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It's one thing when you decide that you love smoking, but don't you agree
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that it's kind of hard to understand how, after 1964, anyone could still
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want to lead a tobacco company?
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The surgeon general's report from 1964 clearly and unmistakably
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linked smoking to lung cancer.
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And yet, here we are.
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It's 2023 and smoking is still a thing, a huge thing, actually.
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People are still running tobacco companies.
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Managers are still risking smokers lives.
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A statement from 1979 by Ross Millhiser, then vice chairman or
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Phillip Morris, sheds some light on how this is even possible.
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“ I love cigarettes.
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It's one of the things that makes life really worth living.”
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So, Phillip Morris was and probably is run by people who actually love smoking.
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That's what's so hard to understand for people who believe in better.
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When you see so very clearly why some behavior is bad, it's easy to
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jump to the conclusion that there is no other way of looking at things.
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But different people can have vastly different value systems.
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Millhiser didn't even need to disagree with the health reports.
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For him, it was sufficient that he loved smoking.
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He wanted to smoke despite the impact on his health.
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You don't change people like Millhiser by insisting stronger, louder, or longer
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on how you are right and they are wrong.
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They know that.
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But they still decide to make different life choices than you do.
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No matter how mad you get at this stance, you won't change it.
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Your effort is better spent at taking actions that have an
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actual chance of making an impact.
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For example, by choosing an audience you actually can convince, like
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for example, the government.
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Or by speaking about the things that make life even more
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worth living than a cigarette.
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Better even, by inventing these things and then speaking about them.
