Smoking And The Media
From being portrayed as a medical cure-all, smoking advertising has fallen a long way since the early days of print and television media. Battered by lawsuits contesting their claims, the cigarette companies are much more careful these days, and tend to use more subtle ways to promote smoking.
Even though many sources of advertising have now dried up for the big cigarette brands, from sports to television and film, they still manage to get their message out there. It is especially important for parents to realise this, as it is easy for children to be subconsciously influenced.
We can break tobacco advertising down into three separate areas, listed by their importance - TV/Film, Print and Sports/Events.
TV/Film
Cigarettes were one of the first products to be advertised on television, and the medium has long been proven the most effective increasing cigarette sales. TV advertising is banned in most countries now, but in the early days of television cigarettes were a staple on the small screen.
Smart advertising executives achieved a very close integration between the programming and the tobacco brand. One of the first news shows, the Camel News Caravan, had a burning cigarette always visible on the screen. And the famous newscaster Edward Murrow, who stood again McCarthyism, smoked a cigarette in almost every scene. Testament to the dangers of tobacco, Murrow actually died of lung cancer in 1965.
Science and television continued to develop during the sixties. So when the scientific arguments became undeniable, cigarette advertising quickly began to disappear from the screen. This is when the tobacco companies started to become more insidious in their techniques.
Big Tobacco has, for many years now, been paying Hollywood production companies to place cigarettes in movies. Robert Richards, a producer, summed up the companies' attitude in 1972, "Film is better than any commercial that has been run on television or in any magazine, because the audience is totally unaware of any sponsor involvement."
Although this practise was uncovered by Congress in 1989, and any such advertising now has to be reported, the use of cigarettes in film continues. Any time that you see a lead actor, or even a bad guy, lighting up a cigarette, chances are that a small part of Big Tobacco's advertising budget has just gone to work.
Print
Twenty years after the health implications of smoking became clear, US regulators started to crack down on tobacco promotion in print, on TV and on the radio. The 1970 Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act banned TV and radio adverts, but didn't go so far as to ban print advertisements.
Instead, warnings were introduced to the cigarette packets. The first such warning was, "the Surgeon General Has Determined that Cigarette Smoking Is Dangerous to Your Health" but was found to have little impact on smoking habits. In 1984, this failure prompted a new selection of warnings, which we list here.
"Cigarette Smoke Contains Carbon Monoxide"
"Smoking by Pregnant Women May Result in Fetal Injury, Premature Birth, and Low Birth Weight"
"Quitting Smoking Now Greatly Reduces Serious Risks to Your Health"
These warnings are still used today. Other countries have taken this idea further, with warnings of sexual impotence (Brazil), pictures of a dead lung cancer victim (India), or an admonition that nicotine is as addictive as heroin or cocaine (Canada).
As for newspapers, many US publishers continue to print tobacco advertising. Although there are no regulations currently in place to prevent this, some editors have taken it upon themselves to 'kick the habit'. The New York Times set a fine example in 1999, when it ended its use of tobacco sponsors.
Sports/Events
Many sports have depended heavily on tobacco sponsorship for their survival, so it has been harder to eliminate this completely. However, with countries like the UK leading the way with a total ban, sports advertising is finally being phased out.
The most international sport to receive tobacco sponsorship has been Formula 1. With races spread out over the world, teams are subject to local regulation for every session. They have therefore had to remove sponsorship from their clothing for certain races, starting with Germany in 1976 and then the UK in 1984. Currently, there is only one team that uses tobacco sponsorship, Ferrari, and it can only do so at a very limited number of circuits.
Other sports that have used tobacco as a sponsor include NASCAR, snooker, pool, darts, cricket, ice hockey and golf. All of these sports have now either reduced or completely eliminated the practise.