Anything that changed from a medical perspective since I am smoking is that we know by now that a 'smokers lung' is not actually that and most never get it. Otherwise all the risks are well known for 15+ years.

Tldr: I don't think people actually care about dying earlier (or more cruel), at least in countries with working or cheap health care.

That isn't really the issue, smokers have been aware of the negative consequences for quite a while. Many are okay with it due to the relief the smoking brings them from stress and other issues, it's a trade-off. Just like alcohol ain't that healthy for you but many people still chose to drink it.

But on the other hand you have massive companies who've spent decades and billions of $ in making tobacco as addictive, and easy to smoke, as possible. So once the customers are hooked it's extremely difficult for them to kick the habit and even when they manage to kick it, many will still get cravings for years, if not decades, to come.

Which could be explained by this: https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/01/11/schizophrenia-no-smoki...

But I would bet that it's much larger.

Wrong wrong wrong. They still do these a lot.

Seriously though, kids used it all the time when I was growing up — I didn't even know "gyp" was derogatory until I was perhaps in my 30's. If I had to guess, young me would have suspected it was spelled "jip" anyway.

We told Pollack jokes too and I didn't even know it meant someone from Poland.

I was not very cosmopolitan as a kid.

When was this?

But covertly? It’s happening even now, all over the world.

It's a slur against the Roma (gypsies).