I have pack of cigarettes called
Royals. It’s a flip top box, and half of the front is covered by a bold black
and white box that reads “smoking kills.” On the back is a larger box that says
“Smoking can cause a slow and painful death.” The pack is from the United
Kingdom, and I’ve had it for at least 5 years. Can’t recall who gifted it to
me, but I treasure it.
I remember thinking that maybe some day the US would adopt
such warning labels. So, it was a big letdown last week when the government
caved in to big tobacco, and dropped its fight to ask the Supreme Court to
review efforts to block the package changes. As it now stands, the FDA will
create some new “less offensive” labels, but we don’t know when.
I’ve been thinking about all of this because of New York
Mayor Bloomberg’s latest effort to force his constituents toward better health.
Bloomberg proposed legislation on Monday to ban all stores from publicly
displaying tobacco products. “Even one new smoker is one too many,” Bloomberg
said. You gotta love this guy. Discussing large sodas and cigarettes in the
news is so much more fun than say, budgets or urban renewal.
According to Action on Smoking and Health (ASH), a
non-profit public health group, “There is strong evidence that when tobacco is
out of the sight of children, it is also out of mind. If they don’t see
cigarettes, they’re much less likely to take up the habit.”
In this case, I’ll use myself as an example to possibly
prove or disprove the above hypothesis. From birth, and yes, in utero, I was
subjected to the smoke of my parents’ filterless Camels. I know they would both
have walked a mile for them – no question. They were so frugal that we never
had paper towels or Kleenex in the house. It was toilet paper or nothing. Yet,
two cartons of camels were faithfully purchased every Saturday at the A&P.
As a kid, that was just the way it was in my house with
yellowed walls and ashtrays everywhere. When my visiting grandmother asked me
if I was going to smoke when I grew up, I promptly replied, “yes.” I thought
that’s what grown-ups did. I can still conjure up the taste of the candy
cigarettes we would suck on and play with. Guess no one gave that a thought
either.
So, my parents had 3 children – two of us are baby boomers,
one a bit older. Of the 3, only my middle brother took up the habit. He’s been
smoking for 50 years without a break. My older brother began smoking when he
was a paratrooper, but quit after a month or two. You see, he was a good money
manager, and always had enough at the end of the month for his cigarettes. Not
so his platoon mates. They would be broke by mid-month and be bumming from him.
He decided not to support his or anyone else’s habit and that was that.
Now, to me. When I was a teenager my mother pleaded with me
to never have that first cigarette. “It’s the most addictive drug on earth,”
she said, “Once you get it in your bloodstream, you will want it forever;
please don’t fall victim to it as I did.” She even suggested other ways that I
could be rebellious or feel “cool.” This was just about the time that warnings
had been put on cigarette packs (1966), and people were discussing the ill
effects to be more than “stunting your growth.” Remember that one?
Well, approval seeker that I was, I was torn. On my senior
trip a bunch of us bought cigarette holders in China town and a pack of
Virginia Slims to fit into them. We just thought this was the funniest thing,
going around our classmates pretending we were Bette Davis.
On my return home, I trashed the cigarette holder, and never
smoked again. You see, my dad had just died of a heart attack, and I didn’t
want to do anything to upset my bereft mother. So, I was spared the habit, and
I am grateful.
I feel enormous compassion for those who do smoke, whether
they’re trying to quit or not. Smokers know that they’re killing themselves
cell by cell. That they’re contributing to an industry that brings
debilitation, death and economic hardship to the poorest people on the planet.
That their second hand smoke and discarded butts pollute everything around
them. They know this and more, and yet many feel powerless to give them up.
When I see a smoker hiding around a corner trying to be
inconspicuous, I always smile and say hello, remembering my mother’s words, and
knowing that that’s what she would want me to do.
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