"Singing" Numbers...

Today I thought I would introduce you to the murky world of Tobacco Control.

It is necessarily dirty, because the science simply does not support their ideology. Instead they play on emotion.

Here is a typical "advisory" from them. I have underlined the big fat lie in case you miss it:

Numbers That "Sing"

"Tobacco control advocates can develop motivating messages by presenting statistics in ways that convey scientific truths and also move an audience emotionally. This technique has been called "creative epidemiology" or "social math"—mathematics applied for a social purpose.

Over a decade ago, public health economist Ken Warner used this technique in a message on the death toll of smoking: "Smoking kills more people than heroin, cocaine, alcohol, AIDS, fires, homicide, suicide, and automobile accidents combined."

This message is logically sound; it is based on scrupulous scientific data. But it conveys much more than facts.

First, the message compares deaths from tobacco with deaths from other causes that readily command public action throughout the world, such as illicit drug use and AIDS. This comparison carries the "moral authority" that smoking merits at least the same level of public action. Second, the message associates death from smoking with death from other terrible scourges that arouse our compassion and fear. It thus meets all of Klein's criteria for an effective advocacy message: It is logically persuasive, morally authoritative, and capable of evoking passion".

Tobacco Control advocates have no idea what scruples are. They learnt well from the front runners, led by Fritz Lickint in 1930's Germany. They didn't simply take a leaf out of his book, they added several chapters. I do not doubt that the TC zealots imagine themselves to be on a holy crusade, but somehow they became corrupted. They are severely addicted to cashotine. The cashotine is supplied by the pharmaceutical companies so that TC merely becomes the marketing division for their "healthy" nicotine.

Crusaders are always blinkered when they fight the "good" fight. The truth got left by the roadside decades ago, and the simplest questions have them scratching their heads. If you ever lock horns with one of these delusional people, ask them any one of the following questions, and I guarantee they will either a) run away b) insult you or c) insult you and then run away.

1. If smoking causes lung cancer, why are lung cancer cases rising while smoker prevalence is falling?

2. If second hand smoke kills so many people, can you name three "victims"?

3. If SHS is so deadly, why have insurance companies never added a loading for those exposed to it?

They like to bring up asthma. You could ask them why, as our nation's exposure to SHS decreases, asthma cases increase? In 2004 we had 3.1 million asthma sufferers. In 2007 that number rose to 5.4 million.

When we get right down to it, what they dislike is the smell. Luckily, a solution exists to deal with that. The boffins call it ventilation. This ventilation has been keeping our operating theatres germ free for decades. The same ventilation has been keeping our scientists safe as they deal with all manner of nasty viruses as part of their everyday work. Indoor welders are protected by them. Factory workers depend on them to keep them safe from airborne particulates.

You know what? We have seen them work in pubs and clubs too.

When you dive into the cesspit that is tobacco control, please remember that the science does not support them, they are known to use brainwashing methods such as the Delphi Technique, and everything you see is plausible, but fabricated. Without a "plausible" story, the cashotine dries up.

Be careful in there.....