Merchants of Doubt

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Merchants of Doubt

• Tobacco industry Public Relations or Propaganda?

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Public relations (PR)

• is a field concerned with maintaining public
  image for businesses, non-profit organizations or
  high-profile people, such as celebrities and
  politicians.
• the practice of managing communication between an
  organization and its publics

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Propaganda

• a mode of discourse
• intended to persuade, to manipulate, and to
  indoctrinate its audience
• into accepting policies
• that they might not otherwise support.

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Propaganda

• Propaganda is a discourse that legitimates
  certain interests and polices while providing a
  one-sided, simplified, and distorted, but not
  necessarily totally untrue, view of events or
  people.

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The Fight over Secondhand Smoke

• By the mid-1980s, nearly every American knew that
  smoking caused cancer and other illnesses
• However, the tobacco industry successfully
  promoted and sustained doubt.
• When the EPA (Environment Protection Agency) took
  steps to limit indoor smoking, the Tobacco
  Institute set out to challenge the EPA.

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Secondhand smoke

• The Industry knew of the dangers of secondhand
  smoking by the early 1970s
• The industry own research had found that
  sidestream smoke contains more toxic chemicals
  than mainstream smoke
• The states were moving actively against tobacco.
• By 1979 all states (except Nevada and Kentucky)
  had some antismoking legislation

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Research

• A landmark study National Cancer Center
  Research Institute in Tokyo (impact on women
  whose husbands smoke).
• Also, a study in New England Journal of Medicine
  (impact of smokers on co-workers)
• Publicly the industry criticized the studies
• Privately they agreed with the studies

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The response of the tobacco industry

• Philip Morris vice-president in 1993
• All of us whose livelihoods depend upon tobacco
  sales must band together into u unified force
• The bottom line is if smokers cant smoke at
  work, in stores, restaurants, they are going to
  smoke less

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The first response increased advertisement

• Presenting cigarettes as a symbol of strength,
  manhood, courage

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From L.A. Times, May 1994

• Brown Williamson Tobacco Corp. spent more than
  950,000 between 1979 to 1983 to feature its
  cigarette brands in more than 20
  movies--including payments of at least 300,000
  to action film star Sylvester Stallone.
• The payments took the form of checks, cash and
  merchandise--including jewelry and automobiles
  for such stars as Paul Newman, Sean Connery and
  Stallone

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Disinformation campaign

• The Center for Tobacco Research set up a special
  projects office to deal with secondhand smoke
• The development of opposing scientific evidence
• Expert witnesses
• Industry sponsored conferences to challenge the
  emerging scientific consensus

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Concealing the source

• Several projects were run as law firms
• to conceal their identity and
• to shield these efforts from scrutiny using
  attorney-client privilege

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Attacking regulations from many different sides

• Restrictions on smoking in the workplace seen as
  employment discrimination
• Increased taxation of tobacco products seen as
  frivolous taxation in general, tax and spend
  attitude, big government
• Generally restrictions on smoking seen as Nanny
  government, overprotective.

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In 1991 Philip Morris outlined four objectives
specifically related to secondhand smoke

• Fight bans on smoking in workplaces
• Maintain smoking areas in transportation
  facilities (e.g., airports)
• Promote the idea of accommodationthat smokers
  had the right to be accommodated
• Maintain the controversy about tobacco smoke in
  public and scientific forums.

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The EPA Report in Dec 1992 Respiratory Health
Effects of Passive Smoking

• The report attributed 3,000 lung cancer deaths
  and 150,000 to 300,000 cases of bronchitis and
  pneumonia in children per year to secondhand
  smoke
• Thousands of cases of aggravated asthma
• Tobacco was considered a class A carcinogen
• But overall the report was cautious many other
  effects of secondhand smoke were left for further
  research

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The EPA Report the tobacco industry attack

• Tobacco industry attacked the report and other
  studies by questioning their
• methodology,
• consistency
• evidence, and
• statistical significance

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Scientists for Hire

• The Tobacco Industry hired a number of well know
  scientists willing to fight science
• One of them, Fred Singer, established Science and
  Environment Policy Project to defend tobacco
  industry

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The use of Public Relations Firms

• APCO worldwide
• In the early 1990s, APCO worked closely with
  tobacco industry to
• develop scientific articles to defend
  secondhand smoke and
• promote the idea that the EPA work was junk
  science

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Bad Science A Resource Book

• 200-page book published by tobacco industry
• Pretended to be scientific work fighting bad
  science
• It propagated the idea that science is
  manipulated by government agencies for political
  purposes

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Bad Science A Resource Book

• It claimed that
• Too often science is manipulated to fulfill a
  political agenda
• No agency is more guilty of adjusting science to
  support preconceived public policy prescriptions
  than the EPA
• Like many studies before it, EPAs recent report
  concerning environmental tobacco smoke allows
  political objectives to guide scientific research

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Overall

• In pluralistic societies, all social, economic,
  and political forces fight for their rights,
  recognition, and interests
• Sometimes the fight is honest
• Sometimes is not
• Citizens need to be aware of the methods used in
  political propaganda, advertisement, and in
  public relations

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