What is the real fear with WTA? Someone break it down in psychological terms. I mean, I get the apprehension and all...but, is there some
Truth or
Dare campaign out there scaring people or something?
p.s. When I wrote "Truth or Dare" I was talking about the anti drug and anti smoking campaigns Truth and D.a.r.e...I read it back as
truth or dare, like


Mr M, I really believe the negativity stems from the long term war on smoking that turned into the the attack on the tobacco industry to promote the pharma industry. Most haven't lived the history where instead of pharma industry advertising everywhere we looked, it was tobacco industry advertising. They used doctors to sell cigarettes and it wasn't out of place to have ash trays in their offices or for them to light up.
Once pharma started coming up with products, they needed the disease to treat, hence the war. You take 40-50 years of escalating propaganda against the tobacco industry and their products, that happened to contain the active ingredient in the pharma industry's "cure", nicotine, and you have a lot of sneaky tricks. The fact that nicotine is starting to get negative studies doesn't surprise me. It really shouldn't surprise anyone. The pharma industry is moving toward other "life saving" products to fight the "worldwide epidemic" of the "number one cause of preventable disease and death".
There has been a lot of fear mongering (BT adds ingredients to make their product more addictive) over the years and BP has done a great job of creating fear and loathing in the minds of their target market- the smoker. The E cig and the tobacco industry's move into a much safer product line has and will continue to generate new approaches to discourage tobacco use and to get individuals to use a pharma solution.
So how does a smoker look at himself today? He/she has been banned from smoking indoor publicly in most locations, starting to see they can't smoke outdoors, can't live certain places or get jobs in certain businesses, get taxed to the extreme and vilified as a burden to society. An environment such as this creates a lot of self loathing. Which brings us back to WTA in particular and the psychology of the ex-smoker.
Those that quit cold turkey have found the way. The Carrs and Politicos of the world believe that is the best and only way to acceptance in the new world. The Quit Smoking Message Board has fanatics that insist that quitting smoking means stopping inhaling the smoke AND stopping nicotine use. Those that quit with pharma products think using tobacco products of any type is wrong, even when they continue using pharma products to stay quit. Of course those that quit by using E cigs look at adding mysterious ingredients they never heard of is wrong. I know how negative I was on smokeless tobacco until a few individuals on here got me interested and I did a lot of research. I was well educated by the anti tobacco industry that smokeless was worse than smoking. Right!
Now not everyone looks at the world as I've described above. Many, many are just happy that they were able to quit smoking and are happy for anyone that finds a way to quit. I personally feel whatever works is good enough for me. I'll never look down on someone that continues smoking. They are a brave and discriminated against lot. No need to add any more pressure.
JMHO