Behind the Bastards: “Part Two: How Cigarettes Invented Everything”

Podcast: Behind the Bastards (Cool Zone Media & iHeartPodcasts)
Release Date: January 8, 2026
Hosts: Robert Evans, James Stout

Overview

This episode continues the deep dive into the surprising and horrifying ways cigarettes helped shape the modern world—not just through public health, but by influencing gender roles, advertising, media, corporate power, and even how we think about science and truth. Moving from the early 1900s through the post-WWII era, Robert and James explore how tobacco companies engineered mass addiction, co-opted social movements, and literally invented the playbook for modern PR, denial, and media manipulation.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Cigarettes and the Mainstreaming of Smoking in America

• Early 20th-century smoking rates were quite low; only 5-10% of adults smoked cigarettes pre-WWI.
• WWI as the Tipping Point: Cigarettes became essential in the trenches—quick, shareable, and stress-relieving ("the best way you have to smoke in between getting murdered by German machine guns is a cigarette" – Robert, 04:34).
  • "You ask me what we need to win this war. I answer, tobacco as much as bullets." – Gen. Blackjack Pershing, quoted by Robert (12:12)
• After WWI: Smoking exploded in popularity—by 1940, 40% of U.S. adults smoked daily (18:37).

2. Early Anti-Smoking Campaigns and Gender Anxiety

• Early anti-smoking crusaders were often also involved in Prohibition, featured moralistic and sexist arguments ("a crime for women to...endanger the morals of children by smoking in their presence" – Robert, 08:34).
• Smoking becomes entangled with changing gender norms: cigarettes helped facilitate mixed-gender socializing and symbolized new freedoms for women in the workforce and public sphere.
  • "Cigarettes do play a significant role in the increasing acceptance of social equality for women." – Robert (09:32)

3. Cigarettes & Advertising: Birth of the Modern Consumer and Media Culture

• R.J. Reynolds launches Camel in 1913, prioritizes national advertising. First viral brand campaign: “The Camels Are Coming.” (22:04)
• Companies target women directly, linking cigarettes to slimness, independence, and sex appeal ("Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet" campaign; helped birth the skinny model ideal – 24:34).
• Candy cigarettes: Big Tobacco encouraged the use of real brands for sugar cigarettes sold to kids, declining to prosecute for IP infringement because "If kids get used to picking up a pack of Camels, that's a win for us." – Robert (26:07)

4. Cigarettes, Social Science, and the Rise of Corporate Denial

• Early scientific links between smoking and cancer were limited by small sample sizes and the infancy of epidemiology.
• The first control group studies in 1928 found heavy smokers were 27% likelier to get lung cancer (36:38).
• Insurance Industry Triggers Research: As lung cancer rates triple (1915-1928), insurance companies push for research to justify charging higher premiums for smokers (37:32).
• Industry Response: As evidence mounts, the tobacco industry pioneers massive, modern PR—network radio ads, Lucky Strike Hit Parade (the origin of the music "Top 40" format).

5. Big Tobacco’s Playbook: Disinformation, Front Groups, & ‘Both Sides’ Journalism

• 1953: The Plaza Hotel PR Summit: Industry meets with PR titan John W. Hill, who designs "Plan White Coat"—the first full-fledged corporate disinformation campaign (52:16).
• TIRC (Tobacco Industry Research Committee): Purports to fund independent research, but cherry-picks projects to sow doubt/avoid linking smoking and disease (58:03).
• Big Tobacco systematically manipulates media:
  • “First, journalists favored reporting on controversy. Second, by providing opposing positions as if they were equal, they affirmed their commitment to balance.” – Robert, quoting academic review (61:06)
  • The tactic of industry-funded “skeptics” in the media is born—used in everything from climate change denial to war on science.

6. Notable Consequences and Legacies

• Advertising to Children: Brands build loyalty early—targeting 11-18 year-olds, funding children’s entertainment (42:13).
  • “Cigarettes taught us how to do that [cartoon-soaked advertising],” linking tobacco-sponsored programming to everything from The Flintstones to modern marketing (43:00).
• Medical Endorsements: Infamous Camel campaign, “more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette,” built on sending doctors boxes of cigarettes for free and “surveying” their preferences (47:24, 49:30).
• The Culture of Denial: TIRC’s statements (“no conclusive proof... many possible causes of cancer... millions derive pleasure...”) are echoed for decades in other industries (56:41).
  • "They invented both sides-ism. They gave us Donald Trump, climate change denial, the gun industry's tactics... all of those strategies pioneered by big tobacco." – Robert (61:14)
  • “Cigarettes created everything.” – James (60:25)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Surge in Smoking:
  "By 1940, 40% of the United States adult population smokes on a daily basis."
  – Robert (18:37)

• On Gendered Double Standards:
  "It's interesting: cigarettes do play a significant role in the increasing acceptance of social equality for women. Because men and women spend time together to smoke."
  – Robert (09:32)

• On Ad Tactics:
  "The Camels are coming... There will be more in this town than all of Asia and Africa combined."
  – Quoting Camel’s first national campaign (22:04)

• On Candy Cigarettes:
  “The cigarette industry makes a concerted decision to never pursue charges over it, to never go after them, because they're like, well, if kids get used to picking up a pack of Camels, that's a win for us.”
  – Robert (26:07)

• On Early Science Skepticism:
  "His reasoning is not inherently unsound. Right. He's wrong, but... these are just people trying to understand the human body in a period in which we don't have that much information about it."
  – Robert on scientists in the 1920s/30s (33:05)

• On Doctor Endorsements:
  "This is their main advertising push for six years... more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette."
  – Robert (47:24)

• On Media Manipulation:
  "Hill understood that his client should be viewed as embracing science rather than dismissing it."
  – Quoting from Am. Journal of Public Health (54:46)

• On Modern Legacies:
  “They gave us Donald Trump, they gave us climate change denial, they gave us the Iraq war... they pioneered all those strategies.”
  – Robert (61:17)

• Comedic Moment:
  "I am never gonna stop making jokes about cum and I'm never gonna stop telling people that when Mitch McConnell comes, all that exits his penis is a mix of dry scabs and spider legs."
  – Robert (28:21)

Timestamps for Key Segments

| Timestamp | Topic / Quote | |-----------|---------------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:10 | Cigarettes’ rise post-1911, pre-WWI; WWI as engine of mainstream adoption | | 06:10 | Early anti-smoking campaigns, moralism, and women's smoking laws | | 09:32 | Cigarettes and shifting gender roles/social mixing | | 12:12 | Cigarettes as "necessity of war" – General Pershing | | 18:37 | Dramatic jump in US smoking rates through WWII era | | 22:04 | Launch of Camel cigarettes, first modern ad campaign | | 24:34 | "Reach for a Lucky instead of a sweet"—cigarettes invade female marketing | | 26:07 | Candy cigarettes and deliberate exposure of children to tobacco marketing | | 33:05 | Early debate on smoking and cancer, limits of 1920s-30s science | | 37:32 | Insurance companies' role in cancer research | | 42:13 | The need to "capture smokers young"—marketing to children/ad demographics | | 43:00 | Cigarettes, cartoons, and children's TV—Flintstones/Winston ad example | | 47:24 | "Doctors smoke Camels" campaign; manufactured health endorsements | | 54:46 | John W. Hill's PR strategy—birth of the manufactured "controversy" in science | | 60:25 | Cigarettes “created everything”—modern media, both-sideism, PR manipulation | | 61:14 | “They gave us Donald Trump... all those strategies.” (climate denial, etc.) | | 62:22 | Closing thoughts: tobacco’s legacy in capitalism and modern media |

Conclusion

Robert and James reveal how cigarettes weren’t just a product that destroyed millions of lives—they invented entire structures of persuasion, PR, denial, and consumer culture. From manipulating gender norms and inventing the music chart, to systematically attacking science and shaping political/media discourse, cigarettes are, in the hosts’ words, “one of the single most important inventions in the history of the planet” for all the wrong reasons.

Further Reading/Listening:

• The Cigarette Century by Allan Brandt (frequently cited throughout)
• American Journal of Public Health articles on tobacco PR

Tone & Style: Sarcastic, darkly comedic, bitterly insightful—true to Behind the Bastards’ critical, irreverent voice.