In 2017, filmmaker Lincoln Mondy created the documentary Black Lives / Black Lungs to expose the tobacco industry’s long history of disproportionately targeting Black Americans. In 2023, he came back with a follow-up that talks about his thoughts on the origins of the tobacco industry and its roots in colonization, slavery, and capitalism.
If you watch the film, you’ll notice that Lincoln says – while the tobacco industry has undergone changes and reinventions in the centuries since the first tobacco leaves were planted in the US – their playbook remains the same. The impact of the industry’s targeting and discrimination is still felt by Black and Indigenous communities today.
Progress is being made in holding Big Tobacco accountable. But when it comes to preventing long-term health effects, death, and disease, we can’t wait for progress to happen slowly.