American Lung Association Vs. Electronic Cigarettes

[kristin]

Kristin,
The only difference, to me, is that we, the vaporers, need to 'get over it'!

I guess my thinking is that we can't "get over it" until the others do. Or, like you said - they'll just keep coming after us.

Let them keep the demonization and denormalization of tobacco smoking and ACCEPT ecig smoking.

We need to get the public (and ourselves) to understand that "smoking" no longer just means using tobacco and that not all smoking is bad.

We spend so much time and effort trying to covince people that what we are doing isn't smoking and they aren't buying it. Fine. Then redefine smoking to fit what I AM doing and acknowledge that not all smoking is the same - just as not all drinking is the same..

Sometimes, embracing, taking ownership and changing the meaning of that which others hold against us is the most powerful action one can do.

 

[Oliver]

Kristin, the most important thing we can do is to be consistent about our message (read 'Behavioral Style').

What we are engaging in is minority influence. It can happen, but only if we can agree among ourselves on our objectives. If we become divided on key issues, we stand to loose our credibility.

In a sense, perhaps this is the problem with the internet in these sorts of campaigns - there is too much potential for fall outs and disagreements, undermining the credibility of those involved before things even get off the ground.

(Also just thinking aloud here).

 

[Oliver]

Just to add....

Your group is called CASAA. You campaign, ostensibly, for smokeless alternatives. Your message (and one we support) should be that tobacco smoking represents a public health emergency, and everything that can be done should be done.

This should be the main campaign effort - making people realise that there are alternatives, and that all products that cause smokers to stop using cigarettes should be legal and readily accessible; that the pharmaceutical industry has not done enough, and should no longer have the monopoly over the tobacco-cessation industry.

 

[kristin]

Just to add....

Your group is called CASAA. You campaign, ostensibly, for smokeless alternatives. Your message (and one we support) should be that tobacco smoking represents a public health emergency, and everything that can be done should be done.

This should be the main campaign effort - making people realise that there are alternatives, and that all products that cause smokers to stop using cigarettes should be legal and readily accessible; that the pharmaceutical industry has not done enough, and should no longer have the monopoly over the tobacco-cessation industry.

Yeah, I know - that's why I said I definitely WASN'T speaking as CASAA.

It's not that I still don't agree with CASAA's message, but I have to wonder if we embraced the right terminology now. Hindsight is 20/20.

Maybe we should have been CATAA: Consumer Advocates for Tobacco Alternatives Association, lol!

But that horse left the barn a long time ago....

 

[Oliver]

But the thing is, why limit yourselves to anything at all? If you campaign for all smoking alternatives, you have a very powerful message.

This is: "look, the stats show that despite all the anti-tobacco action that's been taken, an unacceptably large number of people are dying each year. These people are being failed - it's time to endorse another, parallel strategy - harm reduction"

I really don't think terminology has anything to do with it. It's the message that counts.

 

[CJsKee]

<snip>

Let them keep the demonization and denormalization of TOBACCO smoking and ACCEPT ecig smoking.

<snip>

QUOTE]


I've been on this forum for a long time now, and I see more and more of this kind of thing. I cannot agree with this, Kristin...tobacco is NOT evil and people who use tobacco are NOT evil or "un"normal. They have been made to appear that way by those who would seek to control the thoughts and actions of others.

Have I been in the wrong place all this time?

 

[kristin]

But the thing is, why limit yourselves to anything at all? If you campaign for all smoking alternatives, you have a very powerful message.

This is: "look, the stats show that despite all the anti-tobacco action that's been taken, an unacceptably large number of people are dying each year. These people are being failed - it's time to endorse another, parallel strategy - harm reduction"

I really don't think terminology has anything to do with it. It's the message that counts.

True.

But how is that limiting us? Snus, ecigs, dissolvables are all tobacco alternatives - with the emphasis on "alternatives," not "tobacco." Snus and disolvables are tobacco alternatives and ecigs are an alternative to tobacco.

It would still be promoting harm reduction in the same way urging people to eat lowfat products promotes obesity harm reduction.

I just think nonsmokers and antis are having a hard time buying it, because it's such a mixed message. By continuing to demonize the word "smoking," while advocating a product that looks, feels and tastes like smoking, we miss sending the real message that it's not the tobacco, it's not the act of inhaling of a nicotine solution that looks and tastes like smoke, it's actually SMOKING TOBACCO.

Just as drinking beer is fine. Driving is fine. But drinking beer AND driving is NOT fine.

People have no problem with smokeless alternatives that don't LOOK like smoking. Inhaling is fine - as long as it's from a little white tampon-looking thing.

It seems logical to divert the attention from the HOW to the WHAT.

It's not like people can't see the difference in smoking different things. Ask most people if smoking pot is the same as smoking tobacco. Or herbals. They will all recognize that WHAT you are smoking makes a difference.

Just playing devil's advocate here...

 

[JustJulie]

I find myself agreeing with SmokeyJoe here, Kristin.

We're giving out lots of messages when we talk about e-cigarettes, but the single biggest message in the pile is that e-cigarettes are less harmful than tobacco cigarettes. And it just isn't that we're not using traditional tobacco . . . it's also that we're not BURNING the tobacco and inhaling the products of the combustion.

Of course, the difference between combustion and vaporization isn't an intuitively easy one to grasp, but it is absolutely central to a huge part of why using e-cigarettes is indeed demonstrably less dangerous than traditional tobacco cigarettes. I personally think that by saying that we're "smoking," but "smoking" something other than "tobacco," one of our most powerful arguments gets muted.

In fact, many of us have adopted the term "vaping" to distinguish what we're doing from "smoking." At first, it seemed a very awkward word to use, and kind of unfortunate since some people felt that "vaping" might perhaps have some drug connotations. However, we claimed the word as our own, and perceptions are beginning to change--vaping is starting to become very much associated with e-cigarettes.

While I have absolutely zero desire to throw smokers under the bus, I see our goals to be far more aligned with smokeless alternatives like Snus.

 

[Thulium]

I don't see any reason to demonize "smoking" as far as the action of inhaling and exhaling goes, but the term "smoking" inherently implies the products of combustion and what we are doing has absolutely nothing to do with the products of combustion.

Yes, "e-smoking" is a colloquial term for the act of mimicking the act of smoking with an electronic vaporizer, but just because children put a cigarette shaped piece of gum and blow out the powdered sugar to look like smoke and say "Hey look, I'm smoking!"...that doesn't mean that they actually are smoking. Likewise, simply because we mimic the former activity and sometimes refer to it using the traditional terminology does not change the fact that there is no actual combustion occurring. Without combustion, you can't get smoke. Without smoke, you can't be smoking.

Like I mentioned earlier, just because we call them "smoke machines" doesn't mean something is burning.

When asked, I consistently say, "No, I am not smoking. This is a personal vaporizer or 'electronic cigarette'--it's basically a miniature fog machine so it looks and feels like smoking, but nothing is actually burnt."

Most (but sadly, not all) people understand the difference between a smoke bomb and a fog machine. One produces actual smoke as the product of combustion, the other produces vapor that looks like smoke by heating a (non-flammable) liquid solution.

 

[D103]

Kristin, while I 'get' what you are saying and probably most former tobacco smokers on this forum do as well, at least on some level, there has been an enormous and concerted effort worldwide to demonize "smoking" and it has been very effective as we all know, so much so that an alarming number of people feel it is an immoral act. The tactic of trying to now change how people think about "smoking" is ill-fated at best and could actually be counterproductive at worst. While I agree with you in principle, I believe the general public will only change how they think about "smoking" e-cigs if and only if we are successful at keeping them in the marketplace and the use of e-cigs continues to become more prevalent. In my opinion we stand a much better chance of introducing a new concept - "vaping" than to attempt to change public opinion on a word that now is so contraversial, so emotionally charged, so demonized and in many cases continues to be the scapegoat/whipping boy, if you will, of many seeking to legislate/force others to their own way of thinking and acting.

 

[Thulium]

I find myself agreeing with SmokeyJoe here, Kristin.

We're giving out lots of messages when we talk about e-cigarettes, but the single biggest message in the pile is that e-cigarettes are less harmful than tobacco cigarettes. And it just isn't that we're not using traditional tobacco . . . it's also that we're not BURNING the tobacco and inhaling the products of the combustion.

Of course, the difference between combustion and vaporization isn't an intuitively easy one to grasp, but it is absolutely central to a huge part of why using e-cigarettes is indeed demonstrably less dangerous than traditional tobacco cigarettes. I personally think that by saying that we're "smoking," but "smoking" something other than "tobacco," one of our most powerful arguments gets muted.

In fact, many of us have adopted the term "vaping" to distinguish what we're doing from "smoking." At first, it seemed a very awkward word to use, and kind of unfortunate since some people felt that "vaping" might perhaps have some drug connotations. However, we claimed the word as our own, and perceptions are beginning to change--vaping is starting to become very much associated with e-cigarettes.

While I have absolutely zero desire to throw smokers under the bus, I see our goals to be far more aligned with smokeless alternatives like Snus.

I completely agree, Julie. The frustrating irony is that actually vaporizing tobacco is a difficult distinction from smoking. Herbal/tobacco vaporizers actually bring the temperature of the material up enough that chemical changes take place that are precursors to combustion and so, although there is a definite distinction between that type of vapor and smoke, it is a more difficult one. Using the VG or PG based e-liquids as we do with e-cigarettes, there is really no possibility of combustion and any chemical change is unlikely because we aren't vaporizing a solid, instead we are atomizing a liquid.

 

[Oliver]

I think another issue relates to the fact that we are all wary of claiming that the alternatives we are using are safer than smoking.

That wariness is because of our community-wide ethical standard of wanting to present our argument as factually as possible, and stating that alternatives are 'safer' is to overstate what has been demonstrated scientifically.

"almost certainly safer" sounds even worse!

Perhaps it's time to throw off the taboo and to start making these claims?

In any case, the consistency of the message is key. I really do think its time to rally around the message that "everything must be done to get people off smoking, even if that means using alternative tobacco products" - Frame the current situation as a medical emergency that is being dealt with inadequately.

 

[Oliver]

Forgive my sloppy writing by the way - I'm very, very tired!

 

[BCB]

Reading the different arguments reminds me of strategy discussions/frustrations during the civil rights struggles of the 50's and 60's. The SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) and NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) started things off. College kids found it too mild and created SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee). Others found that too mild and created the Black Panthers and Black Muslims. I saw positives in all these groups and believe that TOGETHER they made change. They did not all spout the same rhetoric. They disagreed with each other constantly and vehemently. Some convinced one group, others convinced a different group of the sense of their mission.

I believe we don't have to all tow the same line to effect change. I LOVE Kirsten's idea of taking back the language and making it our own, using the drinking/eating analogies and refusing to apologize for smoking ecigs now or tobacco cigs in the past. It is true that many people are idiots who don't listen and that many still have never even HEARD of an e-cig.

Keep those ideas sprouting!

 

[JustJulie]

I think another issue relates to the fact that we are all wary of claiming that the alternatives we are using are safer than smoking.

That wariness is because of our community-wide ethical standard of wanting to present our argument as factually as possible, and stating that alternatives are 'safer' is to overstate what has been demonstrated scientifically.

"almost certainly safer" sounds even worse!

Perhaps it's time to throw off the taboo and to start making these claims?

In any case, the consistency of the message is key. I really do think its time to rally around the message that "everything must be done to get people off smoking, even if that means using alternative tobacco products" - Frame the current situation as a medical emergency that is being dealt with inadequately.

When I first started vaping, pretty much what was out there in terms of e-cigarette research was the first Ruyan study by Health New Zealand and, well, common sense. Since, then, there's been a growing body of credible scientific evidence showing that e-cigarettes are indeed safer than traditional cigarettes.

There were also fears that health claims would bring down the wrath of the FDA and they would treat as a drug. Well, that happened, and we're fighting it, but it seems clear that with reduced harm tobacco products, we don't need to be particularly afraid that making reduced harm claims will give us a one-way ticket to classification as a drug (especially since that kind of classification doesn't make a whole lot of sense in the base case).

While I would never say that vaping is "healthy" or "good for you," I have absolutely no problem saying that it's a safer or healthier alternative to smoking.

 

[rothenbj]

I guess my thinking is that we can't "get over it" until the others do. Or, like you said - they'll just keep coming after us.

Let them keep the demonization and denormalization of TOBACCO smoking and ACCEPT ecig smoking.

We need to get the public (and ourselves) to understand that "smoking" no longer just means using tobacco and that not all smoking is bad.

We spend so much time and effort trying to covince people that what we are doing isn't smoking and they aren't buying it. Fine. Then redefine smoking to fit what I AM doing and acknowledge that not all smoking is the same - just as not all drinking is the same..

Sometimes, embracing, taking ownership and changing the meaning of that which others hold against us is the most powerful action one can do.

What's wrong with you statement is that many non-smokers and the exes are "getting it". I know a lot of them that have absolutely no problem with the PV. It's the paid for health associations lobbing for the parma industry that makes all the noise. Perhaps the side over on the law side that wants to sue the governments should focus on suing t those organizations.

 

[kristin]

Yeah, you all make logical arguments. I guess I was just toying with the idea that someday vaping could be considered a valid and acceptable passtime in it's own right and the best course of action to get there without shooting ourselves in the foot.

It seems like the course we are on will keep people's perceptions of ecigs as a necessary evil instead. But I guess it's our only option at this point.

 

[kristin]

I've been on this forum for a long time now, and I see more and more of this kind of thing. I cannot agree with this, Kristin...tobacco is NOT evil and people who use tobacco are NOT evil or "un"normal. They have been made to appear that way by those who would seek to control the thoughts and actions of others.

Have I been in the wrong place all this time?

I didn't say Tobacco is evil - I said tobacco smoking can keep the bad reputation is has justifiably earned.

And I never even implied smokers themselves should be vilified nor would I ever!!

 

[CJsKee]

I don't think we have an "only" option. That may be true for the group, but as individuals we can use whatever works, especially in winning over the smokers. All of your analogies are good ones, Kristin. And we, as individuals, should not hesitate to tell others that e-cigs are absolutely healthier, safer and less harmful than smoking tobacco.

 

[CJsKee]

I didn't say Tobacco is evil - I said tobacco smoking can keep the bad reputation is has justifiably earned.

And I never even implied smokers themselves should be vilified nor would I ever!!

Sorry, I must have misread your post, Kristin.