Don’t Blame Tobacco – Blame Biology
-
Kevin Godbee - Jun 1, 2011
- 5 min read
By C. R. S. Lyles
Just the other day, I turned on my television and ran across a commercial promoting an anti-acne product called Epiduo. Throughout the entire length of the commercial, the mantra of "don’t blame yourself; blame biology" was repeated multiple times, and I couldn’t help but see a parallel between this very phrase and the reputedly-negative health aspects which have always been synonymous with smoking.
But how negative are they really?
We as a society have always taken the inherent risks of smoking at face-value, confident that the authority figures and so-called experts know what they are talking about when they tell us how smoking will lead to disease and death.
But, as with all authority figures in a post-Nixon America, taking their word at face value is the surest way of ensuring that you’re going to be lied to.
For example, let’s take a look at the country of Japan.
Out of the top fifteen countries in the entire world who smoke, Japan has the highest percentage with a whopping 59% of the country’s male population. The life expectancy rate is just under 77 years, and yet the lung cancer death rate (LCDR) for Japan is only 0.5% of the male population.
How is this possible?
In his 2003 book In Defense of Smokers [Free Download], author Lauren Colby spoke with the infamous Ernst L. Wynder (who you may remember as one half of the research team who effectively began this post-modern witch-hunt with the publication "Tobacco Smoking as a Possible Etiologic Factor in Bronchiogenic Carcinoma", and the implications of what he discovered when he questioned him about his 1991 article titled "Comparative Epidemiology of Cancer between the United States and Japan" are staggering to the entire world’s population of smokers.
"The bottom line, however, was the concession of Dr. Wynder that the data did not support smoking as a cause of lung cancer in Japan. According to the authors’ own figures, the lung cancer rate among Japanese males is less than one third the rate among U.S. white males, and as early as 1955, 81.4% of Japanese men were smokers (compared to 52.6% in the U.S.)."
Now, for you history buffs out there, the issue of smoking in America can pretty much be traced back to one pesky little Reader’s Digest article whose implications were studied by both Wynder and his colleague, Evarts Ambrose Graham.
And, unfortunately for all the anti-smoking activists out there, a concession such as Dr. Wynder’s that the effects of smoking do not always lead to developing lung cancer is pretty much akin to Charles Darwin renouncing evolution on his death bed.
Now, while we’re on the subject of the socially-accepted mythology regarding the effects of smoking on one’s health, let’s revisit the exact phrasing used in the equally infamous 1964 Surgeon General’s Report.
"Nicotine is rapidly changed in the body to relatively inactive substances with low toxicity. The chronic toxicity of small doses of nicotine is low in experimental animals. These two facts, when taken in conjunction with the low mortality ratios of pipe and cigar smokers, indicate that the chronic toxicity of nicotine in quantities absorbed from smoking and other methods of tobacco use is very low and probably does not represent an important health hazard."
To clarify for the kids in the back seats, smoking cigarettes will probably end up killing you in the end. I myself am a cigarette smoker, but have no illusions about what I put into my body or believe that cigarettes are healthy in any way whatsoever.
But pipe tobacco and cigars are different.
"Death rates of cigar smokers are about the same as those of non-smokers for men smoking less than five cigars daily…Death rates for current pipe smokers were little if at all higher than non-smokers, even with men smoking 10 or more pipefuls per day and with men who had smoked pipes for more than 30 years."
 |
 |
The point is this: smoking tobacco is not going to give you lung cancer 100% of the time.
In his book, Lauren Colby goes on to say that "We have a new disease, Chronic Onstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), the exact cause of which is unknown (indeed, the definition of the disease is vague; it seems to be a case of "this patient has something wrong with his lungs, but we don’t know exactly what"). Cigarette smoking is thought to play a role; yet [it is] clear that many cigarette smokers never develop this disease, and the authors do not know why. I submit that the reason is very simple: smoking does not cause emphysema."
Further proof of the inherent laziness of our public officials is evident in the revelation that "Every year, the government releases figures on the number of ‘smoking-related deaths’ in the United States…Most people assume that there is some scientific basis to that figure. Not so! The government ‘scientists’ simply take a flat percentage of the number of people who die from a particular disease, and assume that to be the number whose death was caused by smoking. There are no autopsies, no studies on actual human beings."
This is what my tax dollars are going to? I work and fulfill my necessary little role in this grand society so some pretentious dweeb with a God complex can assume that the smoking-related deaths number somewhere around 500,000 a year?
The proof is in the pudding, they say, but nothing really says it better than Lauren Colby’s statement that "To this day, it remains unconfirmed and it remains true, that despite hundreds of experiments, nobody has been able to induce a single cancer in lab animals by exposing them to ordinary tobacco products or smoke."
Smoking is not a definite indication of an early death; in fact, the assumption that smoking tobacco can kill you has only been present since the 1950s. Before then and around the entire globe, tobacco was considered medicinal, calming, and even holy to some cultures. The negative health aspects that can derive from smoking are not guaranteed, but really are based more on one’s biology and quality of life rather than on tobacco.
Just look at the data: Cuba has a 49.3% prevalence of male smokers and a life expectancy of just under 75 years. Ironically, Cubans are predicted to outlive Americans by two or more years, yet are socially-identified with tobacco via their world-famous cigars. France, whose people are so stereotypically type-cast as chain-smokers, have a 40% prevalence of male smokers and a life expectancy rate of 74 years.
The United States has only a 28% prevalence of male smokers, but a life expectancy of just under 73 years.
Looks like the smokers of the world may be on to something, huh?
Carter R. Lyles is a student at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL and at the University of Florida in Gainesville. He is a journalism/psychology major, and in addition to his work at Pipes Magazine, he has contributed articles to The Alligator, Thursday Night Magazine, and The Fine Print. |
Written by Kevin Godbee
More Pipes and Tobaccos Articles
30 Responses
Smokingpipes.com Updates
18 Fresh AKB Meerschaum Pipes |
12 Fresh Nørding Pipes |
24 Fresh Rossi Pipes |
18 Fresh Estate Pipes |
12 Fresh Jacono Pipes |
Recent Posts
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 641. Our featured interview tonight is with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl and is featured in our recurring series, “Ask the Tobacco Blender”. However, tonight he will be the interviewee as we learn about how he became a pipe smoker and collector, when he got his first pipe and how he progressed from there. At the top of the show, Brian will have a review of the rare German tobacco blend, Tumblin’ Dice.
I remember the first time I heard someone else say it. “How many pipes do I need? Just one more.” It’s glib, sure, a bit of a joke, but it also rings a bell of truth, at least to me. I certainly have “enough” pipes, but pipes are seductive little things. Just when we think we’re all set, we have enough, another will come along that tempts us beyond any sense of reason. I suppose it’s the same way with any sort of collecting. There’s always another white whale we’re in pursuit of. When we finally track that one down, though, another will almost inevitably breach the surface, taking its place as the new object of our desire, enticing us to change course and set sail once again. But, there’s a potential problem with having a lot of pipes. Maybe. The more pipes we may have, the harder it can be to keep them in rotation. It makes sense. We tend to gravitate towards our current faves, the ones that most appeal to us for whatever reason, and sometimes, maybe they stay in rotation longer than they really should. The side-effect of this, of course, is that another favored pipe might end up too-long forgotten. That’s exactly what happened recently. Exhibit A: The Castello pictured is one that has been long overlooked. It’s a Trademark shape #55. It’s a really nice example of the shape. The red pearlized stem is beautifully done. The wood isn’t really anything special to look at, but it’s evenly covered, without any bald spots. When I look at it, I wonder why it wasn’t done in the more typical dark ruby-red finish that adorns most Trademarks. I’ve seen a great deal of variation amongst the grade over the years, including one really nice bent-bulldog that left the factory with a brown sandblasted finish. (For those who don’t know, Trademark has long been the lowest Castello smooth grade, usually finished in a dark red.) Was this a stamping/grading error, or is there just more leeway in the grade than we’ve come to expect? I might never know. This example is from the early 1970s, maybe even the late 1960s, identified by the upper case Ks in the grade designation. (On Sea Rock and Old Antiquari pipes, the Ks reflect the size, while with the smooth finishes, Trademark, Castello and Collection, the Ks represent the relative grade.) It has been living in a different rack than the one housing the majority of my #55s. I don’t recall why I put it there, but as many of us can relate to, rack space is often at a premium. I stumbled upon it while looking for something completely different. “Oh, you? Why are you there? I remember you smoke pretty well.” Yeah, I sometimes talk to my pipes – one of many quirks, I suppose. I won’t begin to worry until they start talking back. I grabbed it from the rack, dusted it off, and decided to give it a fill with a bowl of a slightly aged VA/perique blend, Telegraph Hill, from 2018. What a delightful smoke! At five years, the tobacco is expressing a lot of the complexities of aged Virginias and the perique adds a delightful fruitiness. When young, the composition is a bit brighter, maybe a little spicier, but time has polished any edges, and amplified the sweeter notes. Like the pipe, I’d forgotten about this blend for quite a while, but one evening in March, after chatting with my good friend Nate, who is quite a fan of it, I decided it might be time to revisit it. I got a couple of fresh ones, and excavated a couple older tins from the library. I normally reach for Fillmore when I want a VA/perique thing because of its boldness and depth, but in revisiting this one, I’m finding something soothing and comfortable about it that I’ve really been enjoying, both young and aged. Sticking with the theme of the forgotten, and as a perhaps interesting tidbit to the photographically inclined, I shot the pictures for this month’s column with my old Nikkor-O 35mm/2.0 mounted on my trusty Nikon Df. The last time I used this lens, it was adapted to one of my Fujifilm bodies, and I didn’t care much for the results, so I put it away and pretty much forgot about it. But, I’ve recently been exploring some of my old kit, deciding what to keep, what to pass along, and this one once again came to my attention, kind of like that old Castello. On the Df, there’s something about its vintage rendering that I find truly appealing. Another forgotten treasure, and just like with that old pipe, it seems that, at least today, everything old is new again. If your collection is on the large side, are there pipes or tobaccos that you’ve all but forgotten, only to come back to them one day to find yourself wondering why? Maybe it’s just another fun dimension to this endlessly fascinating journey.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 640. Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Ben Rapaport. Ben has been known internationally as an avid pipe smoker, antique pipe collector, and book author. His first book on pipes was published in 1972, and his latest book – his 10th – is out now in very limited quantities. The distribution has already sold out, but you can still get a copy of “The Wide World of Wood Tobacco Pipes. Two Centuries of Craftsmanship and Creativity” by contacting him directly at ben70gray@gmail.com. At the top of the show we’ll be turning the tables on our recurring Ask the Pipemaker segment. This time, Jeff Gracik will ask the questions, which Brian will answer as a pipe collector, and you can give your answers too.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 639. Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Per Billhäll. Per is the owner of Scandinavian Pipes, which is an online retailer of high grade pipes. He started smoking pipes in the 1960s. His first high grade pipe was made by Hans “Former” Nielsen, who is one of the living legends from Denmark. That led to Per becoming a huge pipe and tobacco collector, and show attendee where he became well known. Along with pipe book author Jan Andersson, they started The Pipe Club of Sweden in 1991. Then in 1999, Per started “Scan Pipes”. He is now one of the pipe retailing legends from Sweden. At the top of the show Brian will talk about holiday blends, and other special pipe tobacco blends.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 638. Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Fae “The Sassy Pipe Lady” Simmons. Fae is the owner of Tobacco Treasures, which sells new, vintage, & estate pipes, and smoking accessories on Etsy. She has been in business since 2017, and has been surrounded by pipes and tobacco most of her life. Her father and his brother smoked pipes, and so does Fae. Her husband is also a retired tobacconist that worked all over the industry from coast to coast for several different companies in the industry. She has a great story of how her business got started with a great inventory of unsmoked vintage pipes. At the top of the show we will have an Ask the Tobacco Blender segment with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl, which is one of the most popular boutique pipe tobacco companies in the USA.
Ok, so it’s that time of year, as we all know. Family feasts, houses, yards, and big trees festooned with lights and dangling ornaments, just high enough to keep the cats from reaching a paw into the greenery. It’s also the time of year when your pipe-smoking-significant other makes vast hints about a new pipe. That’s to be expected since he or she was a good boy or girl during the year. Yes, ladies smoke pipes, too. Oh, you want an example? Okay, try Actress Greta Garbo, Millicent Fenwick, Mary Frith, and my late grandmother (who died when she was 93) dipped snuff and smoked a cob occasionally. So now that we have settled that the gentler side of life will puff a pipe too, let’s move on to the upcoming biggest holiday of all. Of course, that huge event is brought to us by the hefty fellow in a red suit, puffing his pipe all the way in a sled filled with presents, being led by a reindeer with a red nose. Or some such. That’s Santa Claus, of course. Becoming a bit more serious, Christmas is such a wonderful time for families and friends. It’s also quite special for pipe puffers. For many of us, this brings up a nostalgic look back to our pipe-smoking or cigar-smoking friends who have died during the current year. A great journalist pal whom I often joined in a local brick-and-mortar pipe and cigar shop. I puffed my pipe, and occasional cigar, as he enjoyed a cigar. He died in October and will be missed. On the happier side of things, Christmas is also a time when mind workers of the world renew their collections with fresh additions. Pundit included. A French passion has overtaken Pundit, from reading more Albert Camus, a heavy cigarette smoker, as were many French intellectuals of a certain time. Instead of cigarettes many of us prefer the more relaxed enjoyment of pipes for that “calm and objective judgment” in the comings and goings of the world. This brings me to French pipes. While visiting France once in the long ago, I happened by a “Tabac” shop in Paris, Tabac Des Vosges. I purchased a beauty of a Chacom bent. I also later bought a Ropp made from ancient briar. To learn more about the dawn of briar pipes and beginnings, take a peek at a well-done piece by Davin Hylton in Pipe Line on April 12, 2023, on Saint-Claude, France, the birthplace of briar. Also in the long back when, on a cold Christmas afternoon, Pundit wandered into an Atlanta bricks and mortar pipe shop to look around. There, resting in an enclosed glass counter was an exquisite Comoy. An older gent, smoking a beautiful bent, asked me if I wanted to look at that pipe. It had a $100 price tag. A college student working for a grocery store chain to help with college tuition at the time, Pundit didn’t have one hundred cents, let alone a C note! I declined and found a $5 basket pipe. A Christmas tradition had just begun. Since that early time, Pundit has made it a holiday ritual to either reward himself, or a special friend, with pipe or tobacco. A Claudio Cavicchi would be nice. Just sayin.’ And now for a couple of December-born Pipe Smokers of the Past: Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on Dec. 30, 1865, and died on Jan. 18, 1936. I always prefer to believe the best of everybody; it saves so much trouble—Rudyard Kipling. Martin Van Buren, born Dec. 5, 1782, and died July 24, 1862, U.S. President, 1837-1841 As to the presidency, the two happiest days of my life were those of my entrance upon the office and my surrender of it—Martin Van Buren. And one more note to recall a deceased World War II veteran who loved William Somerset Maugham, the author. Maugham, a pipe smoker, was born in Paris, France, on Jan. 25, 1874, and died on Dec. 16, 1965. One cool afternoon as the veteran and I talked while sitting in his backyard patio, he looked off into the distance as if studying something. Nothing in particular. Just looking. He turned to me and said if I wanted to learn about life, “read Somerset Maugham.” I did. It wasn’t until late in life that I discovered how easy it is to say, ‘I don’t know’ –W. Somerset Maugham And now a Parting Shot: Any day with an old friend with pipes and tobacco is a good day.
Excellent article, Carter!
Great Article!!
Why aren’t articles such as this reported by the media? Politics and money?
Wonderful piece! Thank you.
Wonderful piece! It’s amazing what happens when those anti-smoking figures are confronted.
very nice.
Why doesn’t the media report it? because the antis pay a lot of dollars for commercials against. we’d have to spend just as much to advertise for it.
I’d be extremely interested in any reports from the last 10 years. Whilst this is an excellent article, the Surgeon General’s 1964 report is perhaps a little out-dated. Going to pass this round the sceptics though!
The UK’s own anti-smoking advertisments now tend to go with the phrasing “smoking-related” – As in, dead smokers who happened to die of things that are commonly associated with smoking.
Great article! Everything seems to be so true, it seems nearly impossible to argue against it! But, I am dumbstruck; every time you try and say something of the sort to an anti your only met with arrogant smirks and smug chuckles and shaking heads. I cannot find a reason not to agree with you Carter, and that is not only because I love smoking a pipe, but because you make perfect sense, this can only mean that the antis are (for the most part) arrogant idiots!
Well written, Carter, and well researched.
As a scientist myself, I can explain why there exists such an abundance of anti smoking scientific studies; MONEY.
Truth is, it costs a lot of green to get a diploma in a scientific field from a decent college. Once graduated, the budding scientific mind quickly discovers that there is no ready market for his specialty except for what little grant money that can be found. Grant money, though available, cannot be considered a guaranteed source of income unless the researcher provides the “expected” result. Don’t get the expected result, don’t expect a nother grant.
Without going through the whole “figures don’t lie but liars do figure” routine, let’s just say that any batch of numbers can be coerced into any result through creative massage. Look into any anti- research and you will find a variety of skews that have affected the outcome: contrived populations, lack of background research, lack of continuity of data. It is aparent that the money for research is pointing in the “anti-” direction and the researcher who wants to keep his family fed will be looking in that direction also.
Once again, carter, thank you for your open mind.
One of the most revealing pieces of well documented information from Mr. Colby’s book, cited in this article: due to the anti-smoking campaign, smoking has declined yet the lung cancer death rate has increased. Is there a link? I don’t think so.
.
Over all I think Mr. Simmons comment above is the most cogent I’ve heard during this entire discussion. It reminds me of the fiasco caused by “scientists” fudging the data on global warming. BTW, Al Gore has been keeping a pretty low profile lately; maybe he can get a job crusading against smoking (if he isn’t doing so already!) 🙂
Nice job, Carter. This is the first I’ve heard anything from the Surgeon General’s report and non-hard scientific data available. I agree with the comment made by Capnbellamy about a definite interest in seeing any scientific studies done within the last ten to twenty years.
My wife is very sensitive to the present information about “second-hand smoke”, but does not insist I do no pipe smoking in the house.
To find any more current info from the Surgeon General’s office might be quite a challenge, especially without research methodology knowledege. Perhaps I shall do a little scratching.
@ capnbellamy & tatanka re: more recent reports vs. older reports.
I trust the older reports more than the more recent information from the surgeon general’s office.
Back in the 50’s & 60’s, even though tobacco was already being vilified, it was nowhere as bad as it is now, which slants the more recent info much harder against tobacco.
Read this from just 6-months ago, and then tell me if you still want to trust anything recent from the Surgeon General.
http://greenhellblog.com/2010/12/12/surgeon-general-jumps-the-shark/
I think I was told that the information you see above in the two notices about how pipe smokers were shown to be better off than non-smokers was actually removed from the report later on because the antis didn’t want it there.
I think the source of that information is in the book, “For Your Own Good” by Reason Magazine’s Jacob Sullum.
Well said.
Maybe: “what this world (really does) needs is a good 10 cent cigar.”
Quote “capnbellamy said:
I’d be extremely interested in any reports from the last 10 years. Whilst this is an excellent article, the Surgeon General’s 1964 report is perhaps a little out-dated. Going to pass this round the sceptics though!
The UK’s own anti-smoking advertisments now tend to go with the phrasing “smoking-related” – As in, dead smokers who happened to die of things that are commonly associated with smoking.”
I think, if anything that report is understated! There are probably more additives added to cigarettes than there were back then. Therefore possibly more deaths related to cigarettes versus pipe smoking related deaths.
As to the UK maybe they are saying the deaths are related to ashtrays?
Great article, even better subject.
Hey Zuni, is that “as in being hit over the head with an ashtray?” 🙂
Re: Nicotine benefits.
http://dengulenegl.dk/English/Nicotine.html
Great article, Carter. For updated “reports”, look to the source of all the current anti legislation: the WHO’s Tobacco-Free Initiative http://bit.ly/mBy724 . It’s a much catchier slogan than a “war on tobacco”, which has become passe what with the current global conflicts bringing everybody down. Even a casual reading will highlight the fact that most of the statistics cited are little more than agenda-based assumptions.
Very thought provoking article!
Great article. Its like i’ve always said. where are the statstics of smokers who dont die from “smoking related illness”
I grew up in a home where my parents and extended family smoked cigars, pipes and cigarettes constantly. If second hand smoke were as bad for one’s health as the Surgeon General’s office implies, we should all have been dead long ago. That’s me, and my other six siblings! Let’s tell the truth: society in general has become more and more intolerant. Look at the most recent outdoor smoking ban in NYC. Outdoor smoking has never been shown as any threat to health, but antismokers are so angry and vehement that any whiffl of tobacco is viewed as a personal assault.
Maybe a way out of this mess is to outlaw tobacco, as an experiment. Then the government would lose billions in tax revenue and we could form speakeasies for smokers. Problem is, the current generation of pleasure-hating idiots didn’t live through the Prohibition Era, which gave us Organized Crime, so they haven’t learned any lessons about why prohibitionism ultimately doesn’t work. Human beings like to smoke, drink, gamble, and some even like to do drugs. This has been true since humans existed. Why can’t we accept this?
Great article, Carter. I always thought that this anti-tobacco campaign is a kind of witch hunt, just to give people something to blame.
Great article, thanks!!!
A further comment:
Excellent article. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if, when the whole truth is known about death from any type of cancer, that obesity is the main cause. Interestingly, one of the major differences between Americans and the Japanese is, we’re fatter than them. That may account for a longer life expectancy in a country with more smokers overall than the USA.
I like the compare and contrast between the thoughtfulness and factual nature of this article and the new packaging campaign waged by the anti’s. When you can’t sway with a message based in reality, always throw disturbing images at it.
Great article!
Are you also aware the CDC requires doctors to list SMOKING as the cause of death if the decedent has ever smoked and dies from a disease the CDC associates with smoking. This is the best way ever to get statistics to say what you want them to say. Control the raw data.
Great article..thanks!
Those silly facts, always messing up everybody’s preconceived notion of evil.
I would like to note that the story about Darwin recanting is a false story that was spread by one Lady Hope, while Darwin’s daughter, who was with Darwin throughout all of his last days, says Ms. Hope never even visited Darwin.
Man i loving it and it is good to get the other side of the story!