Merged Smoking should be banned universally

[TragicMonkey]

It was interesting to me, though, that so many anti-ban posters also don't think that reasonable restrictions on public smoking are reasonable -- which are the only situations I addressed, and which were immediately defended by several posters, including yourself. I would very much like to not have to walk behind smokers on the street, and I think that's a reasonable restriction on smoking that, to my knowledge, doesn't currently exist.

I don't live in the kind of city that has pedestrians. We have few sidewalks, and the only outdoors place you're likely to walk behind other people is in parking lots making your way into buildings, which is not really a long enough time for smokers to bother lighting up. Smokers can generally be found only some distance away from building entrances, not in the path of other people.

Are you in a big city, with a "downtown", where people commonly travel by walking large distances in crowds? Unless there are a great many smokers in that crowd, how hard would it be to alter speed, pass them, or let them draw far enough ahead that you aren't bothered? I would have thought a moving smoker would be less irritating than a stationary one, as the smoke won't gather in one place for so long.

 

[TragicMonkey]

I might add that I have a peculiar and overwhelming hatred for whistling, and will flee the scene once someone begins that odious practice. If I were walking behind a whistler I would immediately change course, stop dead, race past them, or strangle them while beating their skull into the pavement and screaming. I realize that my distaste for whistling is my burden, and the responsiblity is mine to avoid it, not to insist that whistling be prohibited where I might encounter it--in public. But if a coworker whistles, you can be certain that since I cannot avoid that I immediately take steps to see that they stop. What is appropriate is the minimum level of intervention into other people's behavior. It's not like writing program code, where we code for all possible situations, or for the ideal.

 

[23_Tauri]

Seems aptly on-topic, but a toddler in a buggy has just had a screaming fit outside in the street below my office window for the last ten minutes. I hate the sound of young children, it grates on my ears like finger nails down a blackboard. I wager it takes Avalon less time to get round a smoker when walking down a street than it did for the parents to shut that child up.

 

[TragicMonkey]

Seems aptly on-topic, but a toddler in a buggy has just had a screaming fit outside in the street below my office window for the last ten minutes. I hate the sound of young children, it grates on my ears like finger nails down a blackboard. I wager it takes Avalon less time to get round a smoker when walking down a street than it did for the parents to shut that child up.

One good public toddler temper tantrum does more to boost the use of birth control among the witnesses than a thousand commercials with Bristol Palin in them.

 

[23_Tauri]

One good public toddler temper tantrum does more to boost the use of birth control among the witnesses than a thousand commercials with Bristol Palin in them.

Too right. Each time I witness such a scene and thank Aten and simultaneously kick myself for not selling my ovaries before I was too old.

But, perhaps this is the crux of the matter: smoking bans are about intolerance and secular puritanism, that you mustn't do something that I've refrained from, which makes me more holy and good than you. I have sacrificed the pleasures of the flesh so that I may live in heaven a long, healthful and self-righteous life. Whilst you, smoker, you must pay for your sins of the flesh by going through tobacco withdrawal, and be shamed in Smoker's Quit meetings, and spat at in the street.

Sorry, did I get a bit carried away there?

 

[Francesca R]

Seems aptly on-topic, but a toddler in a buggy has just had a screaming fit outside in the street below my office window for the last ten minutes. I hate the sound of young children, it grates on my ears like finger nails down a blackboard. I wager it takes Avalon less time to get round a smoker when walking down a street than it did for the parents to shut that child up.

That toddler might end up paying part of your retirement income. Think of the snivelling wretches children.

 

[Ambrosia]

I'm not in any indoor areas where cigarette smoke is a problem.

If smoking was permitted in a small amount of bars/pubs but the vast majority remained smoke free.

How many indoor areas would you frequent where cigarette smoke is a problem?

I'd be happy(ier) if our government allowed private members only clubs to permit smoking and kept pubs/bars smoke free.

At least that would be a step in the right direction and allow me to choose to join one of these clubs and smoke indoors with my friends and chat over a beer. Especially in autumn/winter when the weather here is usually bad.

 

[23_Tauri]

That toddler might end up paying part of your retirement income. Think of the snivelling wretches children.

I would hope I'm paying quite enough in tobacco tax, NI contributions and income tax to cover the state pension that will supplement my private pension. Oh and remember, as a smoker I won't be a burden on the state in my old age for as long as all those non-smokers.

But, hey, whatever....

 

[23_Tauri]

If smoking was permitted in a small amount of bars/pubs but the vast majority remained smoke free.

How many indoor areas would you frequent where cigarette smoke is a problem?

I'd be happy(ier) if our government allowed private members only clubs to permit smoking and kept pubs/bars smoke free.

At least that would be a step in the right direction and allow me to choose to join one of these clubs and smoke indoors with my friends and chat over a beer. Especially in autumn/winter when the weather here is usually bad.

*sigh!*

Pipedream, Ambrosia. Oh wait a minute, no pipes left to dream with.....

 

[Ambrosia]

It was interesting to me, though, that so many anti-ban posters also don't think that reasonable restrictions on public smoking are reasonable -- which are the only situations I addressed, and which were immediately defended by several posters, including yourself. I would very much like to not have to walk behind smokers on the street, and I think that's a reasonable restriction on smoking that, to my knowledge, doesn't currently exist.

I am not an anti-ban poster. I am a pro-ban poster who would like a few specific exemptions added to the ban legislation here so as to cater for both smokers and non smokers more appropriately.

If 1/3 of the pub going customers are smokers it seems wrong to me that the wishes of the 70% majority are forced on everybody at every venue.

I still don't think that restrictions on outdoors smoking are reasonably justifiable.

You cannot make a reasonable law based solely on what annoys someone. If a smoker was lighting up and deliberately walking in font of you then perhaps that would fall under anti-social behaviour laws.

Show some evidence that outdoors SHS has a significant health impact on non smokers and I'd reconsider my position.

 

[TragicMonkey]

That toddler might end up paying part of your retirement income. Think of the snivelling wretches children.

Even weirder, that toddler might grow up to become your future May-December romance. Sure, they're screaming and squalling now, but in twenty-five years they might be lookin' good in a swimsuit in your pool, causing all your friends to envy you.

 

[PAC]

He that is without a bad habit among you, let him first cast a stone.

 

[Dorian Gray]

But that's the real reason for the prohibitionist movement against tobacco smoking: not because it's bad for you for others around you, but because you're enjoying it! How dare you!

How else can the ban on smokers members only clubs or now the campaign to ban e-cigarettes (I believe they are already banned in Dubai) be explained, unless we acknowledge that it is driven by a powerful Puritanical streak in society with very good political lobbying skills?

Porn is bad, mmmkay?
Smoking is bad, mmmkay?
Smoking and having sex for pleasure at the same time is double bad, mmmkay?

The more I read this argument, the more it sounds like a petulant child who's not getting their way, and less like an adult who has the ability to show concern for anyone but themselves.

 

[Dorian Gray]

If smoking was permitted in a small amount of bars/pubs but the vast majority remained smoke free.

How many indoor areas would you frequent where cigarette smoke is a problem?

I'd be happy(ier) if our government allowed private members only clubs to permit smoking and kept pubs/bars smoke free.

At least that would be a step in the right direction and allow me to choose to join one of these clubs and smoke indoors with my friends and chat over a beer. Especially in autumn/winter when the weather here is usually bad.

I suppose the private club thing would work because everyone in there would be giving consent. What about homes with children, though? None of them asked to breathe smoke, and none of them have a say in it if the parent does smoke.

 

[JFrankA]

I suppose the private club thing would work because everyone in there would be giving consent. What about homes with children, though? None of them asked to breathe smoke, and none of them have a say in it if the parent does smoke.

So should the government babysit the parents in their own home?

 

[case#46cw39]

"Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves, and, under a just God, cannot long retain it." --Abraham Lincoln, letter to H.L. Pierce, April 6, 1859.

The problem is when millions of them get sick and need expensive medical attention / funeral expenses that non-smokers then have to pay for. This "Drug Use Cost" should be built into the price of cigarrettes so that only the community of smokers has to pay for their unhealthy decision. If they want to die on it, it's their free life and that's on them, not me.

 

[Emet]

What about the medical costs of obesity?

 

[23_Tauri]

The more I read this argument, the more it sounds like a petulant child who's not getting their way, and less like an adult who has the ability to show concern for anyone but themselves.

Where did I say I wanted to blow smoke in your face? Please tell me where. Why would I want to, and give you the benefit of my tobacco smoke when you haven't paid the tax on it and I have?

I want the the smoking ban in the UK and other European countries amended so that people have the choice whether to run a smoking bar or pub or not; then we can get out of your face, and Avalon's too; and so that smokers no longer have the spectre of the prohibitionist movement (ASH et al) pushing to make tobacco illegal so we can't even smoke in our own homes.

Y'know, consenting adults getting together to do something that consenting adults want to do together.

 

[23_Tauri]

So should the government babysit the parents in their own home?

Clearly DG thinks the answer to this question is yes, and that governements have the right to dictate what its citizens get up to in the private realm, which is of course the mark of the totalitarian state. Minority Report, anyone?

Personally, I don't want authority poking its nose into my inward life and I consider the anti-tobacconist movement as another worrying step towards a growing intolerance of others. Whether it's not allowing people to freedom of expression to wear WTH they like on their heads, or smoke in their own homes, or eat burgers three times a day, or star in a porn movie, or people being fearful to speak out for fear of being labelled 'politically incorrect', it's all part of the same trend.

You don't have to respect my choice to smoke, DG, but a modicum of tolerance or other people's lifestyle choices would be nice.

 

[23_Tauri]

I suppose the private club thing would work because everyone in there would be giving consent. What about homes with children, though? None of them asked to breathe smoke, and none of them have a say in it if the parent does smoke.

Think of the children!

Show me one study that demonstrates that living with parents that smoke when you're a child increases your risk of ill health in later life. Then I might listen to you.