'Facepalm' and 'muppets' spring to mind
In the desperate search for any old tripe to hide the fact that there is, quite simply, no evidence in favour of plain packaging, Cancer Research UK today tweeted this.
Why do people choose particular tobacco brands? It’s not just the cigarette, so end the #packetracket! #justsayinCoupled with this 1990s quote, presumably from a tobacco company employee (I'm giving the benefit of the doubt, because Lord have mercy on their sanity if they really have chosen a quote from Stanton 'wibble' Glantz).
"In other words, the product itself is only one element that contributes to the consumer's decision to buy a particular cigarette"Ain't that a body blow for those of us opposed to plain packaging, eh? A right bombshell, and no mistake! It's check mate with bells on, so it is.
Unless, of course, you're not an easily-gulled tobacco control groupie with little grasp of nuances in the English language. Because all the unthinking drones who robotically retweeted this were kindly making the tobacco industry's case for them.
The clue is in the word "particular", see?
I know CRUK's faithful lapdogs won't understand this, but any business - and tobacco companies are just like any other - attempts to distinguish itself from its rivals so that you buy their product rather than someone else's. It's called competition.
The tobacco industry has said all along that their branding and logos are designed specifically for this purpose, that is to buy their 'particular' (see how the word works?) brands rather than those of their competitors. It's a major plank of their defence against the government's barking mad plan, for heaven's sake!
You know what I think happened? I think CRUK believe their supporters are so very stupid that they aren't able to recognise the difference between consumers choosing a 'particular' brand over another, and choosing cigarettes over not choosing cigarettes.
CRUK were correct. They fell for it hook, line and sinker.
Sadly for CRUK and the wider tobacco control industry, this still isn't any evidence to prove that people start buying tobacco products because of the branding, which is kinda the point, isn't it?
I'm beginning to wonder if we will ever see anything more than water-muddying and dancing around the tricky questions from the plain packs campaign. Well, that and incompetence, of course.
9 comments:
My particular favourite line from all plain packs supporters (including CRUK) is "If it wouldn't work, why do tobacco companies oppose it/spend £2million on fighting it?" It's not even an argument. You might as well argue against atheism by saying:
"If there is no god, then why does the Vatican exist?"
There's no logic to it, nor to TC's non-argument. I oppose
Even TC's own studies don't conclude that packaging leads to smoking uptake with children. For more on that, would recommend looking at the last 4 tweets from Tobacco Tactics on Twitter: https://twitter.com/tobacco_tactics
The most annoying 'argument' to me is: 'It may or may not work but [when it comes to tobacco] anything is worth trying isn't it?'
This bypasses logical argument and diverts counter-argument and has been used at all stages, including Plain Packs.
Actually, I don't care if kids take up smoking; therefore I don't care why they might do so. But it isn't really about the kids, is it? It's about a bunch of purse-lipped, puritanical, finger-wagging microcephalics who feel (yes, feel; they don't think) that they have a God-given right to inflict their miserable, pathetic, empty 'lifestyle choices' on any- and everyone who in whatever way is, or appears to be, enjoying himself (or, of course, herself). Now, that I do care about. Indeed, I care about that so much that if I happened to stumble upon a lynching party about to teach one of these nasty-minded creeps that the tension in a rope is equal to the mass suspended from it, I believe that I would resist their efforts with every ounce of apathy I could muster. Thus, in their own interests of course, I suggest they f*ck off to Belgium, or somewhere even more exotic.
If a person does not like beer, have never drunk it, except maybe a few mouthfulls when they were a teenager, which made them feel sick, then to them, all beer tastes the same. They do not know, having never drunk it, so are unable to concieve the fact that different beers have a different taste. Curry is another good example.
Most of the anti smoking organisations personnel and their followers are never smokers. This is why it is so easy for them to misinterpret statements like that mentioned, because they are coming from the wrong direction, as far as they are concerned, all cigarettes taste the same, so the branding, to them, means something else.
Martin Dockrell of ASH has said on more than one occasion that all cigarettes taste the same.
" ... a lynching party about to teach one of these nasty-minded creeps that the tension in a rope is equal to the mass suspended from it, I believe that I would resist their efforts with every ounce of apathy I could muster."
Brilliant comment. Made me laugh out loud (or should that be "made me LOL?" Doesn't sound right, somehow!) I may well steal that sentence and keep it in reserve for a suitable future occasion, if I may.
Yes, one of the weaknesses of the whole anti-smoking movement is that by completely banishing smokers from even the tiniest of "debates" for fear of any kind of dissent, their pronouncements on cigarettes, smoking and smokers have become increasingly far-removed from the reality of cigarettes, smoking and smokers. When I first began smoking, I smoked Silk Cut because those happened to have been the ones I'd tried and I liked them. Then when purchasing cigarettes one day my local store had run out of Silk Cut, so I bought a packet of Marlboro Lights instead - not because of the packet, but because I'd tried a couple of them in the past and liked them too. And I discovered that I actually liked them better and started smoking them instead. Who knows, if my local store runs out of Marlboro Lights at some stage in the future I may switch again. I've tried and enjoyed Lucky Strike and Camel from time to time, so they might turn out to be my "regular" brand. But I have to say that I've only ever bought cigarettes of any particular brand for one reason - because I've tried them and I like them. Nothing to do with the packaging - no amount of gold on any box, for example, would tempt me to switch to B&H. Too strong and harsh a taste for my liking. So where, in my impressionable "early smoking" days did the irresistible attraction of "glitzy" packaging come into the equation??
"In other words, the product itself is only one element that contributes to the consumer's decision to buy a particular cigarette"
"In other words, the product itself is only one element that contributes to the consumer's decision to buy a particular beer"
"In other words, the product itself is only one element that contributes to the consumer's decision to buy a particular car"
"In other words, the product itself is only one element that contributes to the consumer's decision to detest the tobacco control idiots."
- MJM
i just had to tweet a reply to the CR idiots. They have no data re branding influencing taking up smoking.
Be my guest, and thanks for the comment.
Post a Comment