Dissecting Antismokers' Brains

Book excerpt: "The true horror of 1984 is not what was done to Winston Smith. The true horror was that the vast majority of the populace was happy, content, and believed that what their government was doing was right." That quote introduces what Britain's Numberwatch has called, "the most astonishing political saga since the rise of Adolph Hitler." Dissecting Antismokers' Brains examines the psychology and motivations that drive antismoking advocates while also analyzing their general abuse of language and science. The combination offers readers a solid foundation for understanding modern efforts to ban, tax, and harass smokers into nonexistence. Published in 2004, Brains remains ahead of its time with a startling freshness in its ideas and theories. The propaganda methods exposed here in their early development have grown and are being used even more intensively in the ads, press releases, and guidebooks of antismoking advocacy groups today. The modern stonewalling techniques examined in the author's follow-up volume, TobakkoNacht - The Antismoking Endgame are shown in their birthing forms in his early communications with advocates and the callous abuse of our love for children continues to be exploited as ads show evil wisps of smoke seeking out open windows to attack babies in their nurseries. McFadden's warnings of future campaigns to deny jobs and medical care to smokers, to extend smoking bans to apartments and outdoor spaces, and to apply similar conditioning/nudging techniques to the control of alcohol and fast foods have proven far too true. For those seeking an in-depth but comfortably readable examination of the foundations of the antismoking movement, this book is essential. Its focus on the combination of psychology, propaganda analysis, and the misuse of science makes it a solid volume for college courses in the areas of social change, scientific ethics, political manipulation, and the use and limits of governmental control over citizen behavior. At the same time, its meticulous deconstruction of the basic scientific and statistical arguments fueling government-imposed smoking bans makes it accessible to anyone who's ever wondered how smoking has moved to being regularly presented as both an antisocial and even "immoral" character trait. Dissecting Antismokers' Brains remains an indispensable volume for anyone disturbed by, wishing to understand, or wanting to fight the growth of governmental control over personal life choices and behaviors.