Interesting Opinion Piece


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That article seems to have kicked the hornets nest. You’re seeing both Privada and Riste respond in the comments and on Reddit. I’m not quite sure that their guttural responses are the right moves, but I’m sure it’s tough to remove emotion from the equation. 
 

In any case, the last thing any of us need are hightened awareness or a refound drive to further clamp down on our hobbies/business. 

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There's too much d*ck measuring at this point from a "new school"/"old school" perspective and neither seems to appreciate being called out (the whole privada beef with the cigar patriarchy).  I think Brian was hoping his foray into collaboration with JC Newman would help legitimize the Privada movement from a "lets all appreciate each other" perspective.  Have to agree that Privada does get a lot of unncessary crap from people simply because of the perception it has from the outside (not that Brian hasnt helped light those fires from time to time).  I do believe they have some pretty good products, regardless of their quasi cult status among the membership who thinks their stuff is the next coming of Christ. 

FWIW

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I have stacks of high school kids over to the house when my kids are hosting, and I very often have a pretty box of ccs lying around and they all know where my coolidor is located in the basement.  Heck, my son feels like he owns the basement.  I haven’t had a single young person ever ask about them, even when I’m smoking one.

I started smoking them when I was 16 because they were forbidden fruit.  I just don’t ever see young kids smoking cigars.  They literally can’t even finish listening to a poorly produced rap song that lasts about three minutes.  All of a sudden they are going to spend an hour smoking a hand rolled cigar that won’t get them high?

Cannabis has been conclusively proven to be damaging to the under developed brains of human beings until about the age of full development.  There are more cannabis vape pens being passed around by these kids and nobody gives a crap.  But cigars now, now there is a grave concern?

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4 minutes ago, Huckleberry said:

But cigars now, now there is a grave concern?

Not by reasonable people no, but the FDA isn't reasonable people. They've been gunning for cigars for a while now, and they've made it crystal clear they're focused on whether cigars are being sold and marketed towards kids.

As @Fuzz said above, you take away the cigar branding and show the packaging to a non-cigar person, they'll think it's candy or something marketed towards kids. And the FDA is going to nail the entire industry with it.

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12 minutes ago, Cigar Surgeon said:

Not by reasonable people no, but the FDA isn't reasonable people. They've been gunning for cigars for a while now, and they've made it crystal clear they're focused on whether cigars are being sold and marketed towards kids.

As @Fuzz said above, you take away the cigar branding and show the packaging to a non-cigar person, they'll think it's candy or something marketed towards kids. And the FDA is going to nail the entire industry with it.

I don’t disagree with your point about the branding in question.  In fact the more thought I give to it the more I agree with you :)  I disagree with not continuing to fight with base level truths.  Take away those and it all eventually goes to nothing anyway.  Slower? Maybe, but it still all goes away if we don’t keep the main thing the main thing.  The packaging is absurd and unnecessary for sure.  Kids spending hours with a cigar that doesn’t get them high is in a lot of ways absurd to me, and a main point we need to continue to make imho.

I think he could have saved a lot of words and just kept it at those examples of pretty reckless labeling, because those examples lose against the reasonable person standard when examined in a reasonable manner by reasonable people.  When he has to throw a political shot at people who disagree with cancel culture as being rapists, racists and whatever other broad trigger words he used to call his shot he just loses my respect.  He is concerned about the reckless and absurd usage of cigar labeling and goes and does it himself, maligning a large portion of people, people he most likely refrains from even knowing.  It was cheap and wildly inaccurate and it took away from a lot of solid points.

Just my two cents…

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I think it’s a hit piece from the old world cigar establishment at a new movement. I am not a member and I tend to smoke more heritage cigars, but I do not believe that they brand these cigars to kids. The big brands need a scapegoat for the FDA and Privada is cutting into their millennial market. I can see both sides of the argument but man I was not a fan of this article. 

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All I know is my 2 year old thinks cigars are cool because daddy smokes them. He knows the empty tubos lying around that he plays with are from cigars. He says things like this is for cigars, daddy smokes cigar, Dana (his name) smoke a cigar.

He may likely think they're less cool when he grows up as tobacco is pretty unpopular here these days.

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6 minutes ago, Bijan said:

All I know is my 2 year old thinks cigars are cool because daddy smokes them. He knows the empty tubos lying around that he plays with are from cigars. He says things like this is for cigars, daddy smokes cigar, Dana (his name) smoke a cigar.

He may likely think they're less cool when he grows up as tobacco is pretty unpopular here these days.

My god-daughter ( @jay8354 eldest kid) when she was really young (4 or 5), once piped up when Jase asked what I wanted to drink, "Uncle Fuzz drinks wine!". She was not wrong, but everyone was a little taken back by that. 😅

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I'm not from the US so I really don't have any skin in the game regarding this. But yeah, that packaging is like poking a Grizzly Bear, I have to assume the people making it are too juvenile to understand what the consequences could be.

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There is a big difference between an act of defiance/rebellion/non-compliance that only affects the person committing it, and an act of defiance/rebellion/non-compliance that affects everybody. I fully support the former but strongly disagree with the latter unless it's a joint decision of all who would will bear the consequences of such act.

 

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40 minutes ago, bishop532 said:

The article wasn’t suggesting they are branding the cigars to entice kids to smoke. It was suggesting that these companies are purposely releasing products that the FDA perceives as branded towards kids.

EDIT: It doesn’t matter what you or I think, or what the truth is. Only what the FDA can convince a judge. That’s the point I believe he was trying to make. 

I agree and that's a good take. I like Halfwheel and the content that they provide. I just feel like there was a better way to approach it. But you are right, the FDA is the FDA. 

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9 hours ago, Bijan said:

All I know is my 2 year old thinks cigars are cool because daddy smokes them. He knows the empty tubos lying around that he plays with are from cigars. He says things like this is for cigars, daddy smokes cigar, Dana (his name) smoke a cigar.

He may likely think they're less cool when he grows up as tobacco is pretty unpopular here these days.

I purposely don't "hide" my cigars or my cigar smoking from my 5 year old.  I don't like to smoke when he's outside with me, but I don't keep my hobby a secret.  I let him look at all of my cigars, help me with inspections sometimes, have him smell different cigars, all that stuff.  I don't want him to grow up and see it as the forbidden fruit - right now he knows that cigars are for adults and that's that.  

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20 minutes ago, Silverstix said:

right now he knows that cigars are for adults and that's that.  

Yeah there's a long list of things my son knows are for adults:

Wine is for grown ups,

Knives "is" for grown ups,

Etc.

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Pretty clear where Jas Sum Kral stands with their online merch
image.png.e7d7e6e17fb60bbe8c19331e234b681b.png

As a "Geriatric Millenial" (not my term), I generally find the packaging and branding of Privada Club and others like it rather annoying. Big words with no meaning. Trying to build hype with loudness and being "edgy". What has always drawn me to cubans and older cigar brands is the simplicity of it all. Hand-rolled, brand name + size, simple logo, and of course the 1-2 hours of sitting there just enjoying it without any distractions. 

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