Nanny State

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In the end, people can and will act in their own self interest. They're a completely capable. Protecting people from themselves only makes them dependent on the government.

Whether you like it or not we all are dependent upon the government as a stable framework for legal, social, intellectual, and financial operations.

Apparently libertarians are in a tizzy on smoking bans. Smoking, though, is one of those things where your "freedom" can directly impinge upon another's. For example, if you live in an apartment complex where smoking is forbidden, it's probably because neighbors don't want your second-hand smoke. How else do you propose the problem be dealt with? If a smoker lacks consideration for those around him or her, what option would you leave for nonsmokers to deal with the problem? Must the private citizen be left to resort to fisticuffs against a neighbor who will not keep their smoke away?

A ventilation system will solve the problem. Suck up the smoke and trap it in a filter. Easy, peasy.

ruveyn

I'm not sure that always works. Smoke really embeds.

My father was a smoker, and we all grew up in blissful ignorance of what that meant to our health. So ... I have now the constant sniffles, and rhinocitis, which basically makes me sensitive to almost everything in the air. I do remember feeling sorry for my dad as social evolution started to force him to stand between trains to smoke on his way to work, rather than be able to sit comfortably. It didn't seem fair. I still feel that way when I walk by office workers huddled outside their buildings. But, then again ... the side effects of second-hand smoke are real, and even my dad came to accept that enough to find a reason to quit once he had grandchildren (he blamed a new tax, and said he was quitting in protest, but I never bought it). To the extent that the rest of us end up paying for someone else's choices, the state does have a vested interest in restricting those choices. Despite my sympathy, I am much, much happier working and eating and traveling smoke free.

The types of bans on trans-fats have tended to involve restaurant food, the precise content of which it is difficult for consumers to know or control. Maybe a ban is less useful than just requiring a big sign, "we use trans-fat in our cooking."

Here they want to ban single use shopping bags, which really is over-kill. We have a stack of re-usable bags, and we're really good at using them, and we reuse the few plastic ones we pick up for discarding kitty waste. What really struck me as funny was walking into the pet store and finding that they sell plastic bags for throwing out kitty waste. It was one of those, "law of unintended consequences" moments, to me. Ban the plastic store bags and you're barely going to make a dent in the volume of plastic manufactured and tossed, because people will now need to buy plastic bags for the things they were re-using the free ones for. Education and incentives makes a lot more sense, so that each person can find the right balance for their own needs.

I do understand things like seat-belt laws and helmet laws, however. Society picks up the tab when there is a disability caused by a spine or head injury. Put the law in, save society money.

Last edited by DW_a_mom on 30 Aug 2010, 11:01 am, edited 1 time in total.

Of course people will act in their own self interest. But that does not mean that all people have the capacity to meet their needs without aggregation of demand.

Ensuring universality of law enforcement, defence, health, education and infrastructure ensures that the greatest number of people have the capacity to act in their own self-interest.

The issue is when you infringe upon private property rights. If a bar or restaurant wants to allow smoking, they should every right. You, as the customer, have every right to take your business elsewhere. There certainly is a market for non-smoking restaurants, bars, etc. I don't understand the issue here.

As far as an apartment complex's that would be up the land lord.(I've been a renter all my life so thats case for me) I don't really understand how the building works when people actually own the apartments in their buildings so that's interesting argument since they're own property rights would be getting infringed on but I would think there are things they could do legally on a case by case basis then rather than blanket ban on smoking in apartment buildings. In all the apartments I've ever been in though that's never been an issue. When a person smokes in his or her own apartment then usually stays in their apartment and the only time you really notice it is in the hallway.

The thing with 2nd hand smoke is that for the most part it's just an annoyance to most people in my personal experience than actual health risk.(I'm not saying there isn't one) I always laugh in situations where I see that because it reminds of the scene in Zoolander when Ben Stiller tells his miner father "I think I got the black lung, pop" and does an exaggerated cough after one day in the mines. I don't think annoying people is violating their rights tho. Other things smell too, you can't force a person to wear deodorant can you?

Stuff like seat belt and helmet laws are just stupid. It has more to do with stealing even more money from populace and more sinisterly in the case of primary seat belt laws to racially or whatever else profiling. If people don't care about their own well being then that's their prerogative.

If it saves lives and maintains general public health it's not stupid. Employees at a smoking establishment depend on their living for the work. No need for them to suffer merely to hold a job.

Then don't work there in the first place.

Some people do not have the luxury of ignoring or discarding a job based on whether there will be smoking.

And there are plenty of people out there that would love to have that job regardless.

I was referring to the employee's problem, not that of the employer. Jobs are pretty tough to get these days.

Second hand smoke is overrated as a toxin, many of the studies done on it have been flawed and/or politically motivated. However, even if it's level of harm was indisputably established, that would still not be an excuse for the imposition on private property rights that smoking bans create. Many jobs are dangerous, the employees know that, it is accepted as part of the job and compensated accordingly. Police work, firefighting and logging immediately come to mind, but are far from the only dangerous occupations out there. A less authoritarian solution would have been to require smoking businesses to provide insurance to their workers, but I have never heard of this option being offered in lieu of a total ban. In my home state all of our cigar bars and hookah lounges had to close down because of the law, which IMHO should have been considered unconstitutional due to the uncompensated deprivation inflicted on owners of such businesses.

As far as health care costs for the state, anyone remember the multi-hundred BILLION dollar tobacco settlement?

Here are some link and videos containing more information about the ridiculousness of smoking bans.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/produc ... 55&s=books

An excerpt from a book about the anti-smoking movement throughout history, it's full of valuable information.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=136FNtfOgRY[/youtube]

Very good short-ish video about smoking bans

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4syGChVdN4[/youtube]

Longer video detailing how smokers are extorted/exploited by the state because they're a minority, among other things.

http://reason.tv/video/show/179.html

Full version of "Talking Butts", a documentary about the smoking controversy.

Last edited by Dox47 on 30 Aug 2010, 7:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

Anything that discourages smoking is a worthwhile effort. Smoking is a very nasty business and when you have seen people dying of lung cancer and going into helpless coughing fits to satisfy a predatory industry it becomes obvious that it should be eventually stopped.

It's not the business of the state to suppress legitimate businesses and impose on people's right to partake in potentially harmful activities.

And if people die of salmonella, tough luck!