The Tobacco Industry's Playbook

The tobacco industry is infamous for business models that thrived as people died. There were very few, if any, redeemable qualities about tobacco products themselves. The products' sole benefit was that they generated a profit.

In the wake of Congressional ban on television and radio advertising, former tobacco attorney Lewis Powell penned a confidential memorandum that would instruct future industries on how to navigate this "affront to American free enterprise." And in doing so, the spirit of the tobacco industry would be reincarnate throughout industries across all sectors and industries, including those entrusted with the public's well-being, in effect institutionalizing The Gospel of Greed.

The Tobacco Industry's Playbook

The tobacco industry's playbook was devised to protect its revenues in the face of mounting evidence linking its products to serious illness. Much of the playbook is now seen so predictably across a wide span of industries.

1. Dealing in Doubt

Tobacco companies campaigned over decades to cast doubt on scientific evidence of the harm caused by their products. Similar techniques were used by other industries whose harmful products were targets of regulatory and environmental efforts. Funding studies designed to undermine scientific consensus and relabling scientific findings as "junk science".

2. Lobbying

Lobbying is simply bribery with a legal label on it. It lawfully attempts to directly influence legislators or government officials, such as regulatory agencies and judiciaries. Although just because it is legal doesn't make it ethical. Political talking points.

3. Astroturfing

This is the practice of hiding the sponsors of a message or organization, to make it appear as though it originates from, and is supported by, grassroots participants. It is a practice intended to give statements or organizations credibility by witholding informaion about the source's financial backers.

4. Self-Regulation

Members of an industry, trade, or sector of the economy monitor their own adherence to legal, ethical, or safety standards, rather than have an outside, independent agency regulate, monitor, or enforce those standards. This creates blatant conflicts of interest, like having the fox guard the hen-house.

5. Personal Responsibility

Personal responsibility became a way for corporations to avoid incrimination by deflecting predatory corporate practices. By claiming individuals whom they have persuaded to purchase their highly addictive products should be entitled to make those choices for themselves, feigning a reverence for "freedom" when the addicts' "choice" is hardly one of free will.

6. Predatory Marketing

Tobacco industry targeted young people, minorities, and low-income communities, in strategies is designed to expand and solidify their consumer base, grooming a group of consumers even in the face of growing health and safety concerns. Other primary tactics we would see mimicked by the processed the sugar industry is to use colorful characters, palatable flavors, and mass market advertising to get their consumers addicted young, in order to extract profits from them for life.

These tactics have become widespread across industries that adopt a "Profit At All Costs" model including, but not limited to, pharmaceuticals, processed foods, alcohol, and fossil fuels.