http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/7373667.stm
There’s a report at the BBC today of the adverts that created most complaints in 2007. The winner by a fair margin was the Department Of Health’s anti-smoking advert which featured people being hooked in the mouth rather viciously, like a fish on a line, and then dragged along the ground (you can watch the advert at the above link). 774 people complained about them, saying that the adverts were “offensive, frightening and distressing”. The complaints were upheld on the basis that they “have the potential to frighten and distress youngsters”.
But isn’t that the point? Research has shown that shock tactics are the ones most likely to succeed, and if a few children get shocked by the adverts and as a result never become smokers then isn’t that a good thing?
This leads neatly into the subject of the UK turning into a “nanny state”. There are lots of examples of this, but smoking is perhaps the most visible one. Is it really any of the state’s damned business if people choose to smoke themselves to death? We make risk assessments all the time as we live. Driving a car is a risk, being in a major public building or mass transit system is a risk, even walking down the pavement carries the risk that a car will mow you down as a blade of grass is cut by a lawn-mower. Smoking is the same.
Smokers know the risks and they choose to carry on doing it and I support their tight to slowly poison themselves. The government makes money out of it anyway. The cost to the NHS from treating smokers is far less than the revenue the government makes from the “sin tax” on ciggies. But I do think that adverts specifically aimed at children to persuade them not to start smoking is probably a good thing.
I also think that employees deserve protecting from the smoke of others and for that reason I support the recent ban on smoking in bars and restaurants. Popping outside to appease your addiction doesn’t seem like too much of an inconvenience really. The argument the other way is that the staff don’t have to work in those places, but that isn’t entirely fair. Bar staff tend to be people who are only able to work at specific times of the day such as students and single-parents, and bar work is one of the few options available to them.
Cheers, Tom.
30/04/08 @ 12:11