Smoking bans: Good or bad?

Smoking bans work for exceptionally warm states that can have outdoor seating all year round, but besides that, I pretty much dislike smoking bans. Even as an ex-smoker.

I believe there are places smoke should not be allowed, like say libraries or hospitals. And I believe certain restaurants should have it banned like any popular fast food joint. But in bars and such, I think it's going a little too far.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Also I hope this thread doesn't get derailed with one of those circular debates.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I found that satire to be amusing.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

there are documented cases of non-smokers developing lung cancer and emphysema simply from working amongst smokers for an extended period.

So how does getting any of these illnesses while being around secondhand smoke necessarily prove that it was caused by secondhand smoke? People can get lung cancer/emphysema without being around smokers for extended periods of time.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

It proves it simply through the modern miracle of common sense.

No, not really. Because you can't just jump to conclusions like that. Even an apparent trend doesn't make something concrete, that's what I'm trying to say.

A friend once said to me, "since they've allowed people to carry guns, crime around here dropped 17%" (whether or not this was true, I don't know). And I think, you know, that's cool and all, but there can be plenty of other factors that contribute to the drop.

Now you mention that there are "documented cases of secondhand smoke => lung cancer/emphysema", and I question the validity. Like I said above, that doesn't really prove anything, it just points out what could be potentially true, at best.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

People who smoke have a higher rate of lung cancer and emphysema. FACT.

So it therefore stands to reason that people who are constantly exposed to secondhand smoke have a higher risk of developing lung cancer and emphysema. Smokers exhale the same carcinogens that they inhale.

Maybe so. The question isn't so much if there is a higher risk but if the higher risk is significant. Lots of things carry various risks. Crossing the street carries risks of getting hit by a car. That doesn't make the risk significant, even though it's there.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

Arguments like yours really piss me off. Sure, lung cancer isn't strictly dependent upon cigarette smoke, but the smoke definitely isn't helping, is it? But no, this is how smokers rationalize their habit,

How smokers rationalize their habit? Smokers rationalize their habit with a powerful physical/psychological addiction. Have some sympathy, pretty much every smoker I know wants to quit and wished they had never started. They do not want or need an excuse to smoke.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

and how Big Tobacco defends itself. "You can't prove that these people wouldn't have developed lung cancer any other way, so secondhand smoke is therefore not the culprit. Innocent until proven guilty. Nyah."

"Innocent until proven guilty." Show me how this philosophy is flawed.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

However, studies have shown that people who've been constantly exposed to secondhand smoke do have a significantly increased rate of respiratory problems. It's a direct correlation and it's perfectly logical to believe that secondhand smoke could lead to lung cancer.

As posted previously by another user, there's really nothing proving/disproving this.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

The only thing preventing people from seeing the validity of this argument is stupid pride and lost profits. It's the same bullshit that prompts the NRA goons into saying "Guns don't kill people. People kill people." Perhaps so, but that smoking .12 gauge shotgun is a bit of a mitigating factor, isn't it?

Don't see the analogy with the gun part.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by AliceNWondrland

Eleo, you could tell me that there isn't one single "documented" case to support the claim that smoking or breathing second-hand smoke is harmful to you, and it wouldn't matter. It's just plain common sense. You're inhaling smoke, tar and other chemicals into your lungs. There's no way that's not harmful.

Plus, it really does smell horrible and it makes many people sneeze, cough and suffer burning eyes.

And like I said, then you'd need evidence that it's significantly harmful.

Plus you guys make it seem like any given building that has a smoking section is just exploding with massive amounts of smoke lethal smoke. I have been to plenty of restaurants with smoking allowed and this is not the case by any means. Most of the restaurants I've been to have devices installed in the ceiling specifically for the purpose of sucking up smoke so it doesn't even wander to other sections.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by DarkLink2135

They've had evidence for AT LEAST the past 20 years that this is so. Damn.

If you want to just ignore proven facts then I guess nobody can debate this.

There's nothing proven about it. Why don't you do your own research instead of believing what you hear in commercials.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by AliceNWondrland

NO. What I'm saying is that this is a no-brainer. This is so common sense - you do NOT need evidence. When you inhale foreign substances into your lungs it cannot be good for you. I don't care about or need evidence for me to be convinced that smoking is harmful.

Based on your philosophy, we should just abandon science.

Originally Posted by DarkLink2135

You are completely mindboggling. You are trying to tell me that the same thing that contains something like 200 different carcinogens when inhaled - mind you, not after being exhaled by a smoker - isn't going to do me any harm?

Please, go on living in your little fantasy land where the rules of logic no longer apply.

There are lots of things that are bad for you that you use, consume, and live in every day. Cell phones blast microwaves into your head. You'd think that would be bad for you, right? It can't be good, right? I mean, if someone said to you, "hey, I'm going to just fire off these waves into your head for a few minutes, do you mind?", you'd not really be up for it, right?

Yet this never freaks anyone out; people continue to use cell phones. Even if you don't personally own one, those same cell phone microwaves are flying all through space because everyone else is. All those microwaves, can't be good for you.

Should we ban cell phones?

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

As for the secondhand smoke argument, why don't you light your house on fire and stand in the blaze for a good hour. Breathe deep. Make sure that smoke gets deep down into the base of your lungs. Now, remember as you inhale, that's just basic carbons being burned off around you. Nothing like the complex chemical additives you'll find in the average cigarette. Tell me that the smoke around you is absolutely harmless. Tell me that you're enjoying the burn. Tell me that microscopic particulates in the air actually relax your airways.

The smoke from cigarettes may not be as thick, but you can't possibly insist, with a straight face, that exposure to secondhand smoke isn't tantamount to being inside a small, slow-burning fire that's ever-so-increasingly covering your airways with constricting particles and chemical by-products.

No, how about I burn your house down for this experiment. What the fuck. How am I supposed to demonstrate this at all.

There's going to be a massive difference between suddenly inhaling the black smoke a house burning around you compared to that of even maybe even 100 people in your house, smoking. I don't get how this supports your argument. What you said is like saying, "if you stab yourself in the belly with a sword, it's gotta be as bad for you as pricking yourself in the belly with 100 needles."

Cig smoke has dirty stuff in it. Cool. We know that. Now show me that walking through dissipating cigarette smoke critically increases the risk of getting smoking-related illnesses.

Originally Posted by Crash Landon

Use fucking common sense instead of trying to justify a habit with flimsy rationalization.

I'm not trying to justify anything. I am an ex-smoker. What I see in you is you regarding smokers as the scum of the Earth because of your lung condition. You complain when they are indoors, and then you complain because they're too close to the entrance when they're outdoors. Nobody exists to accomodate your very specific condition. Get over yourself. Smokers exist, and not for you.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Yeah I know, I was going inside of a building this one time and like I had to sprint through gauntlet of maybe 50 smokers just blowing smoke right into my face, trying to give me cancer, it was crazy. All smokers are assholes and I hate them.

Double Post:
Just went to the doctor. Said I have lung cancer from all of that going inside buildings with smokers outside of them.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Oh thanks for showing me a picture of a cancer-ridden lung. Now I know that cancer is deadly and destructive. How informative.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Actually, way to edit your post after I reply to it.

But either way, thanks for showing me a diseased lung. I'd like to know what this proves besides "emphysema fucks you up."

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

I don't see that described in the picture.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Lady Miyomi

I personally don't care either way about smoking bans. As long as someone's not purposely blowing their smoke in my face (which I've had happen), I don't care where smoking takes place.

Could you be anymore reasonable.

I was speaking idiomatically.

I know plenty of extremely intelligent people who smoke, among other things. One of them is literally a genius, in fact.

Originally Posted by DarkLink2135

Nothing will happen. They just want to ignore proven research and facts so they can have the peace of mind of not realizing they are screwing everybody around them over.

Since I am not even a smoker, I'd like to know, how the fuck am I screwing everybody around me over? By arguing on a forum?

Quote:

Since Eleo and now ieatjackets continue to post nonsense without Acknowledging the research, I'll keep reposting this until something happens:

Actually I think we've touched upon everything to not have to refute those links specifically.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by DarkLink2135

You can also be a genius about certain things but a complete moron about other things. Smokers (at least ones that picked up the habit in recent years) are devoid in the common sense department, and nothings going to convince me other wise. Hell, it doesn't even take common sense to realize that inhaling several hundred carcinogens into your lungs is going to end up killing you.

Most of the smokers I know picked up the habit at a young age. I know I had started when I was 16. And it really had nothing to do with smoking ads on the back of magazines and it really had nothing to do with anti-smoking ads on television. It was about my friends doing it, it was about it calming my nerves during a very stressful time in my life, and it was about growing addiction. But psychological/financial factors play a huge role in addiction.

Nevertheless, people have different outlooks on life. If one doesn't care for their health, that's his or her choice. It doesn't make them moronic because it's their personal choice, and it doesn't concern you.

Originally Posted by pandaswan

Smokers should be glad that they're even allowed to smoke.

Uh what? How would it be fair to illegalize cigarette smoking?

Originally Posted by pandaswan

It really does suck for non smokers to have to second hand smoke every day when out...

When? Smoking is banned indoors pretty much everywhere but restaurants in certain cities/states.

Originally Posted by AliceNWondrland

I shouldn't have to walk through a cloud of cheap cologne just because I'm in the mall, and I shouldn't have to walk through a cloud of putrid, noxious smoke to get into my building every morning and have that stench wafting off of my hair for the rest of the day.

I'm sorry, but cigarette smoke simply does not stick to you so easily or so permanently, especially if you're outside and merely walking through it. The only time I've ever had smoke stick to me was while smoking indoors. If what you said were the case, a substantial number of people inside any given building would smell like cigarette smoke regularly, because there's almost always someone or another outside of a building smoking.

FELIPE NO

Yes, I would. But I'd own my house.

Similarly, if I did the same thing to him, I'd expect him to get pissed.

But if I were moseying down the sidewalk and smelled burned rubber, I'd have nothing to say about it, because I do not own the block, or the air.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

So don't walk it through my smoke and exercise true control of it. You make it seem like smokers are going out of their way to confront you and blow smoke right into your face.

I mean, what, because you own your body you can legally do whatever you want?

"Can't arrest me, I own my body, you're not allowed to touch it."

"So what if I'm in your house? I own my body, I can do what I want!"

Originally Posted by AliceNWondrland

Eleo, I don't want to turn this into a racial thing, but you're black. White people have extremely porous hair. Don't tell me you've never heard any black people say that white people smell like wet dogs when they get wet. There's even a book called, "Why Do White People Smell Like Wet Dogs When They Come Out of the Rain?" It's basically a book that explains black and white stereotypes.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/096...lance&n=283155

My point is that white people - ESPECIALLY white people with naturally blonde or red hair - pick up smells and hold them. If I go into a pizza restaurant, for example, I'll smell like pizza until I take a shower. Cigarette smoke clings to me. If I walk through a cloud of it in the morning, I'll still smell it in my hair that night, and not just faintly, either.

Like I said earlier, I've never found a non-smoker to smell like smoke to demonstrate.

Similarly, never found a wet white person to smell like a wet dog. I thought that was just a dumb stereotype; kind of like niggers stealing TVs.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by DragoonKain

Oh, it most certainly does. I walked by someone smoking on the street. Walked by, so that means I spent less than a second next to a smoker outdoors, and I smelled it on my clothes after walking 3 blocks back to my place.

Okay. You win. Smoking should be banned from the planet!

This thread should be closed.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Actually, it's because we're now arguimg whether or not and how quickly and how permanently smoke does or doesn't stick to your hair and clothes, which apparently has something to do with whether you're negroid or caucasian. It was at that point that I realized I don't care anymore.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.