Opinion ID: 1443950
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Application of the MSA to the advertisements

Text: With the boundaries established by Section VI of the MSA in mind, we turn to whether the advertisements before us violate that provision. They do not. The advertisements are not invidious, disparaging, offensive, belligerent, nor fiercely or severely critical. Nor are they denouncements that are both unfounded and abusive or slanderous. The tone of the youth in the advertisements is usually expressly friendly or helpful, even if implicitly drawing attention to unflattering facts about past actions of tobacco companies or their employees. The youth's messages, and thus the advertisements themselves, do not qualify as personal attacks or vilifications. To illustrate the basis for our conclusions, we will use the same four advertisements that Lorillard has presented as examples of breaches of contract by ALF. In Shredder, the youths are salesman expressly offering help to an unnamed tobacco company. They are seeking to sell a tobacco company a machine that it could use based on its history and possible need of shredding many documents. At no point do the youths expressly criticize the company for the contents of the documents or the possibility of shredding them. They reveal no disparaging behavior, belligerence, or fierce criticism. Throughout the advertisement, the youths refer to only two publications. The first report contains the phrase, Today's teenager is tomorrow's potential regular customer. The second report gauges smoking patterns of sixth graders. Lorillard does not dispute that these reports exist. The youths do not expressly criticize the company for the reports, nor do they unjustly denounce the company for having them. They merely call the reports embarrassing. They attempt only to sell their shredder to the company because they appear to assume that the company would want to shred the reports. The advertisement may be effective at disseminating an unpleasant fact about an unnamed tobacco company, but it does not amount to a personal attack or vilification. Hypnosis also portrays the youths as helpful. There are several statements that, while critical of the effects of tobacco, are not belligerent, or fiercely or severely critical of the tobacco companies or employees. For instance, one youth observes that working for an industry that kills over a thousand people a day, ah, pays pretty well. Lorillard does not contend that tobacco-related disease does not kill over a thousand people a day, nor does it contend that its executives are not well paid. The youth's statement is immediately followed by insistence that the youths help these people, reiterated at the end of the commercial. The closest statement to a personal attack or vilification is the implication that a tobacco executive needs to be less concerned with covering [their] butt[s] and more concerned with doing the right thing. However, the message again is not slanderous or defamatory, abusive, offensive, belligerent, or fiercely or severely critical. As with Shredder, the Hypnosis advertisement may be effective at stating unpleasant facts such as tobacco kill[ing] over four hundred and thirty thousand people each year, but it does not amount to a personal attack or vilification. Lie Detector shows the attempts of several youth to deliver a lie detector to a major tobacco company. The entire message of the advertisement is crystallized when a youth explains, We have a lie detector to clear up the confusion. Your company has said that nicotine isn't addictive, and then you say that it is. This statement simply asserts that tobacco companies have made contradictory statements. The assertion is not presented in a disparaging, offensive, or belligerent manner. It is not fiercely or severely critical. Lorillard does not deny that a tobacco company at one time stated that nicotine is not addictive and then later stated that it is. The contention is not a denouncement that is either unfounded or slanderous. The youths are not abusive, but are merely pleading to see a certain employee. When asked to leave, they leave. We conclude that this advertisement also fails to meet the definition of personal attack or vilification. The caller in Dog Walker maintains an expressly helpful tone throughout the advertisement. His tone is not belligerent, critical, argumentative, disparaging, or offensive. Even though Dog Walker involves a bizarre offer to sell dog urine and begins by identifying the company called as Lorillard, the caller simply makes a factually accurate assertion that cigarettes often include a chemical that is also found in dog urine. The caller does not accuse the company of adding dog urine to cigarettes. Although the Lorillard employee hangs up on the caller, there is no personal attack or vilification of Lorillard or its employees. While the MSA creates real restrictions on ALF's advertisements, we conclude that the advertisements presented to us from ALF's truth® campaign fall within the MSA's restrictions, and do not exceed them. Merely drawing attention to the past conduct of tobacco companies through innocuous and even helpful-sounding offers such as those heard in Shredder, Hypnosis, Lie Detector, and Dog walker, is not a personal attack or vilification prohibited by the MSA.