Thanks to those who responded to director Aaron Biebert's reply to my review of the pro-vaping documentary A Billion Lives.
Carl Philips provided his usual thought-provoking analysis and there were strong views from several others, many of which I agree with. I chose however to remain silent (I think I've said enough) and let others do the talking.
One commentator was Joe Jackson. Joe and I don't see eye to eye on everything but I consider him to be a great friend of Forest and I always listen to and value his comments, even the more critical ones!
If I get a moment this weekend I will post some pieces from his website where he writes beautifully and often very amusingly about his favourite music and musicians.
In the meantime here is his response to Aaron Biebert. It includes an amusing twist at the end:
Dear Aaron Biebert,
If Simon isn't ready to respond to your points, there are plenty of us who are. And plenty of us who defend smoking and smokers not because of a 'right to smoke', but because we are in the midst of a huge, well-funded, nasty crusade against us, and it's a crusade powered by lies, exaggerations, and misleading statistics.
Just to respond to a couple of your points: Statistics really are the issue here because that is what anti-smoking is built on - not on genuine science. Where you have 'lost the plot' is that you seem to think the war against vaping is dishonest and corrupt, but the war against smoking is pure as the driven snow.
You can't claim your movie is 'not about' smoking or the tobacco industry, since your whole premise is based on accepting outrageous antismoking propaganda as gospel. Why are people making a big deal about your 'Billion Lives'? Because it's the TITLE of your movie, for God's sake! You then back-pedal by saying 'so what if that's not the exact number? What's the right number?' That's just the point. THERE IS NO RIGHT NUMBER.
'70%' of smokers want to quit'. No, we don't. This is one of many antismoking 'soundbites' that are simply repeated over and over because they don't get challenged. Others include 'biggest preventable cause of death', and 'tobacco will kill half its users' - which I've watched rise from a quarter, then a third - not because of new evidence but because they can say anything they like and get away with it.
Infuriating when that happens, isn't it?!
This is just a blog post, so no room for lots of facts and figures, but there are many sources. All I can add is, if the work you've put into the vaping issue serves you as preparation for the real issue - which is that the whole damn antismoking industry is dishonest and corrupt, and that antivaping is just the latest offshoot of it - then your time and our time will not have been wasted.
On the other hand ... !
Just the existence of this movie is symptomatic of a growing interest in the issue of vaping, something that could turn out to be the 'game-changer' many of us hope for. It puts 'tobacco control' in a deliciously awkward situation. On the whole, they're anti-vaping, for three reasons: (1) ignorance and prejudice against anything that 'looks like' smoking; (2) neither they nor their supporters in the Pharma industry created it or profit from it, in fact it could mean loss of funding for them; (3) the more attention vaping gets, the more the rest of their lies and corruption could get exposed.
Update: In my introduction to Aaron Biebert's response I mentioned that A Billion Lives is due to be screened in Delhi on November 9, coinciding with the seventh session of the Conference of the Parties (COP7) to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC) that takes place in Delhi from 7-12 November.
A key interviewee in the film is the former Winston Man David Goerliz who has worked for the tobacco industry and public health and is now an outspoken advocate of vaping.
Goerlitz was due to appear at the screening of the Delhi screening but Biebert last night announced that the Goerlitz has been refused, without explanation, a visa.
Funnily enough this reminds me of the hoops we had to jump through when attending the Global Tobacco Networking Forum (as it was known) in Bangalore in 2011.
I got my visa but I was advised not to say I was attending a tobacco industry conference.
Likewise, when we arrived at Bangalore Airport at 4.00am, tired and disheveled after an eleven hour flight, we were under strict instructions not to mention the reason for our visit.
"Don't mention the c-word," hissed one of the organisers as we queued to show our passports.
She meant "conference".
Finally, Lisbet from Norway tells me that A Billion Lives will be shown in London on December 12.
I assume she means central London (unlike the Greenwich screening that takes place on November 16).
When I get further details I'll let you know, if you're interested.
Update: Lisbet now says December 12 was only a rumour which means I have failed the first rule of journalism - always get your story corroborated by a second (reliable) source!!
LBC presenter Iain Dale offers a nice take on this here.