The Climate Historian: “…In the mid-20th century, as evidence mounted linking smoking to lung cancer, the tobacco industry didn’t just fight back—they mastered the art of deflection. Instead of outright denying the dangers, they funded research to stir doubt, muddying the scientific waters.In the 1950s, the Tobacco Institute launched its “health reassurance” campaigns. These campaigns framed smoking as a lifestyle choice, not a public health crisis, deflecting blame from the product to the individual. With this strategy of producing scientific uncertainty and casting smoking as a personal responsibility issue, the industry successfully evaded regulation for decades. This strategy—creating doubt and shifting responsibility—became a blueprint for other industries facing inconvenient truths, from climate change to pollution. Their message: the problem isn’t the product; it’s the person using it. The National Rifle Association (NRA) and the broader gun lobby have used similar strategies, particularly since the 1970s, to deflect attention away from the role of firearms in gun violence. The NRA portrays gun violence as a problem rooted in individual behaviour rather than the accessibility of guns. Their slogan “guns don’t kill people, people kill people,” has turned what could have been a conversation about gun regulation into one about personal responsibility…

The redirection of responsibility from corporations to individuals stands as one of the most masterful corporate manoeuvres. It paved the way for what would become a pervasive strategy in the years to come: the individualization of responsibility. Nowhere has this tactic been more fully realised than in the fossil fuel industry. By positioning climate change as an issue of individual behaviour—whether it is our dietary habits, the light bulbs we use, or how often we drive or fly—fossil fuel corporations have obscured their role in environmental destruction. This narrative creates a convenient illusion: that climate change can be solved through small personal sacrifices rather than meaningful policy reform and corporate accountability. Take, for example, the concept of “personal carbon footprint.” BP promoted the idea in the mid-2000s, launching one of the first personal carbon footprint calculators and asking individuals to calculate their own greenhouse gas emissions. The message was clear: the solution to climate change lies not in changing corporate behaviour, but in you choosing to turn off the lights when leaving the room. And while no one can argue that reducing personal emissions is unimportant, it’s the sheer audacity of the campaign that stands out…”