“Tobacco is Not Our Truth” – Gen-Z Student Challenges ‘Big Tobacco’
Agamroop Kaur produced a documentary on the youth e-cigarette epidemic – “BIG Tobacco BIGGER Epidemic.” She won 2nd prize in C-SPAN’s Classroom’s StudentCam documentary contest. Agamroop shares her experience with the cogent influence of ‘Big Tobacco’ and E-cigarettes in her community. Agamroop believes that with proper education and strong advocacy, we have the power to protect our communities.
We know tobacco is not our truth.
Tobacco companies have long been targeting minority populations to instate commercial tobacco use as a cultural phenomenon while infiltrating youth environments as an attempt to hook the next generation.
Faces resembling mine said that hookah was just part of Indian culture. The superhero woman said smoking was empowering. The teens said that vaping made every day a party.
Whether surfing social media, walking to karate or swim practice, or simply watching a movie, I was bombarded with tobacco advertisements almost daily. According to a 2016 CDC release, almost 70% of youth experienced similar aggressive e-cigarette advertising.
For too long, Big Tobacco has utilized such tactics to market to minority communities to hook a new generation of tobacco users. Since middle school, I have watched my peers lose themselves in the swirls of smoke that blew through their mouths and into others’ lungs. Juggling the weight of school, family complications, and other common youth stressors made youth vulnerable to the industry’s trap of bright colors, candy-store flavors, and an escape through the buzz of nicotine.
I first learned of the harms of tobacco usage during a middle school health class lesson. The class lesson diminished the power of all advertisements, trends, and peer pressure. My teacher had brought in two pairs of pig lungs. One pair was charred and deflated depicting a smoker’s lungs. The other pair: pink and healthy, representing a non-smoker’s lungs. Feeling the smoker’s lungs withering and failing to hold air upon being pumped deeply embedded the dangerous reality of tobacco products.
The power of education and advocacy was the driving force for finding solutions to the youth e-cigarette epidemic. Driven by the cause, my time was invested in campaigning for better policies, developing curriculum materials, giving impactful presentations. More recently, I dipped my feet in producing a documentary. Titled “BIG Tobacco BIGGER Epidemic,” the film dives into the deceptive tactics used by the industry to addict new users and calls upon policymakers to act while laying a clear path to eradicating the youth e-cigarette epidemic.
Collectively, I believe we have the power to make an even greater change. An opportunity to drive the change will arise this November. On the ballot of the upcoming gubernatorial election is a measure: SB-793. SB-793 would end the sale of all flavored tobacco products statewide. While this bill was originally signed into law by Governor Newsom in 2020, the tobacco industry has been working to protect their bottom line and have had success in keeping the measure from implementation. With 96% of youth who vape using a flavored product, upholding SB-793 would mean tobacco-free environments for all youth.
Continuing forward, I hope we unionize and act for a better world, centered upon the value of health. For now, let’s all do our part in protecting future generations by curbing the youth e-cigarettes epidemic.
