> But this is the whole point, they do attract non-smokers. They should explicitly detract them instead.
This is magical thinking. Do we apply this requirement to healthier alternatives in any other market?
For example: I really like McDonalds fries, but I mostly don't eat them because they're unhealthy. However anecdotally some "heavy users" eat them 3 to 5 times a week.
Imagine if McDonalds introduced "Beyond Fries" tomorrow, equivalent in every salient way, but less unhealthy (say, baked potato-level healthy). Would anyone apply the standard above, calling for it to be _only_ a "fry cessation product" for heavy users, and expecting it to explicitly repel the abstaining-for-health-reasons users like me?
I can't see how it's even possible to achieve both goals at once. A healthier alternative to _anything_ is going to draw some former abstainers-for-health-reasons into the market. And smoking has a _lot_ of abstainers-for-health-reasons.
By all means let's call vaping a smoking cessation product, but I'm not sure it's reasonable to assume that we can have our cake and eat it too here.
Attitudes around smoking in general are grounded deeply in magical thinking. People have been raised on anti-smoking rhetoric so deep, with such little cultural push back toward sanity, that it's tough for most people to think let alone discuss the subject with any objectivity.
I suppose in a very literal sense, if you replace addiction A with addiction B, you could say that B is an A cessation product.
But by that logic, smoking could be called a weight loss product.
Other people have a more complex definition, which precludes cigarettes from being considered a health product, despite their appetite-suppressing properties.
If you can drop 100+ lbs by smoking half a pack a day, I guarantee you'll be a lot healthier overall. Not saying you actually _would_ lose all that weight, but it's not like it's a binary between "smoking" and "not smoking". Frequency and amount matters, but the it's pretty much impossible to approach the subject in our society with any sort of objectivity or science.
> Impossible meat, likewise, is a meat "cessation" product.
No it’s not. Meat isn’t addictive. People don’t “quit” meat and develop a habit of impossible burgers. People don’t wake up every morning feeling shitty about enjoying meat.
I fully support vegan and vegetarian lifestyles. To compare tobacco to meat is foolish.
If impossible meat makes vegans start eating burgers, you can't just argue "well, it's still better than meat".
> I'm definitely against marketing vaping to non-smokers.
But this is the whole point, they do attract non-smokers. They should explicitly detract them instead.