May 3, 2021

Menthol Cigarettes

“U.S. health regulators pledged again Thursday to try to ban menthol cigarettes… The FDA said it aims to propose regulations banning the flavor in the coming year and declined to speculate on when the rule would be finalized.” AP News

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From the Right

The right opposes banning menthol cigarettes, arguing that the ban is arbitrary and will disproportionately impact African American consumers.

“The problem with this sort of targeted ban is that it primarily appears to be a half measure. If the FDA is admitting that smoking is dangerous enough to warrant federal intervention, why would they openly endorse an idea clearly designed to primarily benefit one race over the others? Why not just ban tobacco entirely?…

“A better idea is to simply continue public education efforts regarding the dangers of smoking. Smoking rates in this country have plummeted over the past few decades, though the habit never seems to go away entirely. And enacting a ban that only affects menthol-flavored products isn’t going to accomplish much of anything as far as I can see. People with a bad nicotine addiction will just switch over to regular brands, even if they don’t enjoy them as much.”
Jazz Shaw, Hot Air

“Smoking cigarettes, like all kinds of risky personal habits (skydiving, power tools, driving a car, eating red meat, etc.) is a personal choice that harms only the person making that choice. This is not true for alcohol, which no one is talking about banning. What I mean is this… If forced to make a choice between banning cigarettes or alcohol, I would easily choose alcohol because unlike alcohol, no amount of smoking will ever result in someone driving erratically, beating their wife, or losing everything they own…

“After decades and decades of public health campaigns, including a warning right on the package that says cigarettes will kill you, we all know the risks. So now it’s time to treat every American – black and white alike – as informed adults capable of making our own decisions about the risks we wish to take when it comes to our own personal idea of what ‘quality of life’ means.”
John Nolte, Breitbart

“The Washington Post notes that the Biden administration is specifically targeting menthols because ‘African Americans have been disproportionately harmed’ by them — which, once you strip out the jargon, is simply another way of saying that the Biden administration is targeting menthols because African Americans disproportionately like menthols… I’ll happily admit that I didn’t have ‘ban something black people like because they like it too much’ on my Anti-Racist Bingo card…

“The legal scholar Michelle Alexander has argued to great progressive fanfare that the War on Drugs was designed deliberately as ‘a contemporary system of racial control—relegating millions to a permanent second-class status.’ If this is true, one must ask how opening up a new, explicitly African-American front in that war is going to help…

“One does not need to share Michelle Alexander’s presumptions in order to believe that we should be reducing, not increasing, the number of instances in which the citizenry comes into contact with the police.”
Charles C. W. Cooke, National Review

“As is so often the case with elite efforts to restrict access to harmful but legal products, there is a heavy dose of inter-class contempt on display. Cigarette bans are unlikely to affect, be felt, or even be seen by the people trying to drive these products underground. Cigarette smoking is most prevalent among adults at or below the poverty level and among those with less than a high-school education…

“By contrast, tobacco products without flavors (which are favored by whites) and cigars (which remain popular among classes and interests that are more visible to lawmakers) are subject to no additional restrictions. Why? What could be charitably characterized as well-meaning overprotectiveness could just as easily be denounced as condescending and discriminatory favoritism.”
Noah Rothman, Commentary Magazine

From the Left

The left generally supports banning menthol cigarettes, arguing that doing so would save lives and advance racial justice.

“In 2009, Congress gave the FDA authority to ban all other flavors in cigarettes, which it did in order to make these dangerous products less attractive to new smokers. But Congress stalled on menthols and asked for more study. The FDA did more research and found that menthol, which is similar to mint, is the most insidious of all flavors…

“Like candy and fruit flavorings, menthol masks the unpleasant taste of tobacco. Unlike those other flavors, however, menthol cigarettes have anesthetic properties that mask the abrasiveness of tobacco smoke and induce users to inhale more deeply, increasing their exposure to the harmful chemicals in the smoke…

“The ACLU and other civil rights groups sent a letter Monday to U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and acting FDA Commissioner Janet Woodcock arguing against a menthol ban, claiming that it would perpetuate overpolicing in Black communities. But the FDA ban would not criminalize possession of menthol cigarettes, just remove them from the market. Local police do not enforce federal food and drug regulations.”
Editorial Board, Los Angeles Times

“There were 387,000 premature deaths attributed to menthol cigarettes between 1980 and 2018, the FDA says, along with 3 million life-years lost and 10.1 million new smokers. Based on data from other countries, the agency believes a menthol ban would lead to 923,000 smokers quitting within the first 17 months of the ban. The convenience stores that rely on tobacco sales will feel the impact, but the human cost of smoking is greater than a drop in revenue at the local Wawa. We knew this decades ago, and it’s time to correct a tragic mistake.”
Editorial Board, Star-Ledger

The Chair of Maryland’s Legislative Black Caucus writes, “Since the 1950s, Big Tobacco has marketed menthol-flavored products to the Black community using Black-dominated media. It has cultivated Black celebrity endorsers to hook users, deflecting criticism of their practices by making financial contributions to prominent, Black-run organizations. Today, about 90 percent of adult Black smokers choose menthol cigarettes, a rate more than double that of White smokers…

“Tobacco companies have spent billions of dollars over the past 70 years to hook our communities on flavored products, reaping billions more in profits from our addiction. If we are serious about addressing systemic racial inequalities in our state, we must put public health ahead of profit by removing all flavored tobacco products, including menthol cigarettes, from the market once and for all.”
Darryl Barnes, Washington Post

“Some prominent civil rights activists have strenuously objected to menthol cigarette bans, concerned that a ban would spawn a black market for menthol-flavored tobacco products and increase overly aggressive policing in Black neighborhoods. [Al] Sharpton, who opposes a menthol ban, points to tobacco as a common theme in recent conflicts between citizens and police that have led to African American deaths…

“Detractors have noted that Sharpton’s civil rights group, the National Action Network, has held events sponsored by R.J. Reynolds, which makes Newport cigarettes…

“‘People are looking for reasons to discredit the National Action Network. Yes, [Reynolds] has given us money, I don’t even know how much, but Facebook gives us money and I came out against Mark Zuckerberg. You ask the anti-menthol advocates if they’re for decriminalizing marijuana. And if they say yes, then how do they explain their inconsistency? You can’t have it both ways,’ Sharpton said. ‘Our position has been that it would be inconsistent to decriminalize marijuana but criminalize menthol cigarettes, it’s just that simple.’”
Laura Reiley, Washington Post

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On the bright side...

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