No Smoking

[SpeedoGuy]

I do believe there should be some privately owned places such as taverns/pubs where smokers can light up indoors if the owner so wishes. And outdoors as well. Aside from that, though, I've no problem banning smoking in public areas.

 

[dong20]

I am a smoker. I think the bans are rediculous. I think the bar/restaurant/establishment owners should be allowed to decide for themselves whether or not they should allow smoking. I have a very good friend that owns a great restaurant/bar in town, and I know that he would allow smoking if given the option... at the moment, there are no smoking bans, but they are working on some. I think it's obnoxious. I can't imagine the dent it will make in his profits if the ban goes through.

Well, there's a surprise. I've not come across many non smokers, even those that oppose it who feel the ban is 'ridiculous' and 'obnoxious'.

I have to ask, how is valuing profit above the health of one's customers and employees any less obnoxious? Suggest to him that he makes it a private bar/restaurant so the ban probably won't apply. Then, see what effect that has on his profits.

Too many smokers simply don't 'get' just how obnoxious it is to spend time in a smelly, smoke filled, potentially health-hazardous environment, to come home with hair and clothes smelling like an old ashtray because a few feel a ban is an affront to their their right to impose such an environment on them?

If people choose to do so that's fine, but right not to should be respected. Given a free choice; to eat, drink and socialise in a polluted environment or in an 'unpolluted one', which would you choose.

It really is a no brainer.

 

[dong20]

You'd think..

2 threads seem to suggest otherwise

I know, I thought the same as I wrote that. :biggrin1:

A blanket ban is undoubtably 'unfair' if one looks at it in a purely objective 'infringment of rights' perspective.

Businesses had the opportunity to take steps to provide proper, separated facilties with real dedicated ventilation etc and, overall they failed to take full advantange, presumably because of cost, and, perhaps gambling that such a blanket ban would never materialise. They misjudged and it's too late to cry foul now. If I were on the other side of the equation I may of course feel differently. But I also like to think I can separate emotion from logic when necessary.

For the most part I spend very little time in 'smoky' evironments, but it's taken this ban to realise just how much I had adjusted my behaviour over the years to avoid the affects of 'smokers', and thus how unreasonable having to make that adjustment really was. I used to hate going to bars, even those with 'smoking areas' for example because I inevitably came back with stinking clothes and hair, never mind the potential health risk, yukk.

This doesn't apply to you, and a few other smokers here but I don't know how many times I can say that I have no, none, zero problems with anyone smoking a cigarette, but such as in a bar or pub, I just don't want to share it with you against my will. What part of that desire do smokers arguing that a ban is 'obnoxious' or ridiculous not get?

Thanks, K.:smile:

 

[bobabooey69]

Nice! I hear there was a sale on nicotine gum at Walgreens.

 

[SpeedoGuy]

Businesses had the opportunity to take steps to provide proper, separated facilties with real dedicated ventilation etc and, overall they failed to take full advantange, presumably because of cost, and, perhaps gambling that such a blanket ban would never materialise. They misjudged and it's too late to cry foul now.

True.

I don't know if its the same in the UK but in the US the designated "non-smoking" areas in restaurants are a cruel hoax. Simply put, the restaurant owner designate one side of the restaurant the non-smoking area. Smoking tables were typically separated from non-smoking tables by...well...say...little more than a potted plant. Or nothing at all, usually. No separate ventilation, no enclosures or walls, nothing. And that was supposed to be sufficient to allay the objections of non-smokers. After all, non-smokers had their own section so why would they complain?

That was the mentality that prevailed for generations.

 

[STYLYUNG]

Smokers do not have the right to put a toxic chemical into the air that other people must breathe to stay alive. Bleach is a toxic chemical too. It is chlorine. Nicotine is the toxic chemical in tobacco. Nicotine is used to kill bugs on rose bushes. Nicotine addiction is a drug addiction

 

[patrick9999]

Smokers have as much right to put chemicals into the air as anyone else does by whatever means they decide.

 

[dong20]

Smokers have as much right to put chemicals into the air as anyone else does by whatever means they decide.

They don't however, have the right to force them into another's lungs, eyes, clothes and hair against their express wishes.

 

[B_Lightkeeper]

I'm a former smoker and now I hate the smell of cigarettes. I watched a woman at a Huddle House (sort of like an Omelet Shop) sit and go through 4 cigarettes from the time I got there and ate - less than 30 minutes.
She was smoking when I ordered my meal, she lit up another about the time she put the previous one out, then another as her meal arrived, and what threw me - she quit eating long enough to puff on another.
I left shortly after that so no telling how many after that.

I may go back tomorrow morning and will let you know if she is still there.:biggrin1:

 

[B_Think_Kink]

Things will come around, the non smokers who wouldn't frequent the places will start showing their faces. Ontario went smoke free, not as bad as Hawaii, but it took awhile for the smoke stench to get out the buildings, but business is business as usual. People made a huge stink about it, and their rights as smokers. And the non smokers made a huge stink about their rights, in the end the non smokers won. I think that with all the information we have on how bad smoking is for us, yes a smoking ban would be a no brainier, but people who are addicted to things rarely see the negative sides as severely as they are.

I think that the laws should go further and get up in people's grills about smoking in vehicles with others (especially children) inside. Maybe it is a huge invasion of privacy... but it could save that child's life in the long run, and stop them from getting the harmful diseases that they cannot prevent for themselves.

I think smoking and tobacco production (in the perfect world) wouldn't exist, that way no one could be effected by it. When someone lights up a smoke it's not just them that are effected... it puts the people around them in more danger than they have put themselves into.

 

[B_Think_Kink]

Smokers do not have the right to put a toxic chemical into the air that other people must breathe to stay alive. Bleach is a toxic chemical too. It is chlorine. Nicotine is the toxic chemical in tobacco. Nicotine is used to kill bugs on rose bushes. Nicotine addiction is a drug addiction

Drug addictions impare areas of the brain...Shall we continue.

Thanks, you reminded me of my addictions teacher last semester.

 

[PaulF]

I'm a smoker but a polite smoker I will not some where people are eating,or smoke if i'm in a queue of people.i'm not bothered about the ban as long I can go outside and have one. The only ones I feel soory for is there is a little old man who gets in our local(this is when I live in the uk,i'm in Tenerife now)He used to sit in the corner by himself with a pint and a cig bothering no one.He lives on his own, so going out is the only time he sees people.He is frail on his feet and has to go outside now.He was in the last world was so he knows about rules.It's just when i see him i think oh bless

 

[montanaguy]

Smokers do not have the right to put a toxic chemical into the air that other people must breathe to stay alive. Bleach is a toxic chemical too. It is chlorine. Nicotine is the toxic chemical in tobacco. Nicotine is used to kill bugs on rose bushes. Nicotine addiction is a drug addiction

Bleach may be a toxic chemical yes, but chlorine is used to purify our drinking water. Are you going to say that chlorine should be banned from the public water supply systems? I would hope not.

 

[montanaguy]

I think that the laws should go further and get up in people's grills about smoking in vehicles with others (especially children) inside. Maybe it is a huge invasion of privacy... but it could save that child's life in the long run, and stop them from getting the harmful diseases that they cannot prevent for themselves.

From what I've heard, the above is about to happen, if it hasn't already happened, in Austrailia. It has me wondering if there will be "tobacco police" patrolling there and stopping people who might be suspected of smoking in their car with children in it. How on earth will they manage to enforce a law that would be virtually un-enforceable? Unless, like I said, they will have "tobacco police" out and about everywhere.

 

[SteveHd]

Things will come around, the non smokers who wouldn't frequent the places will start showing their faces. Ontario went smoke free, not as bad as Hawaii, but it took awhile for the smoke stench to get out the buildings, but business is business as usual. ...

And that's how it goes, elsewhere. Other locales have implemented smoking restrictions and things carry on. The sky doesn't fall. Even bars somehow cope.

 

[Duality]

I don't smoke cigarettes, so I really don't care either way... I just find it odd that the government can tell a bar, "Don't let them smoke, it's unhealthy, it'll kill people!" and then say, "What's that? Sell alcohol rich beverages at a place that people have to drive to? Awesome!"

Guess it just depends on who's allowed to entertain us dipshits between 7 minute segments of Larry King and South Park.

 

[SteveHd]

montanaguy, I haven't heard of anything that extreme. I agree that it would be unenforceable.

 

[dong20]

From what I've heard, the above is about to happen, if it hasn't already happened, in Austrailia. It has me wondering if there will be "tobacco police" patrolling there and stopping people who might be suspected of smoking in their car with children in it. How on earth will they manage to enforce a law that would be virtually un-enforceable? Unless, like I said, they will have "tobacco police" out and about everywhere.

Mandatory, tamperproof smoke detectors in all new cars with some form of alerting or logging system...?

 

[ganja4me]

I don't feel it is right to smoke in a room or car where a child or someone bothered by smoke is in there. I also don't see why people need to smoke in a restaurant. You really aren't in a restaurant for that long. Most of the smokers I know including myself smoke after we eat anyway so we can just wait till we leave. However, bars seem to be an appropriate place to smoke and people are usually in there for a while. This is why they should have smoking and non smoking bars. If a smoker wants to go to the bar with a non smoker friend they could go to a non smoking bar and the smoker would go outside to smoke. What if somebody who works in a bar is a smoker? Do they get to leave in the middle of their shift for a smoke break or do they not get to smoke until they are finished their shift? I watched a show a while back called "Bullshit" (kind of like mythbusters) where they proved that secondhand smoke is not as bad as directly smoking. Therefore people may have heard that the exhailed smoke is a little worse for them than it actually is. Furthermore, it takes years and years of exposure to the secondhand smoke in order for it to have any effects on your health. Now it's understandable that people don't like the smell of it or don't like to smell like it or it may even burn their eyes if the room is very thickly clouded with smoke. In this case the only solutions are make the place better ventilated which still might not be good enough, make smoke friendly and non smoking bars and let the owner decide (best one in my opinion), or make all smokers smoke outside. The only way both groups can truly get what they want is to have smoke free and smoke friendly bars. Any other way one group is having their rights infringed upon.

 

[PaulF]

IT should be up to the pub owner, all the owner should be able to do is have a sign on the window THIS IS A SMOKING BAR ENTER A YOU OWN RISK then that would give people the choice if they wanted to go in or not.