USA TODAY International Edition
Social media echoes Big Tobacco in lessons for Big Tech
From congressional hearings to multiple class action lawsuits to outraged newspaper editorial pages, there is a growing consensus that social media is harmful to Americans. The problem is both the content that is allowed and the content that isn’t.
Viral videos of a 14- year- old New Jersey girl being assaulted in her school hallway are free to be spread and liked, while prominent doctors who question COVID- 19 lockdown policies are shadow- banned and silenced. The Taliban and Iran’s mullahs are free to tweet, but for many months, not a former U. S. president.
Yet, there is no consensus on how to fix this mounting crisis.
There is, however, a potential road map to reach a solution.
The largest civil lawsuit settlement in US history
Three decades ago, America was at a similar impasse with another ubiquitous, unhealthy substance: tobacco.
Tens of millions of Americans were addicted to cigarettes, and years of suppressed research showed significant harm. Yet, advertising campaigns and enticements continued to glamorize smoking.
The Marlboro Man was a staple on the back of magazines and the front of billboards; 91% of 6- year- olds recognized Joe Camel, a cartoon mascot of the cigarette industry; and each day, 3,000 more adolescents started smoking in America.
The tobacco issue was tearing the United States apart.
For decades, victims had attempted to have their day in court, but out of 813 legal claims filed, only 23 made it to trial. Twice, the plaintiffs were victorious, and both times, the verdict was overturned on appeal, according to Peter Pringle’s “Cornered: Big Tobacco At the Bar of Justice.”
There was every reason to expect that tobacco’s legions of attorneys and lobbyists would continue to prevail. They viciously attacked Food and Drug Administration head David Kessler, who was campaigning for the FDA to regulate tobacco. He was demonized as “an unelected bureaucrat” and on a “power grab.” Advertisers sued the FDA on violating “commercial free speech.”
Tobacco’s chief executives were so confident that in April 1994, seven of them testified under oath before Congress, saying they did not believe nicotine was addictive. Within two years, all seven were gone.
By 1998, Big Tobacco had agreed to drastically revamp its business practices and consented to a $ 206 billion settlement, payable over 25 years – still the largest civil litigation settlement in American history.
How did this historic change occur?
I saw firsthand how the tobacco wars worked
Courtrooms and class action lawsuits played a role: 60 litigators joined an initial class action, which swelled to 182 firms and at one point 50 million plaintiffs.
Eventually, all the state attorneys general sued Big Tobacco to recover Medicaid costs. But much of the resolution was achieved during two years of behind- the- scenes negotiations in legal conference rooms across the United States. A comprehensive settlement was the goal.
I was a key figure in the tobacco wars. Two key reasons why they worked: We had support from the White House and the blessing of Congress. Former Maine Sen. George Mitchell, a longtime Senate majority leader, opened the first meeting, with all the tobacco company CEOs present.
But a larger reason why the tobacco negotiations succeeded is that we brought together the best minds from across the spectrum. We sought out medical experts, public policy people, interest groups and a range of leaders to give us ideas and advice. It also worked because we were seeking a genuine solution, which could be ratified by Congress, not simply a payday.
The settlement we reached ended the reign of the Marlboro Man. States and tobacco victims received billions, as did smoking cessation programs. If underage smoking did not drop by 60% in 10 years, the companies would pay another penalty of up to $ 2 billion a year.
It wasn’t a perfect deal. But by last year, only 11% of U. S. adults smoked cigarettes, compared with 27% in 1997, the year before the settlement was finalized. The tobacco companies all are still in business, having diversified. They also sell abroad. The World Health Organization says 22% of the global population uses tobacco.
Today, the problem of social media is every bit as intractable. Distrust of algorithms controlling what we see and censoring rules at the major platforms – established in consultation with the federal government – are challenging fundamental free speech protections and balanced public discourse.
Viral violence, threats and terror recruitment make social media a dark place. And the rise of social media has paralleled an explosion in mental health disorders among young people.
The arrival of artificial intelligence makes the need for answers more urgent than ever.
Yet, politics, culture and law are way behind Big Tech in their understanding of the social media problem and possible solutions. The usual regulatory answers of congressional legislation or a court case leading to a Supreme Court decision will not cut it.
I’m part of the lawsuits against Big Tech
We have legislators voting on bills who struggle to use their smartphones. I’m part of the lawsuits against Big Tech, but I believe we need more than a judicial decision. Court rulings are notoriously fraught with uncertainty for both sides – it’s a roll of the dice.
Here, the tobacco experience shows promise. We should explore the possibility of inviting all the stakeholders to the table: not only platform owners like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, but also the entire spectrum of people debating social media: First Amendment advocates and those fighting hate speech, news organizations, factcheckers, coding experts, AI creators, medical and mental health experts, teenagers who can’t quit TikTok, and many more.
Let’s hear their ideas and try to craft a comprehensive solution that addresses the needs and concerns of all sides.
Otherwise, we may look back and find that Twitter, Meta, YouTube and their ilk were the digital version of the Marlboro Man.