Monday, November 17, 2008

Hey, baby, got a light?



Yes, even babies were fair game in the cigarette advertisments of the 1950s. Oh, and this man isn't really a doctor. But - hey - anything goes when it comes to peddling tobacco.
Find out how cigarette companies manipulated images and twisted the truth to get Americans to light up.

5 comments:

Nathan Heller said...

Seriously, this almost makes me feel stupid for smoking.

Unknown said...

I'd always felt stupid for smoking, especially since I'd been adamantly anti-smoking for the first eighteen years of my life. I knew well what the risks were.

The advertising never convinced me. Unfortunately what happened was I got a job as a projectionist in the cinema and when everyone went out for their breaks they all sat around smoking cigarettes and eventually I was drawn in too. Old fashioned peer pressure. And once I'd started it was very hard to stop; and I tried everything. Gum, patches, hypnosis. Eventually it was just the thought that if I ever found myself stranded on a desert my first concern wouldn't be food or water but where the hell would I find a smoke? I'd have probably ended up trying to roll up bits of seaweed.

Nathan Heller said...

I've tried to stop twice and failed miserably (or joyfully, depending on perspective) each time. I was in the same boat... I didn't smoke for the first 17 years of my life and berated my dad for his nicotine habit, then as soon as I got to college I decided I wanted to be David Bowie after watching a Charlie Rose interview with him. Bowie can make a cigarette look like a sixth finger, he's so cool. Yes, that's right; I started smoking because I wanted to look like David Bowie talking to Charlie Rose.

The ads have really never had an effect on me, as far as cigarette ads go. But the anti-smoking ads have the opposite effect. I will reach for a pack every time one of those ads come on.

NC

Anonymous said...

The link to the exhibition isn't working (anymore). The correct URL should probably be "http://lane.stanford.edu/tobacco" (just substitute the 'www' with 'lane').

Anyhow, I think its a time for a smoke...

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