Guest Post: A Billion Lives

As the title says, this is a guest post written by Shannon Sparkles with some input from me, however the bulk of what follows originates from Shannon.

I’m really sad that I feel the need to write this, but it needs to be done.

When the team behind “A Billion Lives” posted the film’s new teaser Friday morning, I was elated. I was finally able to get a glimpse into the work that is sure to change the world.

Unfortunately, there was immediate criticism over some figures used in the footage, and the sniper shots began to ring out.

There are a few things I’d like to address in this post, but let’s start with the statistic that “165,000 children die from secondhand smoke every year.” Aaron and his team got that number from a variety of media sources, all citing the World Health Organization. The main source for the WHO statistics originated from a paper published in The Lancet. These are sources that we have been told to trust. As vapers, we know not to trust them, or at least treat everything from them with a level of suspicion. However, the Billion Lives team has stepped into new waters with this project. Yes, we are guiding them along the way, but that statistic isn’t what matters in this film. What matters is that we have been lied to. “A Billion Lives” is about the lies we have been fed, and that’s what we need to remain focused on.

I was shocked when I received the notification for this tweet from A Billion Lives:

https://twitter.com/abillionlives/status/668288077320855552

This started out with a tweet on whether or not the video was confusing, which led to my reply “someone really said that to you??? I just heard my brain explode. The antifreeze argument has been parroted a billion times.

Following on from that someone proposed putting the word “LIE” across the screen whenever there was a known lie being told. Seriously? Do people really need to be coddled so much that they need to be told in large letters that what they are listening to is a LIE?

Does the title of the teaser video not say “You are being lied to”?

It seems that being involved in this for so long, we can all get a little edgy, after all we’ve been the target both as smokers and now as vapers. It does make me wonder how Aaron and his team feel after all they’ve worked on.

Finally (and most importantly, in my humble opinion), nobody taking shots at Aaron and his team seems to remember that this film would not be happening at all if it weren’t for them. They have spent weeks away from their families collecting footage and taping interviews, and working endless hours editing and promoting the film (not to mention the debacle with Farcebook treating their advertisements as “tobacco”). We owe them everything. Have you ever stopped to consider that after some of the things that have been said, the ABL team might be starting to wonder why they did this to begin with? If there is even a flicker of doubt in their hearts, this film won’t succeed. We have to make sure there is no reason for them to doubt, and feed them constant words of encouragement.

Below is my personal message to Aaron and his team.

Aaron, I’m so sorry for everything that has been said the past few days. I know that the small words of one won’t make up for the cruel words of many, but I want to try.

You all really have no idea how much this film and all of you mean to me. The world needs to see the truth, and you are the ones brave enough to tell it. I have so much respect for you all, and I am begging you to please keep your heads up. Your film is going to be a masterpiece and will be sure to find a solid place in changing the world. I am one of #ABillionLives, and I will stand with you until the end.

–Shannon Sparkles

=======

Everything above that line is predominantly from Shannon, I will now add some of my own thoughts.

I’ve watched the teaser trailer countless times since it was released, and yes while including the statistic was probably not the best idea I take a slightly different view in that the context of when the statistic is included in the trailer suggests to me (viewing as a non-vaper, non-smoker general public type person) that the statistic used by the tobacco control / public health industries is, in and of itself a lie. After all, isn’t that what the entire film is about? How we have been lied to both as smokers and now as vapers?

Now that it’s all been resolved, can we now give Aaron and his team our full support, after all as Shannon rightly said, without Aaron and his team this movie would not happen.

https://youtu.be/zSq9iqal2cA

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27 thoughts on “Guest Post: A Billion Lives

  1. Thank you for the support.

    It seems that many pro-smoking advocates would like to hurt our film because they are delusional veterans of a lost war. Lost.

    It’s laughable to me that they are still fighting. It reminds me when they found Japanese soldiers on an island many years after WWII was done. They were still on alert, waiting for orders. They were still at war.

    Sadly, the vaping war is nearly lost as well. If vaping is going to survive, the tactics must be non-conventional. The people fighting it must actually rally around something. They must stop fighting each other…stop fighting their few remaining allies.

    I have had MANY discussions with THR folks lately and I fear the worst. Our film may not be able to help, especially if people run to discredit it without thinking.

    Why would we put that 165K stat in there? Why did we call it “A Billion Lives”?

    Are we idiots?

    I’m starting to wonder…

    This weekend has been hard. We’ve gotten 8000+ positive comments, but the few painful attacks have caused pain.

    Time to get back to the film now…

    Thanks for fighting the current war. Thanks for supporting the Manhattan Project.

    Aaron

    1. Aaron,

      You and your team decided to do a documentary on vaping, it has since evolved into something far bigger than anyone ever imagined.

      Are you idiots? Frankly, no you are not. You’ve taken on an enormous challenge. We all know, or at least suspect that there has been a lot of nastiness over the years from these ‘trusted organisations’ and the work you and your team are doing is going to blow everything they have done over the years wide open.

      Is it too late? Never. In an ideal world I’d love for the film to be the catalyst for massive change that will give back control to the public so they can live as they choose.

      Whether it’ll do that, only time will tell.

      From me, you have my support and my gratitude for taking this challenge on.

      If I see you around, I’ll buy you a beer or two 🙂

    2. Aaron, I understand your pov and welcome a film that exposes the lies told by PH. My genuine concern was by including the stat, credibility and integrity would be undermined.

      I do not believe you are idiots. The trailer has certainly stimulated debate and I welcome that too.

      1. Yes, that was a teaser. People should be a bit more cautious about judging the film by a glimpse.

        It did exactly what we wanted it to do.

      2. I understand (and share) your concern.

        What I don’t understand, is people’s excitement to blast us with their blogs while we’re about to launch an attack on the very people that have been harassing them most.

        It’s stupid.

        If the pro-smoking folks want to smoke, that is fine with me. I’m all for choice. They’ll be able to do whatever they want once the anti-vaping/smoking idiots are gone.

        That’s what happens when we expose them to the public.

        If everyone want us to make a film that the public sees, that actually does something, then we need support. Not people posturing for their friends.

      3. I understand (and share) your concern.

        What I don’t understand, is people’s excitement to blast us with their blogs while we’re about to launch an attack on the very people that have been harassing them most.

        It’s stupid.

        If the pro-smoking folks want to smoke, that is fine with me. I’m all for choice. They’ll be able to do whatever they want once the anti-vaping/smoking idiots are gone.

        That’s what happens when we expose them to the public.

        If everyone wants us to make a film that the public sees, that actually does something, then we need help getting to the public. Not people posturing for their friends.

        1. You’re not attacking the anti-smokers/anti-vapers, you’re endorsing them. That is why those who are more intelligent than you are attacking this pathetic travesty.

    3. As a vaper and ex smoker I am extremely disappointed in your comments on smokers above. There is a thing called freedom and choice. Smokers are fighting for their right and freedom to choose, are you saying you no longer believe in freedom and choice? Is freedom now a lost cause? How sad to believe that.

      Please don’t assume that it is just smokers that are unhappy with your SHS quote in the trailer. If you are going to throw smokers under the bus then you will have to do it without this vaper’s support. I sincerely hope this is not the case.

      1. Paul, my commentary was not directed at smokers. I am for freedom. But, I am not for people attacking my film to feed their own pride.

        We are trying to help.

        Battles must be picked. The battle is about vaping right now. If you’d like to fight us, instead of that battle, then go ahead. That is your freedom.

        Just don’t expect me to sit back and take it.

    4. Anti-smokers deliberately commit scientific fraud by falsely blaming smoking for diseases that are really caused by infection. That is the very foundation of their ideology, and you have given them a pass on it. So, they will use the same fraud to falsely blame vaping, and you have helped them get away with it. That is so far beyond mere idiocy that it qualifies as treason.
      http://www.smokershistory.com/

  2. If the film gains traction, I hope with all my heart that it shall, then the minor grumbles you have had so far will fade to background noise. You will find yourselves, and your film under attack from all angles, by all parties. Changing the world, as vaping could do, is never going to happen easily. The old guard will not fade away gracefully, those that take the reigns are beginning to jostle for position. There is much to play for.

  3. I thought the comment in question in a 7-8 second glimpse was actually a part of the bigger picture, pointing out the irony of lies. (*Just what you said, Paul, context). I thought it was taken out of a larger scene… no more no less. I didn’t give it a second thought until…. then somewhere I tweeted them to put pooh smells in the theaters when they’re lying scenes – and roses when they’re not… just as a joke.

    The 3+ minute glimpse into this film is absolutely astounding. I agree with Mark below, there WILL be resistance on this film. There will also be opportunity. Pointing out the statement was far from my mind until someone pointed it out. In my eyes, the very thought of ripping this film up for one statement?

    Maybe I should have a “shirt burning” once it comes in to gain attention? I think NOT.

    I hope it was politely asked if it can be fixed/edited – or did we all just start yelling? I’ll use the word of my U.K. twitter & facebook friends… utter bullocks. I continue to stand with this film and this team. I will wear my shirt with pride. I am also one of #ABillionLives.

    This project as a whole is something to look very forward to. I appreciate someone having the balls to do this. It will open some eyes.

    Shannon, you said it best. We owe them everything.

    1. Thank you for the kind words. I’m glad you thought the teaser was astounding.

      Hopefully people will wait to see the film before judging it.

  4. Well said Shannon, I too feel for Aaron and his team and hope that those of us that are grateful for their hard work and effort soften the blows of those who have negative opinions but haven’t taken time to remember how the negativity they receive effects them. We need to respect the efforts of Aaron as Director of the film, it is HIS baby. Leave off and let him do this HIS way, be patient, wait until it is released as a whole piece. Then we can discuss what we have seen. Remember Aaron is not a smoker, not a vaper, but a person who can see the benefits of vaping and the truth behind those who wish to stop it.
    Final word: Aaron & team, if you are reading this Thank You for the time you have taken out of your lives to bring to the world what vaping is about and what is happening to try and stop what us vapers have found, a way to quit smoking that works where other systems have failed us, I am very grateful to you all.

    1. I have to admit that I have spent the last three days hearing about this issue and all the pro-smoking blogs (4+) that have been writing and stoking public negativity towards our film. It has been a major distraction and one that my team has taken personally.

      We are trying to tell a story that the public will listen to.

      Some may not like parts of it (or how we tell it), but once the story is told, many will benefit from it. Even the ones attacking us.

      I am grateful for your support.

      1. The only people who will benefit from your despicable screed are the anti-smoker anti-vapers, because you endorse their lies that are based on scientific fraud. They use those same frauds against vapers.

  5. Some people need to get a life! As the saying goes….
    “You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.”
    I’m looking forward to seeing all the ‘professional ANTZ’ squirm.

  6. Paul, I’m sorry, but as presented in the trailer, I simply do not see the two statistics, 165,000 children and a billion lives, being presented as lies. I am most clearly NOT an Antivaper. I spent an entire chapter of TobakkoNacht — The Antismoking Endgame devoted exclusively to ripping apart some of the nastiest lies out there being floated around about e-cigs. Read the excerpt from that chapter (titled “Of Vapors and Vapers”) under the Book Selections tab at http://bit.ly/TobakkoNacht and judge for yourself if I would would ever be against vapers honestly defending themselves by attacking the lies told against them.

    Aaron, clearly at this stage in the game you may not be able to change fundamental elements in the overall direction of the film, but you should still have enough control to add something to the trailer that clearly and strongly indicates that the lies you are defending yourselves against are the same kind of lies that have been used to make people irrationally afraid of the smallest wisps of smoke, the same kind of lies that have made people worry that they’re getting cancers from using phones that have previously been used by smokers (even when they’re not actively smoking near them), and the same kind of lies that have split families up as parents are cautioned that a “deadly neurotoxin,” nicotine, can nestle in the clothing of loving grandparents and then leap out to be absorbed through the skin and poisoning tenderly hugged grandchildren.

    You have to make this clear, not just in the movie (which will likely be seen by only one to ten percent of all who are exposed to this trailer) but in the trailer itself and in all the publicity running up to the movie.

    Can you use that “Billion Lives” figure? It certainly makes excellent press (which is why it was created by Antismokers abusing statistics through SAMMEC) but to use it without adequate cautions ends up making the perceived basis of the film no better than the lies of the Antismokers (I think that if you look at the Antivapers you will find that virtually all of them are actually Antismokers simply moving their money, talents, rhetoric, and lies over to a new and threatening target).

    The teaser Aaron, as you note, is astounding, and it should be widely seen and appreciated, but it needs something added, even if only inserted near the damning statistics themselves or as part of hte introduction, explaining that the statistics aimed at vilifying smoking are used, not because you necessarily accept them, but because if the people attacking you actually believed them then they would not be attacking you and using the same sort of lies in that attack.

    Aaron, you say yourself, in a post here made just hours ago, that “If vaping is going to survive, the tactics must be non-conventional.” and I agree. Vapers can not allow themselves to fall victim to the same tactics that were used against smokers, and one of the strongest of those tactics when it came to getting bans was “Divide And Conquer” — pitting restaurants against bars, bars against clubs, bars and clubs against casinos, and casinos, finally, all alone against everyone.

    Have smokers “lost the war” they’ve been fighting since 1975? No, although we’ve certainly lost 90% of the recent battles and been reduced to bloodily holding on to small scraps of territory. We’ve been working with literally no budgets at all against a “Tobacco Control Industry” that has been getting 500 to 900 million dollars a year pumped into it just from the smokers’ Master Settlement tax on cigarettes. We’ve also faced the onslaught of the billions of dollars in funds that the NicoGummyPatchyPeople and the big charities that rake in billions of dollars through advertisements featuring choking children enveloped in clouds of smoke have poured into their efforts.

    Despite that incredible disadvantage, we have had very significant wins as our own understanding of the enemy and our own tactics have matured. Three years ago we fought Stanton Glantz (one of vaping’s biggest enemies in the US) to a defeat in California as his $800 million/year, $1 cigarette tax boost referendum was beaten at the polls by the choice of just tenth’s of a percent of voters. Glantz’s minions are coming back in 2016 with a demand for a two dollar per pack tax increase, and you can bet your bupkis that moneypot will be slammed against vapers as surely as against smokers. If the two groups can’t work together, and work successfully, on the basis of exposing the lies of the Antismokers as they apply to smokers and as they are now being applied to vapers, we will ALL lose.

    The uncritical presentation of the Antis’ statistics in the body of this trailer needs to be balanced somehow, either within the trailier itself or quite strongly in the statements and material surrounding the trailer and the movie — or else you will have simply surrendered to the Antismokers/Antivapers’ divide and conquer strategy and you will find yourselves looking down the barrel of an exorbitantly taxed, publicly banned, strangle-gripped regulated “addictive-nicotineless” vaping future that will strangle vaping’s ability to attract smokers… and thus choke the budding life out of vaping just as it’s growing wings.

    You’re obviously very talented if this video is any guide. You need to tweak it and/or its presentation to show that the Antismokers who have taken up arms against you as Antivapers are simply continuing a long-standing pattern of lies and distortions aimed at pitting people against one another through grossly exaggerated fears. You can assert your belief that vaping is far healthier than smoking without repeating Antismokers’ propaganda as “background fact.” and while clearly stating that while there have been many lies used in the War On Smokers that vapers will not stand by an allow the same sort of lies to be used against them as well.

    Again, read that excerpt in the Book Selections area at http://bit.ly/TobakkoNacht and you will see my support of your fight and of Free Choice as regards vaping in general. Listen to the Interview I did with Kevin and Jan Johnson at Vapers Place at http://www.podcast.de/episode/221582391 and you will hear my defense of vaping and my plea for smokers and vapers to work together against a very powerful, very experienced, and incredibly powerful and well-funded enemy. The only real weakness of the Antismokers and their Antivaping subset is in their lies. You can’t use those lies to support your case without being contaminated by them, and that contamination will come back to destroy you if you don’t take care to very clearly separate yourself from the lies even if you use them as weapons in building your case. You can still strongly state, as your central precept, that vaping will save many lives as long term smokers will, in large numbers, switch over to vaping at some point in their futures, but you can do that without throwing your fellow fighters in the the pit before being pushed in yourselves.

    Smokers need vapers, and vapers need smokers, as both groups have different strengths in terms of experience, knowledge, materials, organization, energy, personnel, and funding to bring to the battle. Remember that the Antivapers cannot simply be fought on the basis of science alone: just as with the Antismokers, your enemies are coming from a number of different motivational bases, and you can’t fight all of them by yourselves: as a larger percentage of smokers switch over to vaping, you’ll not only see the Idealists and Greedy lining up against you, but also the Moralists, the Neurotics, the Innocents, and the Controllers… all switching significant parts of their craziness, lies, and energy over to “the new enemy of the children” — vaping.

    We need to work together.

    – MJM

    1. Michael,

      I do not doubt you for a second. Unfortunately, I personally don’t have the luxury (or experience) of waging the kind of campaign, nor even completely understanding or analysing the information presented from all sides.

      I fully appreciate that my perception of the stat included in the trailer may indeed be incorrect – I’m always open to opinions to help shape my own 🙂

      Thank you for the detailed comment!

      1. I’m happy to discuss this all furhter, but for the moment, just let me take a quick look at the 165,000 children claim in the hope that you will see, through its obvious weakness, how weak some of the other material is, including the “Billion Lives” claim (which I wouldn’t suggest you outright drop given the power you gain by piggybacking on its lie, but which you *should* strongly note as being almost as much of a fantasy creation as many of the claims against vaping).

        The primary problem with the 165,000 claim, as with the Billion Lives claim, is that it rests purely upon the SAMMEC computer-model type statistical fantasy analyses. Those numbers can be made to go up, down, or sideways — all depending upon what populations, conditions, restrictions (i.e. “caused by,” “related to,” “associated with,” “attributable to,” etc; and whether under a 98%, 95%, or 90% statistical boundary strength), and correction for confounding factors are made. If RJ Reynolds and Philip Morris wanted to sit down and play with the numbers, that 165,000 would likely quickly melt to zero and the Billion Lives would likely decrease close to a millionfold… all supported by “reasonable” sounding (and, in some cases, actually truly reasonable) arguments.

        Beyond that basic weakness (which is profound, particularly when one considers the inclusion/exclusion of such things as confounding socioeconomic factors) there are two other weaknesses that are rarely mentioned and which are NEVER given prominence:

        1) The studies that blame respiratory illnesses of children on home smoke exposure **NEVER** (at least to the best of my knowledge) adequately (if at all) correct for any possible increased respiratory infections among the smoking adults being passed to the children. Do the researchers believe that smoking itself does NOT cause an increase in such infections among smokers? That would be counter to the claims they’ve been making for decades and using in their SAMMEC type projections. Could they hold such a belief today while also believing that the hundred- to thousandfold lesser exposure due to secondary smoke DOES cause such an increase? Unlikely in the extreme.

        It’s also unlikely that such researchers merely “overlook” the problem by accident. By far the most likely explanation is that the people who produce such figures KNOW that the figures are based upon an incorrect model BUT GO WITH IT ANYWAY simply because it produces the sort of results they want. In other words they are quite knowingly lying and should have their academic and editorial credentials stripped… unless they can come up with a convincing explanation for their incompetence.

        2) The 165,000 number is made up of deaths of children who were either (a) exposed to smoke, or (b) ASSUMED to be exposed to smoke simply because they had a parent who smoked. Over half of those deaths occurred in Southeast Asia and Africa in cultures where children are likely to be exposed to far more concentrated fumes from burning biomass for heating and cooking. The data seem to make no adequate correction for such an important potentially confounding factor.

        The numbers cited in the main WHO report are reported within the report, honestly, as being no more than estimates, with those estimates taken from a variety of different sources using instruments that measured different things in different ways and which produced their own subestimates. Some of the descriptions of the sources of these estimates are so confusing as to render them virtually worthless even within themselves, much less when added together with their various deficiencies multiplied to produce final figures that the media report as fact. For example: Read the following sentence carefully and see if you can even figure out what the authors were *trying* to say: “Almost two-thirds of all deaths in children and adults and a quarter of DALYs attributable to exposure to second-hand smoke were caused by ischaemic heart disease in adult non-smokers.” Note that what the core of the sentence regarding children is actually saying: “Almost two thirds of all deaths in children and adults… were caused by ischaemic heart disease in adult nonsmokers.” So how many of those children’s deaths “were caused by IHD in adult nonsnmokers”??? Are they counting up children who died of starvation when the adult exposed nonsmoker died of a heart attack leaving no one to feed them???? I honestly cannot figure out even what the authors were trying to claim, much less make any decision as to how valid the estimate might have been.

        Finally, in terms of projecting numbers into the future, one of the great failures of all these models is that they are all based on one VERY important and VERY unlikely assumption… namely that ALL MEDICAL RESEARCH, CARE, AND ADVANCEMENTS COME TO AN IMMEDIATE HALT over coming decades. I.E. that there can be no improvements in UN Health aid, no new penicillins, no new diagnositic techniques or cures for cancer, no new or improved anything at all… or the figures quickly become wildly wrong.

        Of all the above, I believe the lack of correction for children’s exposure to the claimed increases in respiratory infections among smoking adult caregivers is the most important neglected factor, but the other problems cannot simply be ignored. Taken together, the 165,000 figure is clearly in the same ballpark as many of the claims you’ve seen made about vaping. Indeed, given that the preponderance of vapers are drawn from the ranks of long-term smokers whose respiratory systems have supposedly been compromised, how long do you think it will be before you see figures claiming “CHILDREN EXPOSED TO SECONDHAND VAPOR MORE LIKELY TO DIE FROM RESPIRATORY INFECTIONS”? The effect won’t necessarily be causal of course, but if the vaping community has accepted the lie as it applies to smokers, they’ll be stuck with it when it is applied to their own smaller and weaker community. And note that, just as with the estimates applied to smokers, they’ll hold even if the vapors ONLY do their vaping 100 feet away from their homes!

        Your ONE BILLION LIVES title is a good one: it’s powerful and will make the public stop for a minute to hear what you have to say. You have to be sure that you say the RIGHT THING: that vaping is being lied about, and that in examining those lies you’ve also come to realize that those same sorts of lies have been used repeatedly over the past few decades in much the same way to attack smokers and have thus realized that those against vaping are clearly and determinedly walking down the same path toward a total elimination of vaping.

        Whew… sorry about the length. I’d expected the post to be shorter.

        – MJM

          1. Thanks for reading and thinking about it Paul. You can see why so many people are frustrated by having such stuff repeated as though it were indisputable fact. I fully understand the attraction of using a powerful sound bite to gain initial attention to an argument, but you’ve always got to watch out for how such things can be misinterpreted. I’ve gotten caught a few times over the years when I’ve posted sarcastic or satirical material and had the headline or excepted bits of it treated seriously.

            Compounding the problem for the filmmakers here is that an important part of the message you’re trying to deliver is that you believe a widespread uptake of vaping *would* save a good number of lives in people who might instead have smoked heavily and been harmed by it. While some Free Choicers will argue that, at least technically, the actual “proof” of smoking causing diseases is lacking, I’ve never tried arguing such a case myself: I simply dispute the dubious, falsified, or outright harmful claims, statistics, and methods that are used by Antismokers in promoting their case.

            “A Billion Lives” is one of those statistics, and “165,000 children” is an even more egregious one. If the references are used, there DOES need to be a very visible note about their dubious foundations — and in this case, MAKING that note, in the correct places and in the correct ways, should actually strengthen your overall argument that these same deceivers are now using these same methods to attack vaping.

            – MJM

  7. I posted this comment on DP’s blog, but I’m going to post it here as well, this is why I’m fully supporting “A Billion Lives”, because these lies need to end.

    In most western countries the war has indeed been lost, but not just because of ANTZ propaganda and lies, it has been lost because tobacco companies surrendered, they gave in because it was in their interest to do so. Smokers are just the collateral damage.

    I switched to vaping when the government in my country brought in “propaganda packaging” and hiked the tobacco tax yet again. They did this with the collusion of the tobacco companies, and justified it with the lies from the ANTZ.

    Smokers are not being thrown under the bus by vapers, they were thrown under the bus years ago by the companies they pay their hard earned cash to, the tobacco companies. No tobacco company fought the smoking bans, and their not fighting them now, why ? because it doesn’t hurt them, they don’t giving a flying fuck about how it hurts smokers. Nor do they give a shit about extortionist taxes, they are silent because they have sold out to governments so that they can keep selling their products and making their profits.

    Who gets hurt ? who’s freedom of choice gets taken away ? who gets vilified and demonised ? Smokers, that’s who.

    I was getting played, for more than 20 years I got played, by the tobacco companies that I gave my hard earned money to, by the government who was also sucking the cash out of my pocket, and by the ANTZ, a bunch of nasty little puritans that lived off that same money given to them by the government. It was time to wake up!

    I did, I stopped smoking, and stopped all the parasites from sucking me dry. I took back my freedom, and still got to enjoy my small luxury of nicotine. And make no mistake, I enjoy vaping, even more than I did smoking, because it comes with that added ingredient of the knowledge that I am no longer being used as a scapegoat for tobacco companies, ANTZ or government, as much as they try to make me one. I no longer have to pay for my own persecution. Its a win/win for me.

    So for all those smokers having a conniption fit over a 3 minute trailer to a film you haven’t even seen yet, and for those smokers who think vapers are throwing you under a bus, feel free to keep giving your hard earned to the parasites that threw you under the bus years ago, so they could make money out of you while making you the sacrificial lamb on the alter of greed and corruption, those tobacco companies who put their profits before your freedom, its your choice.

    I’ll end this post with a message for the liars in the tobacco control industry, the liars in the tobacco companies, and the liars in the government.

    “You’ve lied to me until the cows come home, but I think I just heard MOO!

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