Should smoking be banned outright?

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Forgive me for my bad spelling I am not soo good at spelling english words german is more of my thing though

That's not what I meant, I was just being ridiculous........like joking that I don't know what a toilet is, I didn't even notice your spelling.

Oh well how silly of me I tend to be the serious type sorry for the inconvenience cheri.

No smoking should not be banned. What should be banned is "rude smokers".

Really. I smoke, but I am polite about it. What ever happened to "Do you mind if I smoke?" and then if they do mind, you wait and smoke later or go outside, etc?

Even in my own house, when I have a guest that doesn't smoke, I don't smoke while they are there, or in the same room. I may walk outside on the deck and smoke and invite them to come out with me, if I just HAVE TO HAVE ONE, and it's outside and they don't have to stand downwind, it's just polite to not smoke around nonsmokers. Even though I smoke, I do not sit in the smoking section in restaurants, because I don't like to be around smoke while I'm eating. When I'm not smoking and I've quit for a while, others smoking doesn't bother me, in fact I'm one of the wierd people who like the smell even before I was a smoker, but not everybody likes it and it all boils down to simple manners.

If you are a smoker, then never smoke in a nonsmokers home, even if they say "Oh, it's fine, I don't mind". Go outside if you must smoke while visiting a nonsmoker, because the smell hangs around for days inside the house to nonsmokers, even though we can't smell it at all. It's not a nice smell to them either. If you smoke at a nonsmokers home, don't throw cigarette butts on the ground outside. Pick them up and dispose of them properly. It's best to try and wait until your visit is over before you smoke though, because you will bring the scent back inside on you and it will cling to furniture, etc and nonsmokers can smell that.

If you are a nonsmoker and around someone who is about to smoke and it bothers you, speak up politely. Say something like "I'm sorry, but I have allergies/asthma/etc and smoke really makes it worse. Could you not smoke that in here please?" and most smokers will gladly comply. The ones who don't are as*holes.

It's common courtesy and people don't seem to be very well versed in that anymore. Outside smoking areas are a problem sometimes because many times they have no cover for the rain. Also they don't have any place to sit down. I may do some rude things, but one thing I will never do is walk with a lit cigarette in my hand. It's tacky and trashy, I was taught, even though it's neither tacky nor trashy, I just cannot bring myself to do it. I was taught that women never smoke "on the street" or while walking. Women sit down to smoke. That's one archaic rule that I still follow. And, I'd like a bench in my smoking area please, because lacking one I'm going to sit on the ground, and that's even tackier than walking around while smoking, but I'll still do it.

I'm sure that there are people on both sides of the smoking issue who want to be obvnoxious and push their point for political reasons, but for most people it's not about that. It's about either needing the nicotine fix right then, or it's about really disliking the odor of it or having breathing problems while around it. I should never unreasonably expose a nonsmoker to the smoke from my cigarette if I can help it, and they should never unreasonable tell me that I cannot smoke anywhere at all.

Manners. They really are useful.

I think the whole issue of smoking has been overbaked. For one, there are far too many anti-smoke nazis running around who you'd think would drop dead the second they inhale tobacco smoke, with the way they carry on about it. This has inspired a movement of arrogant smokers, who will wave their flag around in public if only to get on someone else's nerves. It's a vicious cycle, and one that unfortunately, non-smokers were always bound to win.

Yes, there is a lack of manners in smoking today, but there is also a lack of manners in not smoking. Nobody has the right to complain about your bad habits, whether it's lighting up a smoke, or lecturing others about something you don't really understand. If smoking is to be banned, then we should look into a genocidal pardon; I'm sure Obama, as a smoker, would be quite forthcoming about the idea.

Smoking doesn't ruin your life or kill you fast enough to warrant a ban.

The only people who still smoke are, I believe, self-medicating because of stress etc and cannot quit at the moment. Everyone who can quit already has. I would quit in a heartbeat if I could. I've tried many times. Maybe in the future, I will be able to.

I'm not a jerk about it. I don't smoke indoors - ever. Not in my own home even, because I know that smoke can filter through into the other apartments. It filters into mine, and I hate it when it does. I don't smoke around entrances or anywhere I'm not easily avoided.

The anti-smoking craze I think is now just about viciously abusing a vulnerable group of people. Unfortunately this is common social behaviour. Up until they decided to start trying to ban people from smoking in parks and huge outdoor areas, I agreed with the measures but lately it has gotten ridiculous. The warnings on cigarrette packs we have here are lurid images of people dying now, which causes stress and probably makes people smoke more. One of them depicts a smoker like she is some sort of computerized robot zombie, an obvious assault against someone's identity meant to beat them down with repetition. It's clearly an attempt to dehumanize smokers and says alot about the current mindset of the anti-smoking movement:



The more constructive warnings like this one have vanished:



Banning smoking in parks is absurd. Cars are whizzing by all the time. If you were in a small room with one of them, the exhaust would kill you rapidly. You will not die from being in a smoky room. Entire cities are not smogged up to the point people are dying, because of cigarrettes. With all the money spent on these campaigns, considerable progress could have been made on alternative fuels or other methods of reducing air pollution.

What I think has happened is that some people have become employed in the anti-smoking industry, as consultants, authors, policy advisers, researchers, and so forth. It doesn't matter if adequate measures have been achieved - they must keep going, or they will be out of work.

Last edited by edgewaters on 29 May 2012, 3:16 am, edited 2 times in total.

No, because that leads to the same thing that prohibition did in the 1930's in America.

1. What people do in their own private quarters is their business, not the State's.

2. Attempts to prohibit smoking will lead to the same disasters as did alcohol prohibition.

That State has no right to regulate the personal habits of adults, which are not a danger to the public.

It is a bad idea.

ruveyn

It's not, actually.

Amendment. What they do to THEMSELVES in their private quarters is their own business. As long as they do not endanger the public the State should have nothing to say.

Suicide is a right, not a privilege.

ruveyn

Again, the state can legally regulate what you do in private quarters even if it doesn't directly harm anyone.

legality says nothing of morality

Good for you, now see if you can avoid arrest just by saying that.

we all break laws, only difference is if you know it or not,
that said, never had the need and probably never will, was picked up for draft dodging unintentioanlly once, wasnt eligable so it was a non issue, i was abroad at the time.

the day a law becomes so unbearable i couldnt do anything but actively oppose it is probably too late for humanity anyway.

Last edited by Oodain on 29 May 2012, 4:32 am, edited 1 time in total.

I disagree with you there. People smoke because they enjoy it. There's a lot of marketing around these days to reinforce how bad smoking is, and reduce your subconscious desire to do it: that is to say, anti-smoking ads are designed to manipulate your perception towards smoking, and to make you feel guilty for doing it. They make you think you want to quit, when on a physical level you probably don't, and that is why your quit attempts keep failing.

Nicotine is a stimulant and euphoric agent, with a unique property that, in higher doses, it becomes a relaxant and analgesic. It also has several other effects including increased alertness, improved concentration, greater arousal and a release of anxiety. These are well-documented scientific facts, consistent across numerous studies. Yet, if you ask one of the smoke nazis about the psychological benefits of smoking... they'll tell you they are none.

Note: I'm not a smoker, but I loathe the overblown stigmatisation campaigns towards tobacco. Spread facts, not fallacies.