ight nightclubs and bars andhang-outs - not to mention the magazines and posters andbillboards - teenagers will find ways to smoke, no matter howmany public service announcements or laws are written to stopthem. Most of these kids know that smoking fills their lungswith toxins like arsenic, cyanide, and formaldehyde. They'lleven recite the statistics to you: Smoking kills over 1,000people a day in this country alone, and is far deadlier, interms of mortality rates, than any hard drug. And then they'llblow their smoke into your face. The only way to get any leverage with teenagers is toreturn fire with fire, taking on the various influences thatmake smoking seem attractive. We need, in other words, to findnew ways to make smoking look ridiculous. John F. Banzhaf III had no particular animosity toward thecigarette companies when he sat down in his Bronx home onThanksgiving Day 1966 to watch a football game with his father.He was struck by a cigarette commercial that seemed to glamorizea habit that both his parents practiced. While at ColumbiaUniversity School of Law, Banzhaf had studied the ''fairnessdoctrine,'' a Federal Communications Commission policy thatrequired broadcasters to offer free air time to opposing viewson controversial public matters. He wondered whether thedoctrine could be applied to cigarette advertising. It had neverbeen applied to commercials before, but the FCC ruled inBanzhaf's favor. By 1967 broadcasters were airing oneanti-smoking ad for every four cigarette ads, on prime-timetelevision. Bleary-eyed football fans who managed to hang on beyondthe last bowl games witnessed history 90 seconds before midnighton New Year's Day 1971 when four Marlboro cowboys galloped intothe TV sunset. From then on, cigarette companies would neveragain be allowed to advertise their wares on television orradio. Between the years of 1967, when the anti-smoking ads firstaired on television, and ending in 1970, when they went off, percapi...
