New cigarette labels: They delight some, annoy others, infuriate sellers--and I'm not sure it's a good idea.

The FDA just made the warning game more interesting--and frightening.  

In a little more than a year, cigarette producers won't be able to sell their goods unless the pack has a comparatively large, graphic warning of the perils of cigarette use.  Images will could include a corpse, compromised lungs, smoker breathing through a trachea opening, ugly mouth and gum disease--the list goes on for nine visually graphic warning messages with limited-but-direct word copy.  The images and warnings will rotate so that in the course a of a smoker's consumption, it'll be a challenge to avoid getting the full message of what harm tobacco can do.  But is this really a good idea?  

Those who don't smoke think that this is just terrific; some actually get worked up about why this didn't happen before now.  

Smokers, on the other hand, resent the intrusion into what they likely have already come to terms with and made what amounts to a compromised choice about cigarettes and their consumption.  These people are sore because they don't want to be reminded of that every time they pick up a pack.  So everybody's excited, but nobody's really happy--least of all the manufacturers!  

I'm of a couple of different minds on the matter, so I'll share my thoughts:  In no particular order:

[1] Yes, these warnings seem to offer a huge improvement--communication-wise--over the historical word verbiage now being replaced by graphic images.  Research has long shown that while there was some rotation of even the copy-only warnings, nobody really paid attention to what the message said on the pack of cigarettes they might have had in their pocket or purse; regular smokers fundamentally habituate to the warnings and thus ignore the cautionary message.

Yes, people can get used to anything--including these new labels.

The graphic visuals and the huge increase in size and prominence of the new warnings are likely to be very powerful, especially if the old adage "a picture is worth a thousand words" is true.  Soon it will be a challenge to ignore dead bodies and ugly lungs, teeth, and gums.  

The warning zealots score big on the improvement front with these.  However, these too will lose their effectiveness over time, don't doubt that.  I remember the flashing neon-sign bomb threat warnings in effect in urban skyscrapers in the sixties and seventies--people blithely walked in and out of the building like nothing was wrong!

[2] But this all begs the question: is new information really being provided?  Who doesn't know, in the case of cigarettes, what use of the product leads to?  Nobody I know is learning anything here for the first time; I bet in the culture we live in it's even hard to believe that young, underage smokers will get much in the way of new information.  I suppose now they have to process that information and can't sweep those considerations under the rug as easily as before, so I guess that if the message has increased poignancy--so much the better for heath advocates.  

[3] What worries me most, however, is the intrusion of do-gooders into the arena of legal products in a way that potentially changes--and compromises--the commercial process by placing the burden of fostering favorable consumption choices on the seller and not the buyer.  

Look, I think cigarette smoking has few positive outcomes--and, yes, lets be honest, there are some favorable ones--but there's also a boat load of negative ones, to be sure.  However, if negative payoffs are to be the principal guide for slapping warning labels on products, there's a lot of other legal products that the same thing can be said for.  

There's a very long list of other things to warn you against.

What about the habitual consumption of hamburgers and hotdogs--as many people on a daily do?  No, better yet, what about alcohol consumption?  In a way, it is actually more harmful than tobacco:  It is estimated that alcohol product kills more than 75,000 people in the U.S. each year...and reduces it's average victim's life by 30 years!  Even tobacco doesn't do that; it shortens life by only a mere 14 years, on average!  

And then there's a host of other less expected products to potentially sound the alarm over:  guns, SUVs, swimming pools, economy-sized vehicles, women's high heels.  Where exactly should the list stop of legal products which, when used for their intended purpose, kill or harm people? 

This could easily lead to other things being declared taboo.

You see, I'm worried more and more about the social do-gooders, those who--maybe with the best of intentions--set out to intimidate buyers in the consumption process in a way that makes me very uneasy.  And they'll be encouraged and embolden by all of this progress with cigarettes, only to now spread their undue influence to a lot of other products on the basis of this victory.  

It seems that we live in a society that increasingly wants to regulate our commercial lives in ways unheard of before--from the types of light bulbs we have in our homes, to whether I can actually have a fireplace in my house, to the amount of water I use to flush my toilet with, to whether Happy Meals should sold [particularly with toys].  

When did caveat emptor get obsoleted?

If the new cigarette warning labels work the way some people hope, there could soon be no end to what the health-and-safety police will want to start tackling to burden consumers and sellers with by way of onerous regulations and threats.  Let's be honest, the best marketplace guide for all is still caveat emptor--not showing corpses, rotten gums, and damaged body parts. 

You see this is the issue:  These bold, dramatic warning labels are not the end-all in product-tampering--even these could be made--may well be made--more onerous.  And here's the important point: the list of products to warn consumers against is potentially a very long list, it's not limited to just cigarettes. 
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