Graphic images might be coming to cigarette packages

Shane Wade
Opinion Editor

Remember those anti-abortion demonstrations last week? Remember the graphic images that were displayed?

How would you feel if similar images were posted on cigarette packages?

Pending a federal court appeal, new cigarette packages with such warning labels may fill store shelves in the near future. These packages are meant to inform and disturb smokers and potential smokers, encouraging them to quit the habit while dissuading others from beginning.

Whether you smoke or not, these government-sanctioned actions should disturb you. Whatever you think of the tobacco industry, they have the right to advertise their product without being bullied by a disapproving government.

The dangers and affects of smoking are widely known. From elementary school classrooms to everyday television sitcoms, children are taught about its dangers, as well as stereotypes about smokers.

Showing smokers the effects of smoking is useless; they already know and feel the effects daily. They experience it through their harsh coughs, the drain on their wallets, the smell on their clothes and the stares they receive. It’s one thing to educate the public; it’s another to bully them.

Displaying blatantly graphic images that offend upon sight is not a tactic any organization, whether it be anti-abortion or anti-smoker, should use. Such tactics show a disdain for the innocent and faint of heart.
Furthermore, where does the line end? Will our beloved Twinkies and Girl Scout cookies be next? Should there be similar labels on guns and ammo packets?

A wide variety of industries and companies, intentionally or inadvertently, hide the dangers and risk associated with their products. Why single out the tobacco industry? If we are going to steal the proverbial horse, let’s do it outright. There’s plenty of companies to go after in the agricultural and food-processing industries. We can start by ending the process of including the “pink slime” food additive in our meats. Surely the national epidemic of obesity ranks on par with the health issues associated with smoking.

Requiring companies to put graphic warning labels on their products is akin to abridging their free speech. Although I don’t believe in corporate personhood, attempts to humiliate and humble corporations shouldn’t adversely affect the people.

As evil as tobacco companies might be, it isn’t becoming for us to stoop to this level. We’re already becoming rapidly successful in decreasing the number of smokers in America; we’ll never naturally get the number down to 0 percent, but our efforts so far have been immensely successful. We need not compromise ourselves to such ends.

It’s not the government’s job to nanny and lay out the entirety of a health issue like smoking for us; at the end of the day, it’s our body and our choice. Let the truth be known, but don’t shove it down our throats. To that end, the graphic warning labels are just a semblance and physical manifestation of the underlying problem.

In our government’s attempt to save us from medical illness, they risk poisoning our liberty and misplacing our freedom.