Rules on Smoking - Too Strict?

[linusrichard]

I'd just like to say that I swallow my gum when I'm done with it, and you should too.

 

[MatildaGage]

The fact that a business can make any legal rules it wants to is good enough for me.

The fact that there is plenty of evidence showing it's seriously unhealthy for the employees nearby is a bonus.

The notion that secondhand smoke magically loses its dangerous properties when the smoker steps over the threshold is a silly leftover from the "take it outside" campaigns.

FACT SHEET: Outdoor Air Pollution From Secondhand Smoke. James L. Repace, Visiting Assistant Professor, Tufts University School of Medicine.

Study Raises Concerns About Outdoor Second-Hand Smoke. ScienceDaily (Nov. 19, 2009)

 

[Molinaro]

There are a couple of rules that are being re-enforced here at my office building. Both of which I think are dumb. I wanted to see if maybe I was being out of line by thinking so:

1). ..... So now the smokers must stand 100 feet away from the entranceway and stay away from the awning. Now smokers have no choice but to stand in the rain/snow/wind to enjoy their cancer-stick. ....

That's not a rule here, it's the law. It has nothing to do with smoking. Groups of people congregating near the entrance to a building create an obstruction that could prevent a quick escape from a fire or other emergency.

That law always existed, but never needed to be enforced until the buildings became smoke free and smokers started plugging up the entrances.

 

[Sir Robin Goodfellow]

Best. Thread. Ever. It's got everything: Nazis, gum-induced psychosis, some sort of Wi-Fi cigarettes... it's even better than a gun-control thread.

 

[Mercurial Artism]

And i get physically sick when i have to deal with a wad of chewed up gum, especially when someone tries to be polite by putting it in the wrapper, yet still leaving it there. Yet i don't think if i explained and even proved this any workplace would institute a no gum policy.

And why? Because you and me are both on the fringes of what we really hate. Most people can deal with these things to a greater or lesser extent, and the rules should be made to reflect a reasonable compromise using the middle of the road on both sides , not people like yourself and I.

Unless the physical sickness is along the lines of anxiety, I've never heard of a gum-induced physical illness, and am very interested to see some specific evidence as to the potential severity of the consequences of this.

As I see it:
gum litter is worse than cigarette butt litter (unless the cigarette is tossed where it could ignite dry brush or something)
secondhand smoke is worse than secondhand gum chewing

While there may not be a reported fatality due to secondhand smoke, there are many possible outcomes apart from fatalities, such as the provocation of an asthma attack, which is typically not fatal unless the person's condition is severe, persistent, and/or uncontrolled (though death can occur in any severity of asthma), the asthma mortality rate being 1.1 in 100,000 (. However, not only does secondhand smoke contain harmful ingredients for healthy individuals, but for someone who has asthma it can trigger worsening of symptoms and an attack.

Lots of times when I went into coughing fits at bus stops, or on the college campus, or other places, people thought I was intentionally exaggerating to show disapproval, when in fact I have no qualms about people choosing to smoke, and when it was raining hard (the worst weather that part of Southern CA saw) at a bus stop, rather than telling the smokers off for smoking I went and stood out in the rain, where my books and school assignments got soaked. I am not entirely unsympathetic to smokers, particularly as many are working class people leading stressful lives, which I can fully relate to.

While there are people who exaggerate their discomfort, something which I think is out of line unless they have a medical condition or a child present or something of that nature, many people are genuinely *physically* made ill by things that seem minor or innocuous. It's like what I said as a child when I had such breathing episodes with even very little exposure, as my mom used to smoke (for years chalked up to "bright child quirks", then "autistic sensory overload", even getting tagged with "multiple chemical sensitivity" by a psychologist before finally seeking medical diagnosis to treat asthma), and I began coughing and my eyes watering - the emphasis is that for a subset of people, this is a physical reaction, not a mere dislike of certain odors. Even for those whose complaints are based on more superficial grounds, there are negative health effects, even if they are milder, take more exposures to manifest.

BTW, I don't chew gum.

 

[AlBell]

This doesn't really matter in that the rational perspective would be to establish that it is safe. And even if you want to argue that the studies are equivocal on the issue of harm, they clearly do not show that there is no harm. And those things which second-hand smoke puts into the air are already subject to regulation and standards which are violated in the presence of second-hand smoke, like "inhalable particles".

Linda

God save us from busybodies typified by your thinking. "Nothing" is safe.

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

I'm really not arguing for the sake of argument. Full disclosure: I live and work in Birmingham. I really honestly just haven't seen gum anywhere in a long time.

This. Like I said earlier, the last time I recall stepping in gum was at least 20 years ago. And I've never sat in it or accidentally touched it.

I have no idea where Sadhatter lives that gum is such a public menace.

ETA: I live in the US and travel extensively. Gum is not a problem anywhere I've been lately (lately = last 20-30 years)

 

[Fnord]

The rules aren't strict enough - smoking should be completely banned on or in company property.

 

[fls]

God save us from busybodies typified by your thinking. "Nothing" is safe.

I didn't say that. I said that these are substances which are harmful and are subject to regulation. Whether or not studies are available which demonstrate that a specific device for delivering these substances is associated with harm does not magically make these substances non-harmful.

Linda

 

[The Central Scrutinizer]

There was this thread from earlier last year.

 

[fls]

*must not get involved in another smoking thread, must not get involved in another smoking thread, must not get involved.... damn it!!!

[qimg]http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg117/ThePsychoClown/Emoticons/aafu051.gif[/qimg]

Who else but you will protect the JREF against us wackjobs who think that our training and experience in epidemiology allows us to understand the research.

Linda

 

[Stray Cat]

Who else but you will protect the JREF against us wackjobs who think that our training and experience in epidemiology allows us to understand the research.

Linda

Linda, I really couldn't give a monkey's anymore... I just ignore the law when ever there are no non smokers around.

The Anti-smokers can whinge as much as they want... Claiming that when there is no study to back up their assertions that studies are not important.

 

[JeanFromBNA]

I don't care about studies. Smoking stinks, and ten feet away from a door isn't nearly far enough. 100 feet, I guess that would do if they were downwind. And when they came inside, they were made to sit in a separate room so I couldn't smell their smoker's b.o.

I live in the good ole Southern US where the smoking rate is higher than average. I defy you to step out the door of any building open to the public and walk ten feet and not see a discarded cigarette butt. Stop at a red light and look toward the curb nearest your car; the ground is covered with cigarette butts. I have never seen that degree of problem with gum.

 

[fls]

Linda, I really couldn't give a monkey's anymore... I just ignore the law when ever there are no non smokers around.

The Anti-smokers can whinge as much as they want... Claiming that when there is no study to back up their assertions that studies are not important.

[qimg]http://i246.photobucket.com/albums/gg117/ThePsychoClown/Emoticons/joint.gif[/qimg]

I didn't say that there aren't studies to back up my assertions. There are thousands of studies which demonstrate the effects of these substances. I've just noticed that pro-tobacco attacks are directed at observational studies when their usefulness under these circumstances are minor.

Linda

 

[Stray Cat]

*must not get involved in another smoking thread, must not get involved in another smoking thread, must not get involved.... damn it!!!

Have fun ya'all.

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Does an e-cigarette plug into the USB port on your laptop?

You're confusing it with the Cigar

 

[zooterkin]

Alabama, or england? If your talking the uk, that may be where the discrepancy lays. I hear , when it comes to public places us in Canada and north america are pretty bad.

You may have a slight point, in that the only time I can recall sitting on chewing gum was in the US. But even there, discarded chewing gum doesn't seem to be a noticeable problem. Furthermore, I can't tell that the lift (elevator) that I've just walked into was last used by someone who chewed gum on the way to work. I can tell if they had a cigarette before the entered the building.

 

[23_Tauri]

I did bother to look it up (which takes time, oh insulting one), and I haven't found a study as of yet.

I wasn't being insulting, irony, just pointing to the fact that you wouldn't be able to find studies showing a link between ETS and asthmatics dying, because there aren't any.

I did find one medical case, but that's it. So for now, I retract that particular side-issue.

So you'd already google'd and found no evidence, and yet still decided to post on here yesterday in post 35 "At least there's no real chance it would kill me, unlike with some asthmatics".

As for your claim that no one has shown second-hand smoke increases the risk of disease. linky

A google search. The top link goes to a news item about a meta-anaylsis that showed increased risk of meningococcal disease in children of smokers. As good sceptics we should all be very wary of anything that can only be shown through meta-analysis of data:

http://www.skepdic.com/metaanalysis.html

A meta-analysis is a type of data analysis in which the results of several studies, none of which need find anything of statistical significance, are lumped together and analyzed as if they were the results of one large study.

As I hope to illustrate in further posts, meta-analysis has been used by anti-smoking campaigners in an attempt to show links between ETS and disease and increased risk of death. That they have had to resort to such biased data manipulation demonstrates the weakness of any correlation, besides which there is no evidence of a mechanism as to how ETS could affect non-smokers' health.

I predict a veritable indoor tornado of hot air coming my way shortly.

 

[plumjam]

The outside smokers should be forced to do something useful for the company while smoking.

Perhaps a giant hamster wheel in the street to offset some of the damage to their cardiovascular systems.
It's the only place they can smoke, and if the wheel falls below 6 mph they get blasted out of it with water cannon, thus removing some of the stench.
The energy from the hamster wheel goes to power the building's computers (their own workstation now being used by colleagues to watch porn and send bogus emails to bosses).

Everyone's a winner.

 

[GlennB]

This. Like I said earlier, the last time I recall stepping in gum was at least 20 years ago. And I've never sat in it or accidentally touched it.

I have no idea where Sadhatter lives that gum is such a public menace.

ETA: I live in the US and travel extensively. Gum is not a problem anywhere I've been lately (lately = last 20-30 years)

Then perhaps you should just look downwards sometimes?
Put exactly "chewing gum" +pavement into Google images and you'll see hundreds of photos like this: