Analysis by Kyle A. Lohmeier
What makes government unique among all human institutions is that government, and government alone, has a monopoly on the legal right to initiate violence. Well, “ability” more than “right,” but in any event, the government can do things to individuals that individuals would go to prison for doing to another individual. This monopolistic violence manifests itself in a handful of ways, most common being armed robbery, or what the IRS calls “income tax,” and on-spec kidnap for ransom, or, as government calls it “arrest and hold for arraignment.”
Most Americans have been sufficiently “educated” to not see these things this way. Most Americans are so “educated” that having money stolen from them by government isn’t “theft” but “the price one pays to live in civilized society.” So, when such “educated” people are watching TV and see the commercial I paid attention to for the first time last night, they probably didn’t bat an eye; the lucky bastards. My dumb ass got angry.
EXT: ESTABLISHING SHOT, CONVENIENCE STORE - NIGHT INT: CONVENIENCE STORE - NIGHT BLACK TEEN sets cash and his ID on the counter BLACK TEEN: Pack of menthols. WHITE CLERK: It’s not enough. BLACK TEEN rolls his eyes and looks irritated. He then pulls a pair of pliers from his pocket and begins using them to yank out a tooth. He eventually rips it free and sets it on the counter. WHITE CLERK turns and retrieves the cigarettes. VOICE OVER: What’s a pack of menthols cost? Your teeth. Smoking menthols or other cigarettes can cause serious gum disease… BLACK TEEN grabs cigarettes from counter and turns to walk away as VO continues. VOICE OVER: …that makes you more likely to lose them. WHITE CLERK: See ya again. EXT: ESTABLISHING SHOT, CONVENEINCE STORE - NIGHT VOICE OVER: What are menthols costing you?
Filling the corner and bottom of the screen on that last establishing shot are some fun facts, namely that the commercial had been brought to us by the Food and Drug Administration and their “The Real Cost” campaign.
One could be upset about the groan-inducing stereotyping going on in the ad; a black kid buying menthols? Really? Couldn’t they have had him saunter up to the counter with a watermelon under his arm too? But, no, that’s actually far from the most maddening thing about this ad.
That honor goes to the fact that there was no credit roll, and 200 some million Americans deserve “producer” credits since we paid for the damn thing. So, for those keeping score at home, the government steals our money, then gives some to the FDA, which wastes it by producing commercials telling us to not use legal products we all already know are unhealthy and then wastes more money getting those ads run during prime viewing hours when those 30-second spots are as expensive as can be.
And, as if that’s not annoying enough, better still is the fact that the government agency wasting our money on these ads is the very same government agency that just handed big tobacco a massive windfall by regulating their primary competitors, the upstart “vaping” industry, out of existence by declaring all vaping products, including the batteries that power them, “tobacco products” subject to their jurisdiction and ruinously expensive approval process. Which was the point, ruin those companies to protect the old stalwarts like R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris, companies that can, and have for years, afforded lobbyists and made massive donations to political campaigns. If the FDA was that concerned with the dangers of smoking, they wouldn’t have destroyed the vaping industry.
We do not need the government to tell us which products we should or shouldn’t use, whether that advice comes from a stupid and expensive commercial or from the FDA’s official approval process itself. We need to realize that the goal of “education” ought to be to instruct kids on how (not what) to think and to teach them objective truths about history and science. Public “education” today is largely indoctrination, turning kids into good little happy cogs in the machine. Because, good little cogs don’t notice the disingenuousness of the FDA banning e-cigarettes and warning against using the only alternative they left smokers with. Good little cogs don’t even notice they’re being robbed at gunpoint so that they can be provided this “service” by the FDA, and if they did, they wouldn’t perceive it as such.
We’re being treated like idiot children by our government because we let them get away with it. As I’ve said before, it’s long since time for us as a people to wise up, and then rise up and demand a better government; one that barely exists at all. Or, at the very least, a government that doesn’t waste our money in so many creative ways and then essentially rubs our noses in said waste of money. That would be a nice start.
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