Do the "warnings" on cigarette packs really do anything?

Hah. Side note: love your topics

I think the point is they’re trying to use the “a picture’s worth a thousand words” literally. The tiny-print cancer warning at the bottom of the pack was a lot easier not to see. I didn’t realize they had implemented those large pictures. Last I heard they were still a forming idea.

I don’t think it’s bad memory so much as a powerful addiction can allow you to more easily ignore the less than pleasant that’s far off, because the current drugless unpleasantness is more pressing.
I think it’s also that they’re trying to counteract all the advertisement the cigarette companies pour into getting new people to smoke, and getting already-smokers to continue.

I probably have a less heated opinion because I already know that even if I wanted to smoke I couldn’t. (I’m pretty much scared of drugs of any type, even many prescription medications… but that’s a different topic altogether).
Right now I can relate it to food, though. If I had a picture of somone morbidly obese on the ice cream in the freezer, I’d probably have an easier time saying no. Granted, ice cream doesn’t have nicotine. But I don’t think the pictures do nothing.

I think they’re hoping the pictures will help people feel stronger against the addiction. They’re certainly not fun to look at, particularly when you’re being told that that’ll be you. (Because that’s what the pictures are saying.)
Whether they’re right in doing this or not, I don’t know.
I do know that they make me want to help you stop smoking, even though that’s not really my right to do…

In Canada the tobacco companies have ZERO advertising anywhere… even at the stores they have to hide the packs like this

you would have a better chance turning a snowball into a golden egg then getting me to quit but thanks anyway

The only purpose I see is so that the company doesn’t get sued for someone dying from smocking.

I think they’re pretty much useless except to become future collectibles on ebay.com

“The public will have until Jan. 9, 2011, to comment on the proposals. Health and Human
Services will make its choice by June 22, and by Oct. 22, 2012, manufacturers will no longer be allowed to distribute cigarettes for sale in the United States that do not display the new graphic health warnings. The strategy is required by the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, enacted last year,” according to an article in The Hill.

The Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act is a bill that allows the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate the content, marketing and sale of tobacco products and all other aspects of the tobacco industry including content of cigs.

Our government at work.

not near as much as raising the prices and taxing the hell out of them. In the end money is what will do the trick. Mmmmmm, money.

Holy crap, that’s some ugly imagery!

I predict a resurgence in popularity of personalized cigarette cases.

No.. smokers will smoke regardless. If anything, it makes them more stubbornly resistant to quitting. In Italy (and I think the EU in general), there are huge warnings that say very blatant things like SMOKING WILL KILL YOU. SMOKING DAMAGES YOUR INTERNAL ORGANS. I forget the other ones. Anyway, no one pays them any attention and then after a while, you don’t even notice these warnings on the pack.

I smoked for 10 years.

No, except one:

Smoking May Cause Erectile Dysfunction (Impotence).

A couple months ago at a gas station a guy was asking for a different carton of cigarettes. The cashier made a suggestion showing him another carton. The guy said, yeah, I’ll take the lung cancer. I couldn’t help laughing, but the guy seemed pissed.

These pictures are B.S.; if people are going to smok/chew tobacco, they will.

If tobacco is so bad, why not ban it? Oh right, tax money.

@woodcutter – Cigarettes have been going up over the last 5 years. If people want to use it, they will pay for it.

They add a little color to the package… thats about it! Kids and adults the same don’t much read or even care what they print in the small box on the package where nobody can really notice it anyways!