ChemistryAndPhysicsAreFun
31146
1003
6
May 1, 2026 8:07 AM
ChemistryAndPhysicsAreFun
31146
1003
6
Sherpafish
Rules for thee...
cbomb707
How many of them are alive and not in prison? - Unrelated where are their mansions?
SirSmurfalot
Every fucking one of them should have been arrested and given the death penalty.
Subsound
Nah, thats too quick.
You need to make it long and drawn out as a lesson to others.
Shiznit007
Burn it all down
pete8772
Probably all in Congress now.
momothefifth
just last week, one was given a high position at the CDC
SlaaneshiRightsFront
I bet not one of them was shot in the back of the head and dumped in the nearest ditch. Shame.
catsociety
ah yeas an oath that means f nothing since most of them got what a small penalty fee to pay if anything at all
enderite
It’s almost as if placing your hand on a rando book and pinky swearing to be honest doesn’t really mean anything…
JackingMeHoff
They lied to Congress and weren't punished for it.
CouldntCakeLess
That aged well and thanks for smoking.
JonatasAM
"Ignore history and vape now, it's perfectly safe as long as we don't do research on it!"
pictory
Ah, tangential but Thank You For Smoking is a fantastic bit of cinema and everyone should watch it.
TheDaharMaster
I love that movie
DrKonrad
Companies have been lying for decades (a century) about tobacco, oil, asbestos, teflon and other forever chemicals... When a company swears that something is safe, you should assume the exact opposite. You may even assume that they *know* it is harmful, but they want to sell it anyway.
Slonato
None of them were prosecuted because the people who care abut laws are idiots who cannot comprehend bad faith across.
wejustdontknow
Many of them are not idiots, they just don't care about anyone else and are working in a system that functions differently than most people have been told.
Ioftenpretendtobeapotato
Quitting is easy I've done it hundreds of times
svga
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_ZDQKq2F08&feature=youtu.be wow the video
and you can see they carve the definition out
neuronicle
What capitalism looks like.
Maviyakuku
They ded?
SavageDrums
And they were all punished, right?
mbq7
They obviously knew, but in principle this is a question to some actual researchers, CEO doesn't need to have a competence for judging their products, that's only a resposibility projection. A lot of terrible stuff has been done with good intentions, that's why third-party oversight & regulations are crucial.
bingotown
Watch “The Insider” about Jeffrey Wigand if you haven’t already.
TapeLeg
nomikos
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Berkshire
djangojazz
Great movie from the 90s about this called 'The Insider' starring Russel Crowe and Al Pacino
bingotown
I saw Wigand on the lecture series after the movie came out. He said everything depicted in the movie actually happened, but some things were just shifted around in time for better story telling. One of my favorite movies. And great soundtrack too.
aoshistark
What is the god damn point of purjury if no real penalty is applied??
phoenix0path
They were punished for lying under oath, right? Right?
deetatron
5v4297j9fj1
Just to be clear, it isn’t nicotine that kills you. It is all the other stuff
b00guy
And i'd bet not a one of them were ever given anything more than a mild scolding from a politician just looking to get their name mentioned in the news cycle.
TheOldSchoolisBack
It was a severe scolding, actually, but yeah. All seven were sacked over the next few years, and the industry agreed to a $200 billion settlement to defray healthcare costs incurred by the states. Sadly, none of them were charged criminally. In their testimony they put forward their own definition of “addictive” which was different than the commonly accepted definition. This weasel tactic likely saved them, as the DoJ determined the bar for conviction probably couldn’t be cleared.
rbudrick
So golden parachutes and no personal legal penalties?
TheOldSchoolisBack
P0werSurg3
Did they actually pay the settlement?
TheOldSchoolisBack
Just looked it up, so your welcome for being your personal google bot. Payments are based partially on sales volume, which has dropped way off. So far they’ve paid $138 billion. They have to keep paying forever.
JonatasAM
Would it please you to know you're better than the gooSlop?
TheOldSchoolisBack
idiotsonfire
If all of them had been arrested and died behind bars for their murders, maybe America would have sent a fucking message.
Samja192
What's the punishment for lying under oath?
CheeseB0t
Depends on whether you're rich or not.
AllRepublicansArePedophiles
A cabinet position
Idontneedrealfacts
Massive profit. Don't listen to the haters, crime not only pays, it pays well.
Grenkak12
$100M golden parachute
pgdave
Depends on whether or not you actually believed it. I don't know what they actually testified to, but if they believed it wasn't addictive (despite the evidence they had) then it wouldn't be lying. If they testified that they didn't have evidence that it was addictive then *that* would be lying. As for how they could honestly believe something in the face of actual evidence? People do that all the time, everywhere - it's not unique, especially when someone's paycheck depends on it.
JonatasAM
or worse their image
TheOldSchoolisBack
They weren’t lying because they explicitly laid out a definition of “addictive” that is different from everyone else’s. Essentially the sworn testimony version of having your fingers crossed. Saved them from prosecution, but was a watershed moment in fighting corporate tomfoolery.
ChuckTenor
Are you rich?
Samja192
No
alienstomper
Im rich in amino acids, does that count?
TheOldSchoolisBack
https://media0.giphy.com/media/v1.Y2lkPTY1YjkxZmJldGllaWhucGxwaTNudjZ5cWtxZ21wN3VuMmtlNGJjMTBjeDhrN25vdCZlcD12MV9naWZzX3NlYXJjaCZjdD1n/MAWxnzv6ZGd7q/giphy.mp4
alienstomper
More like a fatass but i appreciate the sentiment
cfnorg
Depends on how rich you are.
PostHartmann
You don't really have to be that rich if you're white.
pandemicmodedad
Poor white is not the same as rich white.
pitfallgalagatf2
And rich brown/black is not the same as poor white.
PostHartmann
No it's not, but I meant that a rich black man won't get the same treatment as a rich white man. And a poor white man won't be shot for a traffic stop like a black man would.
Donfolstar
That's a really roundabout way of saying racist still exists, but money matters more.
RanOutofWit
The fossil fuel companies are playing from the same playbook. Of course, tobacco kills the users (and people around them) while fossil fuels kill everyone, so maybe it should be taken just a little bit more seriously?
Cranbananarama
They're also, frustratingly, two major industries where "burn it all down" works in their favor/hurts the people more.
ChelVanin
We aren’t a serious society.
Imalwaysready
We truly deserve to be hit by a meteor of our own making.
Botticelliii
No. We don't. Stop doom scrolling. Not everything is shit. The algorithm is designed to make you feel this way. Take a break from the internet.
CouldntCakeLess
GeneralAnubis
Friendly reminder that the "experts" who said smoking doesn't cause cancer are the same ones who said climate change isn't real. Not just the same company. Literally the exact same people.
inkpod
"clean coal"
CyberHexx
This bri* I, ah, mean, cam, Campaign contribution says it's fine and we don't have to worry at all....
alyssajones123
Where I live (above 50°North latitude) it's expected to be over 30°c next week, and about half the local population doesn't believe in climate change. They've funded so much propaganda is ridiculous
reineseele
No the playbook is that oil companies blame the consumers.
akafluffy
It's the gas industry's playbook in the first place, the unleaded gas thing was before '94
Yawnos
So, are the meat and dairy industries, more or less for increased sales. there has been a lot of money spent on convincing people what to eat more of.
ToSisPoS
But a balanced breakfast needs at least 32 grams of pork or else the 9 eggs recommended would unleash their full protein power.
veedubfreak
Like shit-fil-a
leroy666
Capitalism kinda depends on this bullshit. If you can,t keep them consuming “more” and “bigger”. the system grinds to a halt.
Yawnos
Back when business knew the borders of the village and how many people were likely to buy from them they could be responsible about it or it would hurt their bottom line. Now they have the entire world as a market so they see infinite expansion as a strategy when in reality they are eroding the foundations of the market itself. Eventually they're either gonna run out of resources or people will be too poor to afford the product.
InTangier
If I recall correctly, the tobacco industry first wrote the playbook, pouring heavily into marketing and PR companies. These companies essentially wrote the rules that are copied by the most horrible industries today, to carry on selling, business as usual, a product everyone knows is harmful at every level.
bertchstudio
That should be the death penalty
If you are engaged in business that you know harms other humans, you should kys and I don't say that about anyone ever as a survivor of SI. But war profiteers etc don't belong on this planet
InTangier
They don't deserve an easy way out, imo. I just hate the fact that some faceless executives in some US city destroyed the world for a fat bonus. The chain of decisions that caused all this, from the horrible company that hired the mercenary PR firm to the person who came up with the plan, all responsible.
Same playbook with the oil and plastic industry: carbon footprint. Shift the responsibility to the consumer. We don't have to produce sustainable packaging, YOU have to recycle! Diabolical.
Shaodyn
1 in 3 users of tobacco die. If any other product had that kind of death toll, it'd be so insanely illegal that you'd get arrested just for being in the same room.
amoeba15
So 2 out of 3 become immortal?! Sign me up
Shaodyn
What I suppose I should have said was "1 out of 3 users of tobacco are directly killed by the product". Kind of figured that was implied, but didn't count on the Internet's ability to creatively misunderstand.
SergeyPrkl
also some 1/10 of the secondary smokers die directly to it. Kids etc. that have to inhale the smoke without consent.
Shaodyn
1/3 of direct users and 1/10 of people just nearby. That's an incredible level of death directly associated with this product.
ToSisPoS
100 years from now we’ll look back at social media this way.
Shaodyn
Social media is no less lethal than tobacco, but its consequences are more indirect. With tobacco, only the one using it dies. With social media, the one using it is completely fine but people thousands of miles away die because of something that person said.
ToSisPoS
It, like tobacco, leaded gas and paint, asbestos, and x-rays, got entrenched before any study of its repercussions got its shovel out.
Shaodyn
To be fair, before widespread use, social media was at least relatively harmless.
TheOldSchoolisBack
Nah, their playbook is much better, and has largely worked.
Big oil learned from the repercussions to the tobacco industry. They all acknowledge climate change, invest enough in green energy to put forward a solid marketing campaign, throw money into campaigns that make the average consumer blame themselves rather than the oil companies, etc. And all the while, drill baby drill.
lostlittletimeonthis
They also fund any and all movements that restrain green energy
DarkUranium
Also carbon capture: https://www.vox.com/climate/363076/climate-change-solution-shell-exxon-mobil-carbon-capture
reineseele
Yeah in the EU the "pump it underground and it will cost trillions with no security at all for any long term"