I can t seem to find a reason, smokers are smokers, no matter what age they are, and packs of cigarettes are money, no matter who buys them. It s hard to believe that kids smoking cigarettes is bad business for Phillip Morris. Sure it s unethical, illegal, disgusting, and creepy, but it sure isn t bad for business. It might be bad for business if they cared about what most of America thought, but by targeting youth s in recent ad campaigns, it s clear to most Americans that they don t care. Three thousand teens start smoking every day.
Sex sells, especially to teens with raging hormones.
And sex sells cigarettes, especially if the ads are placed in magazines or other publications frequently read by teens. In response to questions by anti-tobacco lobbyists regarding this new campaign, Virginia Slims said that it is absolutely not telling kids to ignore their parents, doctors, and Surgeon General s warnings regarding the negative effects of cigarettes on a person health. However, despite their statement, this ad not only seemingly targets a younger age group, particularly those under 18, but also has been run in several magazines that teens read. It s as if they ve been caught with a smoking pistol and they re trying to say it s not there, that it s simply a hallucination. For years now smokers have been dying from disease, including lung cancer and emphysema, and now, it seems, the tobacco industry is trying to replace these dying customers with new healthy ones, new young ones, new teenage ones.