I support efforts to curb underage tobacco use, but only when they work, and only when they do so without hurting people they are claiming to help.
By contrast, Los Angeles councilmembers are expected to introduce a ban on flavored tobacco products on June 16th. I urge the community I have lived and served in to make our voices heard and oppose these efforts, which have been proven to be both ineffective and detrimental to some of our most vulnerable residents.
Criminalizing flavored tobacco creates more opportunities for conflict with police in communities of color, where police-community relations are already suffering. Flavored cigarettes, particularly menthol cigarettes, are favored by Black smokers, while most white smokers tend to prefer unflavored tobacco. To draw up a ban against products favored by people of color, while leaving those favored by white people completely legal, seems not only unjust but remarkably insensitive at a time when Americans everywhere are working to overcome racial injustices in our communities and institutions.
Banning consumable substances that have health risks has been tried before, and we all know how that turned out. Both the prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s and our current War on Drugs led to no decrease in use, only illegal markets, violence, and – especially in the current era – vastly disparate racial impacts stemming from these policies.
Diane Goldstein – Los Angeles Daily News – 2021-06-13.
Want More Investigative Content?
