Tobacco Wars – The Big Roundup
I wrote a little piece last week on the history of The Tobacco Wars.
Reading back on it I realised it was getting a little confusing even to me, and I wrote the damn thing.
Maybe I should try to simplify things?
OK. First of all we had the Kingdom of Pharma, where the people were very jealous and greedy. They would do anything for cash, and such minor trivialities as morals were of no consequence. They made their income by enslaving people from other kingdoms in the name of their religion – Health.
Within Pharma there was a subgroup called Minions. They were people who were paid very large sums of money to come up with ideas to force people to migrate to Pharma. They were totally unscrupulous and would spend their time dreaming up lies and torturing the facts just so long as the money rolled in.
Then there was the Kingdom of Tobacco. They were a very happy bunch until the Minions from Pharma moved in and started spreading their lies. The Kings of Tobacco were also being paid large sums of money by Pharma to listen to the Minions who had infiltrated the Kingdom, so they betrayed their people and started passing nasty little laws which made the people very unhappy. So some of those people moved to Pharma, partly because some believed the lies but mainly just to get a bit of peace and quiet. Having made the move, they became slaves to the Kings of Pharma, and changed their religion from Life [which they used to enjoy] to Health.
But then along came the Kingdom of Vape which was set up by some migrants from far overseas. They really and truly fucked up the status quo [and I mean the situation, not the band].
You see, neither the Kings of Tobacco nor Pharma saw them coming and didn't know quite how to react. Even worse, the people of Vape were just as happy as the people of Tobacco, but Pharma and its Minions realised that none of their lies and trickery worked. Not only did some of the people of Tobacco migrate to Vape, but some even forsook their new life in Pharma and moved to Vape.
Neither Tobacco nor Pharma were very happy about this so they decided to change their game a bit.
The Kingdom of Pharma was first off the block because no one was migrating there any more and there was even some emigration too. They sent their Minions into Vape but the Minions discovered that this was a whole new ball game and that none of their old lies and trickery worked in the land of Vape. So they had to invent brand new ones, and even had the gall to say that the people of Vape were killing themselves but that the Minions hadn't invented the reason yet. But the people of Vape knew the Minions were lying and told them to go fuck themselves. This didn't make the Minions very happy. The Minions screamed that Vape was as bad [if not worse] than Tobacco and that the people must go back to Tobacco, because they knew it was easier to get people to migrate from Tobacco to Pharma. The people of Vape just laughed at them.
But then we have the Overlords called EU-WHO, who were also in the pay of the Kings of Pharma. These Overlords had the power to force any Kingdom to do their bidding so naturally [in return for enormous wads of cash] they demanded that the people of Vape must be treated to the same punitive laws as the people of Tobacco in the hopes that everyone would migrate to Pharma. There were even rumours that the Kings of Tobacco backed this plan as they were losing their people to Vape also.
So that is the story to date.
There is all out war between Pharma and Vape. Paradoxically some of the people of Vape still believe the lies of the Minions and are fighting on behalf of Pharma. Tobacco is sitting on the sidelines in bemusement. Some of the Kings are refusing to pay the Minions because everyone sees through their lies. The Overlords are hopping up and down in a rage, and some of the Kings are even threatening to ignore the Overlords.
It's a complete mess.
I'll let you know if I hear any more.
I have characterised the whole scam for the last twenty years as, "The Nicotine Wars." There is a pent up demand for nicotine as there is for caffeine and in Ireland alone the market value of the demand is between one and two billion euros a year.
Pharma took tobacco on with its range of NRTs hence the false health scares, bans, restrictions and price increases. As Pharma recruited the charities and elements in the medical world to fight for their market share by fair means or foul, nobody noticed the rapid emergence of a third player, the e-cig.
The nicotine wars now have THREE players looking for your money!
Indeed – but it really all boils back to the "charities" [backed by Big Pharma] and Gubmints [blackmailed by Big Pharma – do as we say or we'll shut our factories and screw you with massive profit margins]. In fairness, the Vapers aren't really costing us smokers anything. If anything they are drawing the fire which makes a pleasant change.
Many years ago I said that what the pharmaceutical industry needed was to gain control of commonly used recreational drugs because they haven't achieved anything sufficiently profitable since antibiotics. The most commonly used recreational substances are coffee, alcohol and tobacco. They had no hope of going after coffee so they went after tobacco and are still trying to find a way in on alcohol. The whole business of supporting tobacco control and the neo prohibitionists has been about finding a means of grabbing a huge market from the tobacco industry and putting the profits therefrom in the hands of the pharmaceutical industry. Even viagra, statins and blood pressure medications combined cannot surpass the profits available in the nicotine, alcohol and caffeine markets.
It goes back a very long way to the banning of the likes of marijuana and cocaine. The former in particular was seen as a threat so it was made illegal. Just how many medications are there on the market these days based on cocaine? Many thousands, I would guess. They're even trying to shut down natural [herbal] medicines so they can sell their own chemical derivatives fro the same herbs.
Comically awesome post! No wonder I have a hard time explaining it to friends…
I will be quite honest and admit that I have a very hard time explaining it to myself.
I live in the kingdom of Tobacco and spend alot of time in the land of Vape. I'm typing this from Vapeland. The kingdom of Pharma and its' minions are a right pain in the neck. The price of a pack of smokes is so ridiculous that I've taken to rolling my own. For about $25 bucks a month I can smoke all I wish. That's all it should cost to buy them but since the Kings of Pharma have gotten their grubby little mitts involved the price has skyrocketed.
Piss off I say to Pharma and it's minions!
When they established the Kingdom of Vape they never bothered that much with boundaries [unlike the boundaries between Tobacco and Pharma, where they try to enforce a one way system only]. You are obviously in that area where the two Kingdoms merge.
Love it Grandad! All Hail The People of Vape and The People of Smoke! Banish the Antismoking and Antivaping Minions back to the Stygian Depths from which they issued!
:>
MJM
I visited the land of Vape once but ultimately found it as boring and worthy and was just as despised so I moved back to the ever sunny land of Tobacco 🙂