Public Enemy #1: How Many More?

Abstract

Public Enemy #1: How many more? explores historical and contemporary manifestations of the tobacco industry on public health, and specifically Black lives, in the United States. This is reinforced with bold text that serves as a mini poem within the poem, emphasizing tobacco’s impact on mortality. By juxtaposing messaging from the industry with Black American music (e.g., Hip Hop, R&B lyrics), TV culture references, and movements for racial justice, the poem provides an opportunity for critical analysis of the intersections between commercial tobacco, systemic racism, and capitalism. It counters narratives focused on personal responsibility and instead offers a complex, nuanced understanding of how systems of power intersect to harm communities. The title, a hip-hop reference to the group Public Enemy, whose songs include political messages to raise cultural consciousness, is a call to reflect on who is really the most dangerous threat in our society. I intentionally use italics for emphasis and references from Black culture to elevate our lives, voices, contributions, and legacies, which are in no way expendable. Any loss is a societal loss. Birthed from the pains of my own series of tobacco-related familial losses, this poem is a testament that the fight is one of reclamation that must be ongoing and provides an opportunity for reckoning and truth-telling. Like the Public Enemy song it references, Public Enemy #1: How many more? is a battle cry to take system-level action on these intricately woven epidemics to rectify, rather than perpetuate injustice, and advance racial and health equity. To view the original version of this poem, see the supplemental material section of this article online.