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To be honest I can't imagine the Marlboro man undergoing chemo for lung cancer. Or standing outside a bar smoking in the cold with all the middle aged office wo
by mustpax 17y ago
To be honest I can't imagine the Marlboro man undergoing chemo for lung cancer. Or standing outside a bar smoking in the cold with all the middle aged office workers.
What I'm trying to say is that he's a pretty two dimensional fictional character. I don't think we bother to fill in any details beyond the few that he signifies: freedom, smoking, epic marketing triumph and whatnot.
- byrneseyeview 17y agoExactly! That's probably why people don't sell chemo treatments or smoking regulations by talking about cowboys. What I'm saying is that people smoke to be someone, and very few people want to be the person who smokes these. I guess if they invest as much in branding as Phillip Morris did, they can change that. But it's probably not worth it.
- aswanson 17y agoI'm guessing most people smoke because they are addicted to nictone. I can't see the be someone motive extending far beyond 10th grade.
- silentbicycle 17y agoIt's probably something for people rationalizing their brain's begging for nicotine to latch onto, though. Same with, "...but if I quit smoking, I'll gain weight!" Like people struggling with alcohol reminding themselves that red wine is good for their heart, as long as they stop after one glass.
- aswanson 17y agoI don't know. Nicotine is an ugly addiction that I read somewhere is almost as strong as crack. And crackheads don't seem to need any rationalization for what they do other than the high. I think the same mechanism, for most smokers, is at work here, given the power of the habit.
- silentbicycle 17y agoWell, part of it is that cigarettes are ubiquitous in many places, and considerably more socially acceptable than crack. I don't smoke, but I know people who have had to completely avoid bars and coffeehouses for months at a time because they associated them with smoking.
- anigbrowl 17y agoNo, people do not smoke 'to be someone'. That's a wild generalization. It may well have something to do with why people start smoking, but very little to do with why people keep smoking. I smoke, but frankly I'm embarrassed about it because my reason for doing so is purely addictive. I find this especially ironic considering that I have used most illegal drugs but have never had any serious difficulty when I decided to quit doing so. I'm thinking about the e-cigarette thing because it offers a viable harm reduction option more likely to result in a permaquit.