Cigarette Maker Should Pay $3 Billion

[Capn]

I they can just appeal till almost forever, they have the lawyers.

If Philip morris paid the guy tomorrow, (assuming no taxes, and I don't know how settlements are taxed) he would become something like the 155th richest man in the world, (sarcasm)this settlement wasn't excessive(/sarcasm).

 

[Cyberian]

<< IF AND ONLY IF the tobacco companies are indeed guilty of purposely making cigarettes artificially extra addictive through the use of chemicals.
>>



Good point.
Cigarettes are legal and the dangers are well known. The fault is not with the tobacco companies.
If I get drunk and fall down the stairs should I be allowed to sue Seagram's?
If I eat Big Mac's all my life and develop high cholesterol levels and hypertension can I sue McDonald's?

 

[pulse8]

<<

<< IF AND ONLY IF the tobacco companies are indeed guilty of purposely making cigarettes artificially extra addictive through the use of chemicals.
>>



Good point.
Cigarettes are legal and the dangers are well known. The fault is not with the tobacco companies.
If I get drunk and fall down the stairs should I be allowed to sue Seagram's?
If I eat Big Mac's all my life and develop high cholesterol levels and hypertension can I sue McDonald's? >>




ARGH! I don't really agree with the settlement, but I HATE these arguments. ALCOHOL AND BIG MACs ARE NOT INHERENTLY ADDICTIVE! *sigh*

 

[StageLeft]

Well pulse alcohol can be addictive to some people. If not physically psychologically. The same is for caffeine; it is also an addictive drug. Yes on a smaller degree but caffeine still is. I know a LOT of &quot;casual alcoholics&quot; - people who have 2-3 shots every night. This is not healthy and yet it is part of their daily routine. They &quot;need it&quot; to relax. Yet somebody who never drinks won't know what they're missing.

Anyway my point I now have to make is that if these companies lieing was such a bad thing and caused so many ruined lives how come now, in a time of enlightenment when everybody and their dog knows that smoking is so bad, do we have smoking rates just as high as in previous decades (its because youngsters keep starting to replace those who kill themselves)? Its not the cigarette companies, its the dumb bastards who start smoking because they are bored. I do have a little more sympathy for somebody who started in 1960 than who started in 1995, but if other people can quit so can you. Everybody _knew_ that smokes were addictive; if you pretended otherwise you were kidding yourself.

 

[dafatha00]

I agree that the guy has no right to sue Philip Morris, but the sooner tobacco companies go bankrupt, the better.

I can't name one good thing tobacco has ever done for our society. Its always been bad.

 

[brtspears2]

These lawsuits show how F*cked our legal system is. Smoking is a choice, no one forcing you to start. It is addictive, along with many other things in the world, like TV, Anandtech, Coke, for a few examples.

THis reminds me when GM was sued for $6 billion dollars when a drunk driver hit a 1978 Chevy Malibu at a red light at 80mph. Stupid lawsuits. In the end, no one wins. You get the big number, but for sure, the big company has more money and can play with the legal system to not pay.

 

[pulse8]

Alcohol CAN be addictive, but it's the person that sets that, not alcohol itself. Not everyone who drinks alcohol drinks it because they are addicted to it. Can the same be said about tobacco? I don't think so. Alcohol is not addictive in and of itself, cigarettes are.

 

[brxndxn]

$3 Billion!!! to ONE man? The man isn't even worth the knowledge it takes to comprehend $3 Billion.

Really.. this is awfully stupid. The jurors gotta be dumber than sh|t.

 

[dafatha00]

Tobacco kills approximately 3.5 million people each year. 3.5 MILLION people. Jesus, that's more than any war. Its pointless for people to die. Yeah yeah, its the people's choice to smoke, but if the tobacco industry didn't exist, we wouldn't have this problem now would we.

 

[StageLeft]

Not everyone who drinks alcohol drinks it because they are addicted to it. Can the same be said about tobacco? I don't think so.

Well actually a lot of people you see at bars puffing are doing it because they enjoy it but don't regularly smoke. My friends and I in university used to have one or two a night on the weekends when we'd drink. None of us smoked regularly, but doing it very infrequently you can actually get a semi-enjoyable high from it. At peak I probably had 15 smokes during an entire year. Then I stopped because I found the next morning my mouth tasted gross and my head was splitting apart

Ultimately though alcohol is kinda good in that people use it at get togethers and its fun to drink it, but basically when people say that tobacco never did anything good for society I agree. Its a crappy industry.