There is natural compassion for the sick, even when their personal decisions may have led to their sickness. But should sympathy translate into “jackpot justice” for those who bring about their own illness?
Recently in Connecticut, a jury awarded a longtime smoker $8 million in damages from a tobacco company after she developed cancer of the larynx. We sympathize with the plaintiff, but that judgment is an injustice.
Lawsuits against tobacco companies by people stricken with cancer have been based on the argument that the companies “hid” the dangers of smoking from their customers.
But how do you “hide” common knowledge? Long before cigarette cartons were inscribed with dire warnings about the dangers of tobacco, cigarettes were quite appropriately nicknamed “coffin nails.” Centuries-old literature contains references to the dangers of tobacco.
Whether this or that company was not as honest as it ought to have been about its own understanding of those dangers, smokers simply cannot claim to have been ignorant of the perils of lighting up.
In the Connecticut case, the jury absurdly declared that the company was “58 percent” responsible for the plaintiff’s cancer, while she was only “42 percent” responsible.
We can’t even begin to guess how jurors would arrive at such a precise division of responsibility, but they missed the mark — by 58 percent. While we have no admiration for tobacco companies, smokers are 100 percent responsible for their choice to light up.
Unfortunately, it’s much easier to get sympathetic juries to go after “Big Tobacco’s” deep pockets than to place the responsibility where it truly, though sadly, belongs — with the individual.