Voltaire said:
Tobacco companies make a harmful product, but everyone knows it is harmful, everyone is aware of the risks. Let people be grown-ups and take responsibility for their own health for Christ's sake. It's a no-brainer that inhaling smoke into your lungs isn't a positive thing (and that applies to marijuana as well as tobacco cigarettes).

I'm sorry, but people who smoke until it kills them have only themselves to blame. I have several family members who have died of lung cancer and it was their own fault (which they were smart enough to recognize). Choices have consequences and we'll be much better off as a society once people start taking responsibility for their own lives instead of always playing the victim.
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I'm sorry but that's a crock of shit. Just because someone exercised poor judgement and became addicted to a deadly drug which, if used as intended will kill the user, doesn't absolve the companies that market those drugs from liability.

Really that is the difference between cigarettes and alcohol and junk food. If used as intended, cigarettes will kill you. You can't say that about alcohol and junk food. If you use them as intended, in moderation, they will not kill you. Where as if you use cigarettes as intended by big tobacco you will die.

So don't hand me this "Everyone knows cigarettes are harmful" crap. Well no shit sherlock, that doesn't mean that because they know that, that they can beat the addiction. I mean fuck lets get real. Were talking about a drug that is far more dangerous and toxic then heroine. Would you be ok with them selling heroine in the same manner cigarettes are produced and marketed?
 
Damocles said:
I corrected the spelling in the title for you, Mott. Remember, suffixes, "ette" means "small", it isn't a small "ciger" it's a small cigar....

(I really should make a "spelling nazi" troll. It's just fun.)
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dont' forget a grammar and punctuation nazi too! LOL I write to fast to pay to much attention to any of those. Good thing were not being graded, eh?
 
tom prendergast said:
I am not sure where you would draw the line? Should alcohol, fast foods, car and weapons manufacturers be also held accountable? What about cannabis, if that was made legal would they also have to pay large sums in compensation?

Having said that, rather than extracting large sums from the tobacco companies much of which just goes to avaricious ambulance chasers. I would be more in favour of a levy being placed on nicotine products which would go specifically to fund medical costs for smoking related diseases.
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How about we just outlaw cigarettes as a nicotene delivery system as being to deadly. I have no problem with other tobacco products. There certainly not safe but neither are they even close to as deadly as cigarettes. I enjoy a good cigar myself on occasion but I haven't formed a compulsive addiction where I need to smoke 20 of them a day.

The point I am really making is that the #1 cause of preventable death in our nation is cigarette smoking. We've done a lot to reduce those deaths through education but still far to many die. What else can we do?
 
Mott the Hoople said:
I'm sorry but that's a crock of shit. Just because someone exercised poor judgement and became addicted to a deadly drug which, if used as intended will kill the user, doesn't absolve the companies that market those drugs from liability.

Really that is the difference between cigarettes and alcohol and junk food. If used as intended, cigarettes will kill you. You can't say that about alcohol and junk food. If you use them as intended, in moderation, they will not kill you. Where as if you use cigarettes as intended by big tobacco you will die.

So don't hand me this "Everyone knows cigarettes are harmful" crap. Well no shit sherlock, that doesn't mean that because they know that, that they can beat the addiction. I mean fuck lets get real. Were talking about a drug that is far more dangerous and toxic then heroine. Would you be ok with them selling heroine in the same manner cigarettes are produced and marketed?
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That is not entirely correct. People also get addicted to alcohol as well and can most certainly die from its use. At the same time, some people can smoke in moderation their entire lives without developing cancer etc... our bodies (as you mentioned) respond in different ways. Which is why some people become alcoholics and others do not despite similar drinking patterns early on in life. The same holds true with cigarettes. Some people get addicted to the point that they cannot quit on their own. They need rehab. Others quit on their own... some with ease, most with vary degrees of difficulty.

As you stated, it is not a reflection on character. It is simply that our bodies and minds respond differently.
 
Mott the Hoople said:
How about we just outlaw cigarettes as a nicotene delivery system as being to deadly. I have no problem with other tobacco products. There certainly not safe but neither are they even close to as deadly as cigarettes. I enjoy a good cigar myself on occasion but I haven't formed a compulsive addiction where I need to smoke 20 of them a day.

The point I am really making is that the #1 cause of preventable death in our nation is cigarette smoking. We've done a lot to reduce those deaths through education but still far to many die. What else can we do?
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Do you have a link to that stat? Because I would have thought obesity was #1.... though that is not based on any study, just my assumption.
 
Watermarx said:
The difference is that cigarette companies lead a huge campaign to try and claim that cigarettes were harmless. No one has been claiming that soda and alcohol is harmless, or sending millions of dollars to bogus labs that claim the same.
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And Ivory soap claims it cleans better than Dove...so what....the claims of others don't run my life.

the fact is, warning labels have been on cigarettes for more than 40 years....no one forced you to smoke them or cigars or use snuff....
Why do some folks refuse the concept of personal responsibility and have to find someone else to blame for their own actions?
 
Asked not answered, sounds like most republicans support cig companies being left alone. I know sf supports legal weed, why do the other individual choice republicans not favor the much less harmful smoking weed?
 
Topspin said:
Asked not answered, sounds like most republicans support cig companies being left alone. I know sf supports legal weed, why do the other individual choice republicans not favor the much less harmful smoking weed?
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Because they haven't figured out how to make a profit on it and still keep their alcohol and religious backers.
 
Topspin said:
Asked not answered, sounds like most republicans support cig companies being left alone. I know sf supports legal weed, why do the other individual choice republicans not favor the much less harmful smoking weed?
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republicans, much like democrats, are too eager to continue to hold on to abused commerce clause power to acknowledge that they shouldn't have any power or authority over the growth, possession, or use of a simple naturally occurring plant.
 
Mott the Hoople said:
How about we just outlaw cigarettes as a nicotene delivery system as being to deadly. I have no problem with other tobacco products. There certainly not safe but neither are they even close to as deadly as cigarettes. I enjoy a good cigar myself on occasion but I haven't formed a compulsive addiction where I need to smoke 20 of them a day.

The point I am really making is that the #1 cause of preventable death in our nation is cigarette smoking. We've done a lot to reduce those deaths through education but still far to many die. What else can we do?
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Well you can be sure that prohibition won't work, excepting that it would make a lot of Mexicans, Colombians etc. even richer smuggling ciggies to the US.
 
Superfreak said:
That is not entirely correct. People also get addicted to alcohol as well and can most certainly die from its use. At the same time, some people can smoke in moderation their entire lives without developing cancer etc... our bodies (as you mentioned) respond in different ways. Which is why some people become alcoholics and others do not despite similar drinking patterns early on in life. The same holds true with cigarettes. Some people get addicted to the point that they cannot quit on their own. They need rehab. Others quit on their own... some with ease, most with vary degrees of difficulty.

As you stated, it is not a reflection on character. It is simply that our bodies and minds respond differently.
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Well, actually, alcohol in moderate doses has either neutral or beneficial effects in pretty much everyone, whereas if you escape the negative effects of tobacco it's mostly due to luck. I know I went to a lifespan calculator the other day and it yelled at me because I quit drinking. The average lifespan of a smoker is 70, whereas for drinkers it can pretty much be assumed to be around the average lifespan, because 90% of the population drinks. There was actually a study a while back that had the counterintuitive result that heavy drinkers lived longer the teetotalers (it's just one study, though, and not the last word on the subject, but it's an amazing result nonetheless).

It's also a lot harder to get physically addicted to alcohol. I was drinking half a fifth a night for six months and when I stopped all that happened was that I had a craving for alcohol that went away after a while. Cigarettes are known to be one of the most addictive things out there.

This isn't necessarily a hard and fast rule though. Last year I was actually smoking about a cigarette about once every week or two with my friend (who unfortunately picked up the habit), mainly for the pleasant buzz you get when you're not adjusted to it. At that rate I never got addicted.
 
bravo said:
And Ivory soap claims it cleans better than Dove...so what....the claims of others don't run my life.

the fact is, warning labels have been on cigarettes for more than 40 years....no one forced you to smoke them or cigars or use snuff....
Why do some folks refuse the concept of personal responsibility and have to find someone else to blame for their own actions?
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The conservative concept of "personal responsibility" is that the powerful have no responsibilities and the powerless have all the shit heaped on them.
 
SmarterThanYou said:
republicans, much like democrats, are too eager to continue to hold on to abused commerce clause power to acknowledge that they shouldn't have any power or authority over the growth, possession, or use of a simple naturally occurring plant.
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IMHO a ban on marijuana is a violation of the right to privacy.
 
It's mind boggling to have republicans support tabacco companies while supporting prohibition of cannabis. laughable
Looks to me like most tea party congressman and senators are against prohibition. Hopefully this freedom spreads as democrats have shit on their chance to end it.
 
Superfreak said:
Do you have a link to that stat? Because I would have thought obesity was #1.... though that is not based on any study, just my assumption.
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Here's a pretty good source.

http://www.cdc.gov/chronicdisease/resources/publications/aag/osh.htm

Here's an interesting thought. Health Care reform could possibly be paid for by the prohibition of cigarettes. Even after the loss of tax revenue savings would in in the neighborhood of 200 billion dollars annually from medical costs related to smoking and lost productivity. It makes you winder how much of the nearly 100 billion in the medical cost caused by cigarette smoking annually do we and our employers pay through our health insurance premiums? I would imagine most of it. I really makes you wonder what an impact such a prohibition would have?

BTW, Obesity is #2 preventable cause of death, that and tobacco cause more preventable deaths then all other recorded causes combined.
 
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Crashk said:
Because they haven't figured out how to make a profit on it and still keep their alcohol and religious backers.
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I think there's some truth to that. I also think there's some truth that they have enough problems dealing with tobacco. The real problem, politically, with the cigarette issue is the large # of farmers in the south who raise tobacco as a cash crop.

I can remember when Elizabeth Dole was first running for Senator in North Carolina, at a press conference she made a comment about being tough on drugs and then someone asked her why she was still molly coddling tobacco farmers with subsidies when tobacco was the most dangerous drug known to man and kills far more people then heroine does?

She turned to one of her advisers and he motioned for her to walk off and she did with no attempt to answer that question.
 
Here's an interesting graph. Look at drug abuse at the very end and compare that to cigarettes in terms of preventable deaths then think about how we put large #'s of people in prison for selling illicit drugs but we reward tobacco merchants with billions of dollars in profits. What's wrong with this picture?

Preventable_causes_of_death.png
 
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