speech and respect - College of Social Sciences and International ...

Perverse Penalties
Was Legal. Vote to Make This Legal Again." 81 In autumn 1991 a fullpage
advertisement ran in major British newspapers:
This commercial has been banned from British television. As
usual, it all comes down to a question of taste. Voice over: "For
years we had a love affair. We thought it was over. But now
passions are soaring once again since we discovered the taste of
... 'I Can't Believe It's Not Butter!'. . . the new spread flavoured
with buttermilk for that fresh, butter-like taste. High in polyunsaturates,
low in saturates . . . with virtually no cholesterol." Looks
innocent enough, doesn't it? Well, believe it or not, our commercial's
got some people—including a certain food lobby—very hot
under the collar.
The next day's variation partly obscured the still-legible word "butter,"
noted that the product could be promoted in the United States,
and commented: "Now America is the land of free speech. If you
want to say 'I can't believe it's not butter!' you can come right out
and say so. ... But not in Britain." 82
When American television banned all tobacco advertising in
1971, Philip Morris initiated the Virginia Slims women's tennis
tournament and R.J. Reynolds launched the Winston Cup auto race.
They soon had many imitators: Vantage's Golf Scoreboard, Salem's
Pro-Sail races, Lucky Strike bowling competitions, Winston's rodeo,
Benson & Hedges ice skating, and Marlboro horse races. In 1988/
89, 22 of the 24 major league baseball stadiums displayed cigarette
advertisements in locations likely to be televised during games. By
sponsoring the 1986 World Cup in Mexico City, R.J. Reynolds was
able to erect four 20-foot signs next to the playing field, which were
seen by the 650 million television viewers. 83 Philip Morris regained
access to television for the first time in nearly two decades by
subsidising the National Archives' bicentenary celebration of the Bill
of Rights. Seeking to identify the right to smoke and to advertise
cigarettes with civil rights, feminism, and artistic expression, it also
bought advertisements occupying two-thirds of a page in leading
American newspapers featuring the head and shoulders of Judith
Jamison, the black director of the Alvin Ailey American Dance
Theatre, accompanied by a quote skillfully chosen to imply an
analogy to smoking:
If anyone loses even a single right, we risk losing them all. . . . We
cannot assume that the individual rights spelled out so succinctly
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