Ban Smoking in Public Areas!

[King]

To solve peer presure we should ban friendship.

Just kidding.

[StevenNick]

It's not the government's business to regulate the risk out of everyday life.  People know all about the dangers or first hand and second hand smoke.

You really seem to underestimate the pure stupidity of a lot of people.

Also, I bet some smokers never wanted to smoke.. they just bent to peer pressure.

Some people don't wash their hands after sh**tting.  Shall we pass a law mandating government minders in all public bathrooms handing out fines for people who don't wash their hands??

[ilikeverin]

It's not the government's business to regulate the risk out of everyday life.  People know all about the dangers or first hand and second hand smoke.

You really seem to underestimate the pure stupidity of a lot of people.

Also, I bet some smokers never wanted to smoke.. they just bent to peer pressure.

Some people don't wash their hands after sh**tting.  Shall we pass a law mandating government minders in all public bathrooms handing out fines for people who don't wash their hands??

I'd expect the number of people killed because they didn't wash their hands to the number of people killed because they inhaled secondhand smoke is something like 1:90,000, maybe even more severe.

Besides, how can we crack down on non-hand-washing?  By teaching kids to wash their hands in school!

*said like a 50s ad jingle* Public education... the solution for everything!

[JohnFKennedy]

*COUGH* There is *COUGH* *COUGH*  too much smo-*COUGH* *COUGH*  -ke in restuarants and *COUGH*  bars these *COUGH*  days. Its so ann-*COUGH* -oying *COUGH* *COUGH* *COUGH* *COUGH*

Then get out of the restuarant!

So what, now non-smokers don't have the right to go out for a meal without injaling second hand smoke?

What should be done is for tax cuts to be offered to all restaurants and bars that ban smoking. This encourages them to do so and also pass a law that says that if you do allow smoking then the section for smoking must be firmly separate from the non-smoking section.

[TheWildCard]

Okay let me just state cars make transportation easier... So throw that "if your going to illegalize smoking illgalize cars" crud out of the window right now. I've never seen anyones life made easier because of smoking.

I know someone who has never smoked in her life... Yet the Doctors found out she has the lungs of a heavy smoker... This is because while growing up her parents and grandparents smoked and what happened? Her lungs never fully devoploped I can't tell you how sad it was when she couldn't go into certain restaurants that allowed smoking back before the California ban.

I'll state again... If you want to kill yourself go ahead but don't take me or anyone else down with you I'm for nicotine enhalers. I'm sure if the smoking industry wanted they could make one that tastes just like a normal ciggarette and feels like one too that doesn't put others at risk.

[StevenNick]

Okay let me just state cars make transportation easier... So throw that "if your going to illegalize smoking illgalize cars" crud out of the window right now. I've never seen anyones life made easier because of smoking.

I know someone who has never smoked in her life... Yet the Doctors found out she has the lungs of a heavy smoker... This is because while growing up her parents and grandparents smoked and what happened? Her lungs never fully devoploped I can't tell you how sad it was when she couldn't go into certain restaurants that allowed smoking back before the California ban.

I'll state again... If you want to kill yourself go ahead but don't take me or anyone else down with you I'm for nicotine enhalers. I'm sure if the smoking industry wanted they could make one that tastes just like a normal ciggarette and feels like one too that doesn't put others at risk.

At some point the government needs to just let people make decisions on their own, though.  My point in bringing up cars in relationship to smoking is to show that the government can't make life safe for everyone, and it shouldn't try.  Let people take responsibility for their own actions!

[JohnFKennedy]

Okay let me just state cars make transportation easier... So throw that "if your going to illegalize smoking illgalize cars" crud out of the window right now. I've never seen anyones life made easier because of smoking.

I know someone who has never smoked in her life... Yet the Doctors found out she has the lungs of a heavy smoker... This is because while growing up her parents and grandparents smoked and what happened? Her lungs never fully devoploped I can't tell you how sad it was when she couldn't go into certain restaurants that allowed smoking back before the California ban.

I'll state again... If you want to kill yourself go ahead but don't take me or anyone else down with you I'm for nicotine enhalers. I'm sure if the smoking industry wanted they could make one that tastes just like a normal ciggarette and feels like one too that doesn't put others at risk.

At some point the government needs to just let people make decisions on their own, though.  My point in bringing up cars in relationship to smoking is to show that the government can't make life safe for everyone, and it shouldn't try.  Let people take responsibility for their own actions!

But if people are affected by the actions of others, should they be allowed to do it?

Sure, be responsible for your own actions, but what you are doing hurts others.

[12th Doctor]

Absolutly not.  If a manager wants to ban smoking from his/her restaruants, or an owner wants to ban smoking from their property, that's fine, but no government should enforce a ban on behavior that is not harmful to society.

[??????????]

Just use snuff or chew. No one dies of lung cancer that way!

[ilikeverin]

Just use snuff or chew. No one dies of lung cancer that way!

But they die of throat/jaw cancer anyway!

[??????????]

Just use snuff or chew. No one dies of lung cancer that way!

But they die of throat/jaw cancer anyway!

Rare. 2-3% According to the government.

[ilikeverin]

Just use snuff or chew. No one dies of lung cancer that way!

But they die of throat/jaw cancer anyway!

Rare. 2-3% According to the government.

Gimme a site.

*'typical teen' voice/tone* But you haven't seen this one movie, where this guy, who's like this baseball player in his 20s or 30s or something, had to have part of his jaw removed, so his skin flapped around up there when he talked.  Oh, my, gawd, it's was so gross!

[??????????]

Just use snuff or chew. No one dies of lung cancer that way!

But they die of throat/jaw cancer anyway!

Rare. 2-3% According to the government.

Gimme a site.

*'typical teen' voice/tone* But you haven't seen this one movie, where this guy, who's like this baseball player in his 20s or 30s or something, had to have part of his jaw removed, so his skin flapped around up there when he talked.  Oh, my, gawd, it's was so gross!

Yes it is true. Some people do get oral cancer as a result of tobacco usage. Even according to the federal government the incidence is rarer then getting lung cancer from smoking. You have a greater risk of gum disease and tooth lose then from oral cancer. I can't remember the federal branch that does those studies but they have it on their websites.

[King]

Bump as an example of what gets done after three-pages of hearted debate: NOTHING.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

After looking at this thread I have to wonder why you and Dibble are going to be running mates.

[John Dibble]

It's not the government's business to regulate the risk out of everyday life.  People know all about the dangers or first hand and second hand smoke.  Any further regulation of LEGAL BEHAVIOR is simply benign tyranny by an overactive government.  Any banning of LEGAL BEHAVIOR in private establishments is a blatant violation of basic property rights.  Why don't all of you stop sticking your noses in places it doesn't belong and address problems that are actually, like, you know, important?

I don't know about you, but I don't want to die of lung cancer when I have never smoked in my life.

Then don't go to the restaraunt if it allows smoking, I've solved your problem - Merry Christmas, have a nice day.

[Democratic Hawk]

Smokers are increasingly persecuted and for contributing significantly to the government's coffers.

I support restrictions within reason but it's going too far. I once read that for a non-smoker to inhale the equivalent of ONE cigarette they had to sit in the average restaurant for two weeks solid. Is that true? Of course, the negative effects of smoking on smokers and non-smokers varies according to the individual's own physical constitution

Personally, I elect not to smoke in the presence of people eating - it's common courtesy - but, in all fairness, both smokers and non-smokers need to be accomodated

Dave

[John Dibble]

I once read that for a non-smoker to inhale the equivalent of ONE cigarette they had to sit in the average restaurant for two weeks solid. Is that true? Of course, the negative effects of smoking on smokers and non-smokers varies according to the individual's own physical constitution

Well, the thing is that organizations will often have bias in their research, including the anti-smoking ones. The WHO has made studies that show somewhat similar results to what you say, though they of course do not release them to the press because they have an anti-smoking agenda.* I'm sure tobacco companies have done similar things with results that show SHS is bad for you. The truth is likely in between. My guess is that occassional exposure, such as at a restaraunt, is not going to be very harmful to you in the long run, but that long term exposure, such as living with a second hand smoker who smokes around you, is more harmful.

*In one study they couldn't even cause lung cancer in mice after exposing them to cigarette smoke for a long time. - Finch GL, Nikula KJ, Belinsky SA, Barr EB, Stoner GD, Lechner JF, Failure of cigarette smoke to induce or promote lung cancer in the A/J mouse, Cancer Lett; 99(2):161-7 1996