I hear you, and I think you know I have very similar gusto for not trusting their motives.
But I do think it possible for TC to change their tune, to appear to be like on our side, and then have many of us praise them, even as leaders for our side. I hesitate to name names, but pretty sure you all know who I could be referring to, who has IMO only somewhat changed tune and who still brags about certain aspects of past TC things, all of which could end up hurting vaping rights/practice going forward. I see this person as fundamentalist who contributed to the mass deception, turning us into 3rd class citizens, shoving us into even more remote corners, all for the false narrative of "public good." I don't feel like it is great to praise this person now, though will readily admit that what the person says now on vaping does seem like tune has changed (at least a little bit) and do find myself appreciating that. Yet, this same person will openly brag about all the TC efforts they engaged in for anti-smoking and I'm pretty sure is proudly still in that boat when it comes to smoking.
Given how most people here treat this person, I would say reconciliation is entirely possible. Moreover, it strikes me that someone like Glantz could change his tune on vaping, saying things we want to hear, and could conceivably be the leader of the vaping movement. Though I'm fairly certain it would take months for that to play out and there would be a whole lot of skepticism along the way to that leadership role being established. For some, like me, I would probably never see such a person as worthy of being leader, but could find myself appreciating what appears like a change in tune of what they had previously espoused.
In essence, I think most politically aware vapers keep harping on the points we do in the hopes that everyone will change their tune and agree with us. Though I think we mostly are hoping for general public to at least consider our side of the issue and not be so prone to give into mass deception they are clearly being subjected to. I also am not sure that some of the people on our side are fully on our side and instead, they seem prone to giving into mass deception themselves regarding alleged harms or potential harms of vaping. Heck, as someone who's been accused of being from the other side, I'm really not sure if anyone can say with 100% certainty who is on what side, and if they are there 100% of the time.
