Kalle Lasn was in a supermarket parking lot one afternoon when he had an experience that changed his life.In order to shop at the store, he needed to put money into the shopping cart to use it.Annoyed that he had to "pay to shop," Lasn jammed the coin into the cart so that it wouldn't work.It was an act of _ --the first of many--for Lasn. Born in Estonia, Kalle Lasn moved to Australia as a young man and then later to Japan, where he founded a marketing research firm in Tokyo.Eventually, Lasn moved to Canada and for several years produced documentaries   for public television.In the late 1980s, Lasn made an advertisement that spoke out against the logging industry and the deforestation going on in the Pacific Northwest.When he tried to show his ad on TV, though, no station in this area would give him airtime.In response, Lasn and a colleague founded Adbusters Media Foundation, a company for the "Human right to communicate. Adbusters produces magazine, newspaper, and TV ads with a social message.Many use humor and irony to make their points: In one, for example, a man chain smokes a brand of cigarettes called "Hope".In another, a child is dressed in an outfit used in fast-food ads.Next to the child is a note from its mother telling the restaurant to leave her child alone. Adbusters also has a magazine and a web site, the Culture Jammers Network, whose members include students, artists, and activists as well as educators and businesspeople interested in social change.Many of these "culture jammers" are working to raise awareness about different social issues by hosting events like "Buy Nothing Day" , " No Car Day" and "TV Turnoff Week" .Lasn and his partners hope these events will encourage people to think about questions such as; *What kinds of things are we being encouraged to buy by the media? *Should cars be our primary means of transportation? *How are television and radio being used now? How could we be using them? Some culture jammers are using other methods to challenge how people think.Some pretend to be shoppers.They move items in stores from one shelf to another making it difficult for people to find things easily.Other culture jammers break into large company well sites and jam them so that they become unusable.The goal in both cases ia to prevent "Business as usual" and to gel people to ask themselves questions such as "Why am I shopping here?" or "Why should I buy this product?" Lasn and members of the Culture Jammers Network want to make people aware of social issues, but they also believe it's important to think of solutions, too."A lot of people tell you everything that's wrong but they never say much about how to fix these problems," says Lasn."But there is plenty we can do.If you start despairing, you have lost everything." Though many TV stations still won't show Adbusters' " uncommercials" , some cable TV stations have started to.People all over the world have joined the Culture Jammers Network and are doing their part to promote social change. What's the main point of the ad for "Hope" cigarettes?
Smoking can help to remove your worries and make you hopeful. Hopefully, the bad taste of the cigarette can help you to quit smoking. You are hopeless at abandoning the habit of smoking. Smoking can ruin you if you are hopelessly addicted to it.