Cigarettes are disgusting.
Before the ’50s, there was little knowledge of the health risks associated with smoking. They were marketed as glamorous, sophisticated, and, in some cases, healthy.
Today, however, we know that they’re deadly. This heinous product would never be allowed to enter the market today. Cigarettes are disgusting, and the corrupt industry that continues to push them is socially irresponsible and ethically reprehensible. It is the duty of governments around the world to ban the sale of cigarettes and save their citizens from the industry’s treachery.
Cigarette companies peddle their products by appealing to children and taking advantage of the unshakeable grasp of addiction. Stats Canada says that in 2011, “smokers continued to report, on average, they smoked their first whole cigarette at the age of 16, and started smoking regularly at 18 years of age.”
The cigarette companies know this. The government knows this. However, because the cigarette companies are not “directly” advertising to children, the government has no recourse to punish them for getting youth addicted.
The cigarette industry is massive. According to a July 2017 report in The Guardian, the five biggest cigarette companies made a combined profit of around $35 billion in 2016.
Their business plan is essentially as follows: get children to try their product, burden them with a lifelong addiction, and squeeze every penny out of them as they slowly die. If a person buys two packs of cigarettes a week for a year, they’re spending around $1,450. Smokers do not want to be smokers—is there any other habit on which people are willing to spend nearly $1,500 a year that they don’t even like (besides golf)? One study of American smokers found that an astonishing 70 percent of smokers wish that they didn’t smoke but are unable to quit.
Environmentally, cigarette butts are atrocious. They contain toxic compounds that contaminate water, are mostly made of plastic so don’t break down, and are among the most littered items in the world. The Philip Morris mission statement states: “We are committed to being a great employer and a good corporate citizen. We strive to be environmentally and socially responsible.” Have you ever heard such blatant lies? The only “good” thing that the cigarette industry does for anyone is make tons of money for people who are willing to invest in one of the sleaziest, dirtiest, most despicable industries on the planet.
The Canadian government puts many restrictions on smoking, but they do little to actually push our country away from cigarette consumption. According to the Capital Regional District website, “Smoking is prohibited within seven (7) metres of bus stops as well as doorways, windows and air intakes of publicly accessible buildings.” This effectively makes smoking illegal in downtown Victoria. That’s not a suggestion—it’s a hard and fast law. However, because the enforcement of this law is negligible, smokers don’t take it seriously. Based on these laws, each person caught smoking in a no-smoking area should be paying up to $2,000 in fines. This should be viciously enforced while the country moves toward banning the product altogether.
Five-cent deposits should be placed on cigarette butts as they are on aluminum cans to help prevent litter. Government-funded research should look for innovative ways to help addicts quit. And cigarette companies should be taxed into oblivion to fund these programs.