COVID: Too tough to care.

Democrats have been talking about protecting your health.

Republicans have been talking about protecting your personal choices and autonomy.

Two different frames. This seems familiar. I remember a corny movie from high school.

In 1964 the Surgeon General announced that the scientific data were clear, and cigarette smoking caused cancer and heart disease. A lot of people resisted the science. Many people smoked and they didn't want to believe it, and even if they did, they didn't want to do anything about it. Quitting is hard. Getting started is easy, and many people started smoking in high school. 

In 1966 I sat in a Medford High School auditorium and saw a 19-minute movie designed to convince young people not to start smoking. The movie was titled "Too Tough to Care."

Readers my age may remember being bored or embarrassed during movies like this one, "educational" films assigned to high school students on subjects like safe driving and sex education. This one was unusual. It was funny. It didn't focus on x-ray images of diseased lungs. Instead, it was a goofy look at a fictional advertising campaign.

The imaginary cigarette brand

I have been writing about political framing for five years. The movie was the first exposure I remember that depicted conscious and manipulative frame switching as an instrument of persuasion. The movie wasn't preachy and it wasn't even mostly about tobacco. It was about messaging. The movie will seem dated and juvenile, but that is part of its charm. I recommend it because it is an unintended commentary on today's COVID debate. Click below. 

After watching the movie during home room I remember talking with my friends about how clever the movie was in shifting the argument. It was the kind of thing I was just learning to do in debate class. In the movie an imaginary cigarette company executive urged his advertising creator to figure out how to make cigarettes appealing to young people. They tried showing six-year-olds smoking at birthday parties. That didn't work. Nor did showing teenagers smiling while smoking. Neither disposed of the problem that cigarettes were dangerous.

Tough enough to smoke anywhere

The advertising creator came up with a solution: Make cigarettes a matter of courage and independence. Show cowboys. Show athletes. Show chin-up tough guys. Don't fight the fact that smoking is dangerous. Embrace it. Associate smoking with fearless independence notwithstanding the danger. He created a slogan for Finster cigarettes: Too tough to care. Do cigarettes cause cancer? So what!  Are you going to let scientists scare you out of doing something you enjoy? No!

Today Democrats and Republicans are talking past each other. Democrats treat COVID as a serious health problem requiring serious solutions. Trump, early on, said COVID is just a flu and will disappear when the weather warms. Don't let COVID dominate you. Trump defined COVID as a test of American toughness.

Neighbor’s sign

Fox News, Republican officeholders, and Trump's supporters generally went along, and they settled in on an approach: Don't let Democrats and Dr. Fauci and the science do-gooders tell you what to do. A statewide poll taken last week reports that 20% of Oregonians do not ever plan to get vaccinated.  They don't need it, don't want it, don't trust it.

A neighbor at my farm tells me he will lose his job because he refuses to get vaccinated. Local hospitals are overflowing with COVID patients and local news media report daily on the health risks for the unvaccinated, but no matter. My neighbor put up this sign. Politically conservative,  religious, rural residents like my neighbor do not see this as a personal or public health concern. Vaccinations are about not getting pushed around by supposed scientific experts.

Is COVID dangerous? Maybe, maybe not, but either way, he's too tough to care.