Comment: Poor-looking tactics in influence campaigns make social media the new frontier for quitting

SINGAPORE: The Singapore Government has pbaded the Tobacco (Advertising and Sales Control) Bill, introducing new restrictions on the packaging of cigarettes.

Whatever their brands, cigarette packs must be the same size, shape and appearance, have a dark brown surface with a matte finish, and have health warnings for at least 75% of their contents.

Such dull, standardized packaging is intended to make tobacco products less attractive to consumers, while providing more health information about the dangers of smoking.

DISCOURAGE YOUNG PEOPLE TO PILOT IN A DAMAGE HABIT

Such a concerted effort to stop smoking is essential because it weighs heavily on our society. According to the Ministry of Health, more than 2,000 Singaporeans die prematurely from smoking-related diseases each year and the social cost of smoking is estimated at at least $ 600 million a year in direct health care costs and lost productivity . .

The Ministry of Health also noted that over the past decade, Singapore has found no definitive pattern of sustained decline in smoking prevalence, which ranged between 12 and 14%.

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According to a study published in Policy Studies in Asia and the Pacific, the prevalence of smoking in Singapore is around 15% among adults and 6% among 13 to 15 year olds.

According to research conducted by the Singapore Cancer Society, 80% of adult smokers in Singapore have become habituated before age 21. Indeed, studies conducted in other parts of the world have shown that smokers are 16 times more likely to smoke in adolescence. adult smokers.

As it is proven that early smoking experiences are a predictor of tobacco addiction in adulthood, governments around the world must do everything in their power to discourage youth from this harmful habit.

ALIGNED ON INTERNATIONAL EFFORTS AGAINST SMOKING

Singapore's move towards plain packaging will align the country with the World Health Organization's Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, alongside countries such as Australia, France and the United States. , New Zealand and the United Kingdom, which also imposed standardized packaging for tobacco products.

The Ministry of Health has undertaken considerable preparatory work in proposing these changes, referring to more than 200 studies and holding three rounds of public consultations.

Indeed, beyond the packaging laws, many countries have put in place stringent laws limiting tobacco advertising and promoting tobacco use in the paid media.

However, an unfavorable trend is gaining momentum, which will negate the value and hard work of such anti-smoking legislation and its enforcement. It is the circumvention of the restrictions imposed on tobacco advertising by tobacco multinationals through insidious campaigns in social media.

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FIGHT AGAINST INSIDIOUS CAMPAIGNS AND SHADY TACTICS

These campaigns capitalize on the appeal of social media influencers through photographs featuring young models playing cool places, wearing fashionable clothes and catchy hashtags.

In a misleading way, however, no explicit mention is made of tobacco manufacturers behind these campaigns. This visually striking content seeks to portray smoking as a normal practice among young people and to present it as a seductive and seductive lifestyle choice.

Civil societies react to this trend. In the United States, the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Children has prompted several organizations, including the American Academy of Paediatrics and the American Lung Association, to launch a petition asking the US Federal Trade Commission to take measures.

This petition claims that tobacco companies actively promote smoking through hundreds of thousands of images, hashtags and videos shared by young people on social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

The scope of such content is considerable. The petitioners' research found that only 123 hashtags linked to the social media campaigns of these tobacco companies had been viewed 8.8 billion times in the United States and 25 billion worldwide, just on Twitter.

The largest shopping center

These tobacco multinationals have launched such campaigns in many countries in Asia, Europe, the Middle East, Central America, North and South America, bringing together leading young influencers in each country. . Closer to home, tobacco companies have funded such social media campaigns in neighboring countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Thailand.

Influencers receive strict instructions on which cigarettes to present, how to take natural, non-advertising photos, when to post these images to maximize public engagement, and the hashtags they should use.

In one country, influencers were even asked to hide the health warnings on cigarette packs before publishing the images. Such shady tactics are designed to mislead young people into believing that these images are organic content from social media, simply reflecting youth culture.

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SCOPE OF SOCIAL MEDIA

Although nothing fortunately indicates that tobacco companies have targeted social media influencers in Singapore, the porous and borderless nature of the Internet means that young Singaporeans can still be exposed to such images.

Many social media influencers also have a global fan base. Even campaigns well beyond our shores can appeal to our young people if highly respected influencers in Singapore are mobilized. After all, Singaporeans are avid users of social media, with Singaporean youth being the most active.

Singapore is particularly interested in the fact that most of these social media campaigns that use almost exclusively English use English even when this is not the case. lingua franca country of origin of these campaigns. The highly visual nature of social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat also means that language is by no means an obstacle to the communicative impact of such images.

In addition to online misinformation, this is another problem that shows how far the broad reach of large technology companies with global influence has important ramifications for society.

Due to the lack of transparency in the algorithms that determine the content we serve, social media does not allow us to understand why we see more particular forms of content.

Nor can we exercise more active control over our social media feeds if we wish. Young people who like, share or comment on pictures describing trendy and trendy negative behaviors, with particular hashtags, can then receive more images of this type on their social networks.

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SOCIAL MEDIA CAMPAIGN ON TOBACCO

These transnational campaigns on social networks that promote smoking should therefore be actively monitored by health authorities.

The Ministry of Health should also work with its counterparts in ASEAN and more distant countries, as well as the World Health Organization, to combat this blatant and damaging practice of tobacco multinationals.

Health authorities around the world must also engage with technology companies to remind them of the supportive and supportive role they should play in helping to minimize the exposure of young people to images representing the world. smoking in a positive light.

These companies have the ability to modify their algorithms to stop the spread of such images, in the same way that they have algorithms to eliminate obscene and extremist content.

In Singapore, agencies such as the Advertising Standards Authority in Singapore should consider developing more concrete guidelines on the responsibilities of social media influencers for full disclosure in the case of content sponsored by tobacco and cigarette companies. e.

This practice of covert campaigns in social media promoting smoking as a positive behavior is extremely pernicious and must be rejected.

Professor Lim Sun Sun is Professor of Communication and Technology and Director of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Technology and Design Singapore and a Member of Parliament.