Now here’s a couple of pictures for those of you who may think tobacco companies are just typical businesses selling a simple product. [Sorry. The pictures are a bit out-of-line. I can't arrange them correctly with this posting system.]

I know what you’re thinking. First, nice shorts, guy, then, wow, he must have smoked a LOT of cigarettes to get those muscles.

This is what happens in a country with lax truth-in-advertising laws, not to mention lax tobacco advertising laws. Can you imagine this being used in the U.S.? Impossible.

I read somewhere that since people in North America and Europe have reduced their smoking so drastically, the tobacco companies have ramped up their overseas sales to people without the same awareness, or hyper-awareness, of the health effects of tobacco use. It sure seems like it in Japan.

There are more and more smoking areas in, say, train stations, now, but the concept is just a little off. If you want to smoke you have to go stand in an area marked off by white lines on the ground. Unfortunately, the smoke doesn’t respect the lines and goes whichever way the wind blows - in my face, most of the time.

Smoking in bars and restaurants and other public places is in about the same place as California was in the 80s. It’s very hit and miss as to whether the place you’re going to will be smoke-free or not. Once around that time, I went into a restaurant with a friend and the hostess said, “Smoking or non-smoking?” “Non-smoking,” we said, to which she replied, “I’m sorry we don’t have non-smoking.” We never quite figured that out...

Smoking at my university is arranged the same way as the train stations. There are quite a few designated, painted-line-enclosed smoking areas and a whole lot of smoking students. One of the duties of the teachers, university professors, mind you, is to tell students smoking out-of-bounds to move 20 feet to the left where the rest of the smokers are gathered. Quite a teacher/student relationship we’ve got going.

Anybody see the recent video on CNN of the two-year-old smoking baby from Indonesia? There was quite a bit of shock and outrage expressed in the comments section, of course, and cries of child abuse, but very little cultural awareness. The reason that can happen in a country like Indonesia is because of the lack of awareness that I mentioned earlier.

Blame the tobacco companies that think an ad campaign like the current Winston one shown here is somehow not deceitful and immoral.