Transparency in the Marketplace

Members of the US Congress have asked eleven magazines for women to stop running cigarette advertisements. Not one magazine publisher would comment on the record about the request.

Advertising Age - MediaWorks - Congress Asks Women's Mags to Quit Their Smoking Habit

The publishers, then, are willing to take tobacco money but for the most part unwilling or unable to say why that's OK. Their silence makes some sense, of course. If magazine advertising works, it's hard to defend promoting addictive carcinogens to your readers. And it's their legal right to accept the ads. The question is, will it become unstylish to do so?

What a wonderful world this would be if all advertisers, including tobacco, liquor and oil companies, had to be transparent in their marketing policies. Alas, it appears only bloggers do so.

Tags: US congress, tobacco advertisements, transparency in marketplace