How Big Tobacco Won Reporting
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I’m trying something new here that I’ve never done before. For the past year or so I’ve gotten into the citizen journalism game, specifically around exposing corruption, most notably in the health and medical space. (Since our media isn’t doing it, someone’s got to!)
To spend time here takes away from time devoted to my businesses which I still need to do to pay the bills.
With my recent positive experience in using GoFundMe after my house burned down, the idea occurred to me to try this method out.
If you’ve enjoyed my journalistic endeavors (Medical Monopoly Musings , Pandemic Updates , or my writing in general) than this is an opportunity to support me doing more of it.
At this time I feel like it is the more important work to be done. But as I said while this new endeavor is passionate…it has not been profitable.
I want to create the following special report. I will be giving it away for free when it is done. But this is a chance to support this work so I can spend less time in my businesses specifically and more so here.
How Big Tobacco Won
Important Lessons for Today in Corporate Power Over Law, Science, Media and Culture
“Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it”
We’ve all heard this phrase. But as it’s become somewhat cliché, few really aim to understand history especially what I would call its seedy underbelly.
Everyone I know is vaguely aware of what Big Tobacco did in peddling cigarettes. Vaguely being the key word.
Ask yourself how did they get away with being hugely profitable for decades and decades when the science was actually quite clear about these risks?
Although many think that Big Tobacco eventually lost I think it is more accurate to say that they won instead. The fact is all these companies are still around and hugely profitable. I’d say that is winning especially given the unethical behavior and crimes they committed.
I would also argue you MUST understand the details. Why? Not because you’ll get tricked by Big Tobacco in the future. But because these same strategies and tactics are used by industry after industry. Many industries are successfully using them today and most people are none the wiser.
They haven’t learned THIS history.
But some did. The PR firms that Big Tobacco worked with learned. The predatory CEO’s that put profits over people learned. Those that would control scientific opinion learned. Those that would buy politicians and regulators learned.
Although they manipulated public perception for decades before, we can say the conspiracy really began to turn darker in 1953 when the tobacco companies colluded seeking to control scientific opinion.
It wasn’t until 2004, over 50 years later, that they were charge and found guilty of these crimes.
50 years…but some believe conspiracies don’t ever actually happen. (This was a Racketeer and Corrupt Organizations, aka RICO case which means conspiracy by a group.)
Not only must you understand what has become known as the “Tobacco Playbook,” but you need to find out how this was brought into the 21st century right as Big Tobacco was finally falling from grace.
Still, you can NOT understand how it is being done today, if you don’t understand the genesis of these methods as pioneered by Big Tobacco. The truth is that tobacco is simpler than what has gone on in other industries for a variety of factors that I plan to explore.
In addition to the written PDF form, I’ll be reading this aloud and posting it to the Health Sovereign Podcast .
(Actually I did cover this in a smaller way in an earlier podcast episode which you can find here . That gives you just a taste of what is to come.)
I don’t know how long it will be in its final form. And I don’t have a specific due date. Just a vague idea that the more money I raise that faster and better I’ll engage in this project.
If you’d like to support my endeavors to expose these corrupting strategies then here’s your chance.
To spend time here takes away from time devoted to my businesses which I still need to do to pay the bills.
With my recent positive experience in using GoFundMe after my house burned down, the idea occurred to me to try this method out.
If you’ve enjoyed my journalistic endeavors (Medical Monopoly Musings , Pandemic Updates , or my writing in general) than this is an opportunity to support me doing more of it.
At this time I feel like it is the more important work to be done. But as I said while this new endeavor is passionate…it has not been profitable.
I want to create the following special report. I will be giving it away for free when it is done. But this is a chance to support this work so I can spend less time in my businesses specifically and more so here.
How Big Tobacco Won
Important Lessons for Today in Corporate Power Over Law, Science, Media and Culture
“Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it”
We’ve all heard this phrase. But as it’s become somewhat cliché, few really aim to understand history especially what I would call its seedy underbelly.
Everyone I know is vaguely aware of what Big Tobacco did in peddling cigarettes. Vaguely being the key word.
Ask yourself how did they get away with being hugely profitable for decades and decades when the science was actually quite clear about these risks?
Although many think that Big Tobacco eventually lost I think it is more accurate to say that they won instead. The fact is all these companies are still around and hugely profitable. I’d say that is winning especially given the unethical behavior and crimes they committed.
I would also argue you MUST understand the details. Why? Not because you’ll get tricked by Big Tobacco in the future. But because these same strategies and tactics are used by industry after industry. Many industries are successfully using them today and most people are none the wiser.
They haven’t learned THIS history.
But some did. The PR firms that Big Tobacco worked with learned. The predatory CEO’s that put profits over people learned. Those that would control scientific opinion learned. Those that would buy politicians and regulators learned.
Although they manipulated public perception for decades before, we can say the conspiracy really began to turn darker in 1953 when the tobacco companies colluded seeking to control scientific opinion.
It wasn’t until 2004, over 50 years later, that they were charge and found guilty of these crimes.
50 years…but some believe conspiracies don’t ever actually happen. (This was a Racketeer and Corrupt Organizations, aka RICO case which means conspiracy by a group.)
Not only must you understand what has become known as the “Tobacco Playbook,” but you need to find out how this was brought into the 21st century right as Big Tobacco was finally falling from grace.
Still, you can NOT understand how it is being done today, if you don’t understand the genesis of these methods as pioneered by Big Tobacco. The truth is that tobacco is simpler than what has gone on in other industries for a variety of factors that I plan to explore.
In addition to the written PDF form, I’ll be reading this aloud and posting it to the Health Sovereign Podcast .
(Actually I did cover this in a smaller way in an earlier podcast episode which you can find here . That gives you just a taste of what is to come.)
I don’t know how long it will be in its final form. And I don’t have a specific due date. Just a vague idea that the more money I raise that faster and better I’ll engage in this project.
If you’d like to support my endeavors to expose these corrupting strategies then here’s your chance.
Organizer
Logan Christopher
Organizer
Medford, OR
