Headline reads "WIDOW BEATS BIG TOBACCO"
The story is about Jessie Williams who died of lung cancer. The family sued Phillip Morris and won a pile of millions. Of course the tobacco Co appealed the settlement. That was in 99. This week the courts dropped the appeal and awarded Mrs Williams 79.5 MILLION!! Why does this relate to radio??????? Jessie was the Janitor at KISN Radio for years. Jessie was a class act guy, and everyone loved Jessie at the Mighty 91. Jessie's uniform had the huge KISN logo on the back of his shirt. I have never seen a more dapper janitor in my life.

So Jessie smokes packs of smokes a day on own free will, dies then the family that sat back and did nothing gets rich off it?

This is why other countries either hate us or envy us.

Laws were enacted by elected officials across the land. A jury of peers awarded him a victory, numerous higher courts upheld the ruling and the right leaning Supreme Court refused to reverse the decision. What did you want us to do Mc74? Be like Iran and a have a select few determine the rules of the land?

I wonder if Jessie would have wanted his family to sue Philip Morris on his behalf?

I don't see big awards being handed out down the road as most "younger" smokers these days will not be able to argue that the tobacco company deceived them as was common industry practice during the Jessie era.

Yes, this far more money than this family needs but it sends a message to ALL manufactures of consumer products -- DON'T LIE! For that, its worth every penny.

I don't think what Jessie thought matters, it was the family that lost him, likewise it was the family that was decieved by the tabacco companies as well.

This is all about legal precedent. Watch the lawsuits roll in now that SCOTUS has ruled.

New law could increase the price per pack 61 cents, think it will make any difference?

My headline would be "Former radio guy beats Jim Beam and Jack Daniels, one bottle at a time". ;-)

So Jessie smokes packs of smokes a day on own free will, dies then the family that sat back and did nothing gets rich off it?
It took a little thinking, but IIRC 10 years ago when the original award was calculated I'm thinking there was a penalty clause built in by calculating what was believed to be the number of packs of cigarettes he ever purchased. Additionally, IIRC, the amount of the damages had to do with the tobacco companies willingly and knowingly selling a product that they knew would eventually kill its users.

That's it exactly.

Tobacco is almost unregulated. It's everywhere, and it's very, very harmful.

When we know absolutely that it's a killer today, why we continue to sell it everywhere is beyond me. IMHO, the smoking bans are a good thing. It's getting harder to smoke and the negative norms are sinking in.

This next generation will have it easier than prior ones and that's good.

It should be legal to smoke tobacco, but it should be for inquiring customers only. Those companies know exactly what they are doing and the cost to society is very, very high.

We don't need that market and just about everybody knows it.

Also IMHO, the only way the problem is going to get addressed is if the cost of making that money is driven up to the point where maybe it doesn't make all that much sense to make that money, and the social norms around tobacco change enough to bring political will to back those efforts.

The lawsuits are part of that, and it's a perfectly valid check and balance.

If this were a lawsuit about kiddie toys with some horrible chemical in them, that parents and kids really liked to buy, and the company sold them anyway, we would not be having this discussion.

Tobacco is no different.

Mc74 wrote:

So Jessie smokes packs of smokes a day on own free will, dies then the family that sat back and did nothing gets rich off it?


And the fact they hooked him with a powerfully addictive drug has nothing to do with it, right?

then take it one step further.

If you are identified as a smoker, you are not eligible for any type of government subsidized heathcare and must find a private insurer.

If you are identified as a user of any substance known to cause heath related problems including legal and illegal drugs, high sugar and fat content foods, or engage in activites that may cause injury either work or recreational in nature, then you must provide your own heathcare coverage.

That would make people totally responsible for their own actions.

Healthcare issue solved.

At the risk of taking this thread even further OT...

>>That would make people totally responsible for their own actions. <<

But in the 21st century, people think that "taking responsibility for their own actions" isn't their responsibility.

I remember the warnings on smoking being bad and that you shouldn't way back in the 60's.
Anyone from the 70's on that didn't know or wasn't aware just hasn't paid attention or refused to believe it.
Yeah, I did for a while way back then but decided around 1970 that I didn't like it and just quit.
I guess I am not an addictive type.
Except Mountain Dew but I have kicked that, too.

I forget the date that they took advertising off radio and TV but it was somewhere back then.

I picked up a bargain (?) DVD in Big Lots of 40 Jack Benny episodes. I watched the first one, so far, and it was laden with embedded promotions for American Tobacco Company and Lucky Strike. Jack went to the company to get his contract renewed (the story line) and it was like a 30 minute infomercial and the greatness of the American Tobacco Company. This episode was done probably around 1950.
Remember, LSMFT!
And the other one....everyone who smokes is gonna die!

I figure anyone in my general age group is pretty much the dividing line. After that, the facts were fairly well known. Before, there was still some question about it and not long before, they were advising people of the health benefits of smoking! I would think Jesse Williams definitely falls into the latter! I believe January 1, 1971 was the end of cigarette advertising on radio and television. They tried to get around it for awhile with small cigars but that was soon banished also.

I've picked up a number of Dragnet episodes on DVD...and heard radio episodes on www.otr.net, and the commercials that touted the benefits of smoking Fatimas were more than blatant. After circa 1953, the Fatima brand was discontinued and replaced by Chesterfield. I don't recall which cigarette sponsored Sgt. Bilko, but their commercials were integrated into the program so slickly that we were always fooled. And you can even go to Youtube and find Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble taking a smoke break with Winstons while Wilma and Betty did housework.

Here's a link that smoke break:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDamNtQpu2w

No wonder the Dinosaurs died off!

Dont try and tell me they hooked him. The didn't. Guess what, I tried to smoke a few times and they didnt hook me. Nobody I know was hooked from the start.

Its a choice.

Did you see what just flew by? It was a spark! There goes another one and another! I'm just going to stand back now.

There is coercion and there is enabling.

Everybody chooses. That's a given. There is no action without this. That is just how humans are. We choose to do stuff, or stuff doesn't happen, unless it's really, really basic stuff like breathing.

When we "make" somebody do something, really what we do is make the value of said choice worth choosing in a way that the other party sees as favorable.

I don't think we can make a case for big tobacco coercing anybody into smoking.

That brings me to enabling.

When we choose to do something, we have essentially some awareness of a plan of action that experience tells us might be viable. So then, if we don't know there is a million dollars hidden under the porch, it is extremely unlikely we will just choose to investigate the porch.

Our past experience might cause us to consider that as a viable choice, but without that past experience, it's simply one of many possible random actions.

We don't do those, but for extreme boredom, or confusion, or something similar.

Enablers reinforce choices by making them available choices. That's awareness of the action, and the perception that it might be viable. When we run an AD that is simple feature / benefit, we are trying to enable a choice. This is simple advocacy with the intent to sell a product or service that is otherwise benign.

When we do more than that, meaning we act with intent to bias the choice toward viable, when it's fairly clear that it's not known viable, or that we have a self-interest in a successful choice by another, that's coercion. Tobacco has plenty of warnings and restrictions, which really take coercion off the table. I agree with most people that big tobacco didn't coerce anyone.

Tobacco is a huge enabler though, and that's not often discussed! The stuff is everywhere, and the negative impact is always downplayed, and the product is always positioned in terms of basic needs / wants. (sex, pleasure, etc...)

The enabling, given the danger of the product, is wrong in my view.

Enabling in and of itself isn't a bad thing, and that makes the discussion complex.

"You know that stuff will kill you, but sure, I'll make a beer run, what kind do you want honey?" ---> this is harmful, or bad, enabling. This is the kind of enabling the tobacco companies entertain daily.

At the end of the day, Tobacco companies seek to make a profit. They flat out are not coercing people into using their product, but they are serious enablers, while at the same time trying to also appear as the innocent, "it's their choice" people just filling a need.

They advertise with sex, they produce the product in ways that increase dependence, produce it in many forms, most notably easy to consume versions aimed at enabling people to continue their habit where smoking bans are in place. It goes on and on.

If we have determined that smoking is bad, and it is bad, then continuing to permit large companies to make profits off of the habit and enable like they do, doesn't make a lot of sense.

That's what we need to fix.

If we really want to deal with tobacco, it needs to be done Disneyland style. Go to a Disney park, and try to see where they sell the smokes. You can't! If you inquire however, you are treated well, and told where and when the product is available.

Until we do that, we are going to have a significant tobacco problem. No need to infringe on rights. Just stop the enabling. When that stops, norms will shift, and the problem will drop to a mere fraction of what it is today, and that's as good as it can get, without actually considering peoples core rights, which I don't think is necessary.

These kinds of lawsuits put the pressure on to do that. They present as favorable affirmations toward that goal. Big tobacco is guilty of this enabling. They lobby for lax regulation, and they promote their product in compelling ways and in many places (actually as many places as is possible) and in many forms.

Public opinion is growing increasingly negative, and that's starting to show in the form of bans and other legislation aimed at reducing the impact of tobacco. We are slowly reaching a state where we can actually talk about these things and make progress. That's good.

The only real defense the big tobacco companies have is that "people should have a right to smoke." Many agree with this, but the question of enabling is often left off the table, leaving us with an unbalanced environment where fairly draconian things are being tried to solve a problem, when more simple solutions would be effective, if considered.

I dont buy much of these kinds of lawsuits. You have to take responsibility for you own actions. I could see issues with this in the days before the label warnings which started in 1964 BTW. I remember reading it, it was just about lung cancer in the beginning.

I read the warning as I lit up at age 13 ! I knew how to read pretty well. But at that age, I was bullit proof. Gee I might have the teenager bullit proof complaint in court...they didnt say that teenagers have poor judgement and may not believe this warning label.

Eventually, about 20 years later, they put all the other stuff on the label warning, Emphysema, Cancer, heart disease etc.

So I suppose Jessie started smoking well before 1964 and that is how his family got the money?? I wonder what other issues along those lines came up firming the plaintiff's position ? Be interesting to read some of that court record.

Be interesting to read some of that court record.

The consevative SCOTUS read the same and didn't overturn the rulings of the lower court.

They used to have commercials that would say more doctors smoked this brand that that one! They actually said a person would be healthier if they smoked! This is not a choice under those circumstances and after you start, it's extremely addicting and since it's general knowledge(or lack of)that it's healthy, there's no reason to stop! Also, if someone actually died of lung cancer, they didn't know it was attributed to cigarette smoking! You can't sit here in 2009 and say someone in 1910 was stupid not to wear a seatbelt!