Relativizing a harm against ubiquitous everyday risks makes it seem negligible

Evidence

In a strategy document, executives at Philip Morris recommended that the company “[i]dentify a strategy in risk assessment methodology that allows comparison of ETS [environmental tobacco smoke] to other indoor air (volatile organic chemicals), foods (pesticides), and water (lead, fluorine). Design a communications package that illustrates the significant risks associated with everyday life that includes ETS as a ‘negligible risk’” (Philip Morris USA, 1989). — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1650

Categorization

• XREF: The advantageous-comparison mechanism maps onto how harmful policy is normalized by comparison to already-accepted harms, extending the vault’s claims about rationalizing Islamophobic policy.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm…, 1650