Thank You For Smoking (the book) came out in 1994. The year I smoked my first ever cigarette. I was 17. It was a Marlboro Red. I remember thinking (somewhere between the choking and coughing): I don't feel anything. I don't get it. Am I supposed to feel something? Why do people do this? 11 years later, I found myself asking the same question: Why do people do this? Why am I doing this? I couldn't find a good enough answer, so I quit.
I made the quitting sound easy. It wasn't. Over the years, it does become a habit. It does become a part of who you are. I won't lie. I sometimes miss it. But I miss it for nostalgic reasons, in that it reminds me of being young and reckless (or maybe careless is a better word).
I guess that's my two-cents on smoking. I could go into my grandfather losing a lung--and then his life. Or the recent trip to chemotherapy where someone near and dear to my heart has been going through treatment. I'll save you (smokers) the gory details.
Let's talk about the novel, shall we?
The chapter where Nick meets the Tumbleweed Man is the most telling (and honest) chapter in the whole novel. Did it not feel real? For a large chunk of this novel, it feels like sharp, biting satire--where people and situations are grossly exaggerated for comic affect. We can assume Oprah had a show on smoking, but was it like it played out in the novel? Or the Larry King show? Did a lobbyist go on either show to say smoking 'retards the onset of Parkinson's disease'? Unlikely. But how hilarious it is for Nick to get away with it.
Smoking is bad. Look at what it did to the Marlboro Man. I'm guessing Chris Buckley's Tumbleweed character was based on real life Marlboro Man Wayne McLaren. After being diagnosed with cancer (at age 49), he spoke out against smoking--and Phillip Morris fought back by denying that the man even appeared in the ads. Bullshit. They later said he did appear in ads, but not as the Marlboro Man. McLaren died in 1992, at the age of 51.
I think what is so sad is the honesty of the Tumbleweed Man. He, like so many people back in the 40's and 50's, didn't know any better. The Tumbleweed Man tells Nick: "Doctors used to promote cigarettes" (179). After the first cancer scare, the tobacco companies reaction was filtered cigarettes. The Tumbleweed Man ad campaign was important, in that, it promoted the image of a tough, rugged cowboy. Filter-tips were as the Tumbleweed Man says "for pussies" (179). The Tumbleweed Man ad would toughen up the product.
In 1994, the cigarette ad campaign was under attack. The ads such as Joe Camel, were being criticized for their appeal to children. How much power does an ad have on the public? Do you believe that Joe Camel ads would get kids to smoke? What do you think of the Marlboro Man ads? Also, there's a funny moment where the Senator of Vermont is wanting to push for cigarettes to carry skull and crossbones. Thoughts on that? I know in England the packs read: Smoking Kills. Gets the message across, doesn't it?
Bibliography
Buckley, Christopher. Thank You For Smoking. New York: Random House, 2006.
11 comments:
Not just Wayne McClaren, even. There were TWO 'Marlboro men.' The other was David McLean, and he died of lung cancer at 73. Based on my own experiences, I really don't think much of anything has an influence on smoking. More people smoke in Europe than in the US, and they have those gigantic warnings (the one you mentioned, as well as 'Smoking Causes Fatal Lung Cancer,' which I saw on a pack of Winstons my girlfriend brought back from England). Likewise, Joe Camel wasn't really going to do much for anyone who hadn't already decided they were going to smoke. I mean, I remember those advertisements (though I was pretty young) and I remember thinking 'That's stupid, that camel's nose looks like a penis,' but it never made me wish I had a cigarette. I think Bill Hicks said something about the marketing of cigarettes being similar to a potential marketing process for crack cocaine. You could technically package them in barbed wire with labels that said 'fuck you' and people would still buy them. I have a feeling even if people like James Hurley in "Twin Peaks" didn't light up, it would STILL be cool. Maybe it's just a rekindling (pun intended) of the age-old human instinct to appreciate and admire fire? The chance to actually light something on fire (on a regular basis, even!) is pretty enjoyable. Strangely enough, I smoked my first cigarette to prove to my band's drummer I could blow smoke out my eye socket (I could).
As a person, I like to resist the idea that advertising has any profound effect on our behavior. Is that realistic? Probably not, but I like to think I do things because I want to do them, not because some company spent a couple million bucks to put it on television. I've never smoked anything my entire life. The only reason that is, is because my Dad smoked (he recently quit and took up drinking instead. Better?). My childhood memories consist mostly me wafting smoke away from my face while I watched TV. If not for my early exposure to the habit, it's entirely possible that I may have started smoking. I agree with Eli's comment about warnings being entirely irrelevant. At this point in the game I can feel comfortable saying that everyone knows smoking will kill you. How can you not know? Everyone also knows that crack and meth can kill you a lot faster, and yet those seem to be pretty popular. Telling people "vices are bad" is redundant. Also, I think the time for smoking to be cool is practically over. Smokers are the new lepers, nobody likes 'em or wants to be around them. We've moved on to better, deadlier stuff
I think it really doesnt matter how extreme the anti smoking labels on the packs get. People are still going to buy them. I think that if the packs had a death timer on them that told you the exact day that you will die from lung cancer, the person will still buy the cigarettes. ITS NOT THE ADVERTISEMENTS! It seems like the people we look up to and see on TV are to blame, but that is not entirely true. People just want to try something new, and they try smoking out for a little too long and get addicted. The health risks dont scare anybody because they dont happen for a long time and the smoker believes they will quit before it gets bad. My friends mom has smoked since she was 14 and now has several health problems and emphasema, and she still smokes her Marlboro menthol 100's. My friend (her son) sees this and he still smokes. I myself am a social smoker who has one or two maybe once a week at a party. I cant explain why. I just like to.
There is a website that lists every well known actor/actress who smokes in films (including what brand they use). It is as if they are making a hit list so they can pick them off with a rifle at the Oscars. The whole anti hollywood smoking thing is ridiculous. It is just a trait of the actor's character and has nothing to do with them as people. I was in a musical where I smoked at least ten cigarettes in a matter of two hours but thats a different story. I know it is bad when kids see these films (The girl in Grease who becomes cool because she wears black and she can smoke and then stomp it under her heel) because it influences them, yet nothing can be done about it really. Its up to the parents and teachers to tell their kids not to smoke and warn them of the dangers.
I agree that in the 40's and 50's didnt know better... but it was also a thing of life longevity. People have been smoking for centuries, yet we are just discovering the effects now because most people live past the age of 50.
I have to slightly disagree with the lepers comment though. Now that major cities are banning smoking, and the witch hunt is beginning, smokers have become the new rebellion. People enjoy doing illegal things and the more restrictions that are put on smoking, the more appealling it may become. Weird logic.
I know this is bad but if I ever see Eli on campus I want to see the smoke eyeball trick....... because frankly I want to understand that logic.
Advertising is not the reason why people smoke. I can look at every major actor or actress in every possible situation with a cigarette and it wouldnt make me want to smoke any more or less than i would anyways. I think that the marlboro man is extremely over hyped in this novel...to non smokers and smokers alike it is obviously not something that influences decisions. I cant believe that people actually still think those ads get to people. The only reason people pay attention to these ads are that its a product of association. You see the camel on the tv and you see the camel on the pack of cigarettes so you think of that when you make your purchase...its not like the camel makes you smoke, but it could help you pick between camels and marlboros or parliaments
I remember the controversy of the camels ads appearing too childlike, and I also remember loving those ads. I would flip through a magazine, bored as children should be when looking at a magazine, and then see a Camels add. I remember staring at them for a while, entranced by the dense artwork. When I asked my mother if people died from smoking she said no, that liberls were trying to brainwash people. She would then explain to me how the Indians smoked for thousands of years and never got cancer. I believed her, and she believed what she was saying until she came down with lung cancer. She never smoked again, but she only lived for five months after her diagnosis, almost long enough to see her last Christmas.
I'm glad Camels cartoon adds are gone. I'm disturbed at how transfixed I became as a child when my eyes caught sight of the happy Joe Camel, a cigarette perched inbetween his lips. Most people acknowledge now that smoking is bad and it kills you and that the tax should go up to discourage smokers. Still, there's plenty of them around, and it will probably remain that way.
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