Democrats have been talking about protecting your health.
Republicans have been talking about protecting your personal choices and autonomy.
Two different frames. This seems familiar. I remember a corny movie from high school.
In 1964 the Surgeon General announced that the scientific data were clear, and cigarette smoking caused cancer and heart disease. Many people smoked and didn't want to believe the Surgeon General, and even if they did, they didn't want to do anything about it. Quitting is hard. Getting started is easy, and many people started smoking in high school.
In 1966 I sat in a Medford High School auditorium and saw a 19-minute movie designed to convince young people not to start smoking. The movie was titled "Too Tough to Care."
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| The imaginary cigarette brand |
Readers my age may remember being bored or embarrassed during movies like this one, "educational" films assigned to high school students on subjects like safe driving and sex education. This one was unusual. It was funny. It didn't focus on x-ray images of diseased lungs. It was a goofy look at a fictional advertising campaign.
I have been writing about political framing for five years. The movie was the first exposure I remember that depicted conscious and manipulative frame switching as an instrument of persuasion. The movie wasn't preachy and it wasn't even mostly about tobacco. It was about messaging. The movie will seem dated and juvenile, but that is part of its charm. It is an unintended commentary on today's COVID debate. Here is a link: Click
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| Clever Ad Man |
In the movie an imaginary cigarette company executive urged his advertising creator to figure out how to make cigarettes appealing to young people. They tried showing six-year-olds smoking at birthday parties. That didn't work. Nor did showing teenagers smiling while smoking. Neither disposed of the problem that cigarettes were dangerous.
The advertising creator came up with a solution: Make cigarettes a matter of courage and independence. Show cowboys. Show athletes. Show chin-up tough people. Don't fight the fact that smoking is dangerous. Embrace it. Associate smoking with fearless independence notwithstanding the danger. He created a slogan for Finster cigarettes: Too tough to care. Do cigarettes cause cancer? So what! Are you going to let scientists scare you out of doing something you enjoy? No!
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| Tough enough to smoke anywhere |
Fox News, Republican officeholders, and Trump's supporters generally went along, and they settled in on an approach: Don't let Democrats and Dr. Fauci and the science do-gooders tell you what to do. A statewide poll taken last week reports that 20% of Oregonians do not ever plan to get vaccinated. They don't need it, don't want it, don't trust it.
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| Neighbor's sign |
Is COVID dangerous? Maybe, maybe not, but either way, he's too tough to care.
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10 comments:
We recently honored the memory of Americans coming together after 9/11. Today we're in he midst of a far worse disaster, 667,000 dead, and people won't even help out by getting vaccinated. Instead, they sabotage relief efforts by spreading disinformation.
It's no surprise that these crackpots are supported in their madness by the "stolen election" party. As the Virginia Slims ad said, we've come a long way, baby.
Debate. That explains everything!
Sorry not sorry dude’s going to lose his job. Be a real bummer when he loses his life.
This is a piece that goes deeper than the usual written about why people refuse vaccinations.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/14/the-virus-is-painfully-real-vaccine-hesitant-people-are-dying-and-their-loved-ones-want-the-world-to-listen
Recommend the read.
I watched the movie. Cool car. The ending was oddly sexist. "Finster" is a classic Mad Magazine style product name, and of course it's a parody of the Marlboro Man. Even though it was done in the '60s it has older production values. Another satire was "Thank you for not smoking" (2005) which framed promoting smoking as a moral issue.
The anti-vax posture is textbook Regressive, using a specious appeal to individualism to exert control over a gullible constituency. Hopefully, the irony is not lost.
By the 60's it was widely accepted that only very dumb people continued to smoke, even though it persists among a minority to this day. We'll likely look back with the same disdain about anti-vax.
I had an interesting conversation with a medical worker about the Hippocratic Oath. Doctors are taught to treat patients without regard to anything but their illness. In a pandemic medical ethics are put to the ultimate test as we are seeing with rationed care, a by-product of a for-profit system.
I agree. It takes a special kind of mindset (stupid?) to be willing to lose ones job over refusal to take a safe vaccination. No sympathy for your neighbor, Peter.
Sarah Palins "death panels" are being discussed around the Nation, and Idaho has designated at least 10 Hospitals as Crisis Care Centers, with stiff triage standards. Even so, I don't think folks like Petets neighbor are going to change their minds. As I recall, the original Matlboro Man died an excruciating death from smoking related cancer.
I have removed a comment that was created in the Curt Ankerberg style, i.e. plagiarized from a conservative news source. It is habitual behavior by Ankerberg, but this instance was someone else's work.
Ankerberg is a local Republican office-seeker who has been found guilty of tax fraud and filing inaccurate tax returns by a U.S. Tax Court. The judge concluded these were not "mistakes." They were "fraudulent intent for each year by clear and convincing evidence."
People wishing to learn more about the source of nasty comments or plagiarisms that pop up on this site can consult the local newspaper story:
https://www.mailtribune.com/top-stories/2018/03/18/judge-finds-fraud-in-ankerberg-tax-filings/
Peter Sage
As Curt said in the article, he has "water on the brain." One of the symptoms is dementia.
Now you can say too religious to care. The way to dive out of getting fired is to claim religious exemption, “ My Buddha made me do it”
The religious truth is , there is no denomination religion that is against vaccination.. The Pope promotes the vax. Some mega church pastors will give you an anti ax form for $25. A new industry for the kool aid drinkers will now arise and lead us into Armageddon, amen.
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