toomanyhelicopters wrote:Rog, you should've asked him if he could help you out, that the reason you were standing there was so you could tell every person in a car that they had to stop driving, because car exhaust is so bad for your lungs. and THEN hit him with the conduit

Maybe I will. Next time.

steve wrote:As I understand it, there is no statistically-significant link between "passive" smoking and any health risks. Penn and Teller even did a whole episode exposing this public policy charade.

You're taking the word of a cable tv show that employed talking heads from the Philip Morris/R.J. Reynolds funded Cato Institute to prove it's point over The New England Journal of Medicine.

on july 1, 2005, the new south wales state legislature passed an act limiting smoking to one area of any bar or club. by january 1, 2006, we are all expected to refrain from smoking inside bars and clubs entirely. i am certainly not the least bit impressed by any of this. i have discussed the subtle yet infrangible connection between cancer sticks and amber fluid at length with many smokers and non-smokers.

both state and federal governments here have cited the 'public health concerns' argument cited in other regions.

while it might be fair to say the "passive smoking causes cancer" argument is not statistically supported any more than the "second hand car exhaust causes cancer" argument (or the "shellac causes ear cancer" claims of some,) there are other arguments which are quite valid:

1. cigarette smokers are a burden on any country's health system. many cases of cancer and coronary disease have been conclusively linked to cigarette smoking. it is certainly a noble ideal to attempt to reduce the burden upon any health system, public or private, no? limiting the number of areas in which people smoke may in some way assist some who were considering quitting to commit to such an action.

2. passive smoking may not cause cancer, but it certainly causes irritation and illness. irritation from second-hand smoke can cause subsequent infection and illness which may have otherwise not appeared, or had significantly mollified symptoms.

3. in outdoor public spaces, the public is exposed to a myriad number of potential carcinogens and pollutants. in indoor public spaces, it is actually possible to limit the quantity and variety of pollutants, and goes some way to increase the comfort of staff and patrons.

this said, it is certainly a case of legislating against existing practice and custom without exemption, and clearly an unusually regulatory step in a political environment so enamoured of liberalism and liberalist rhetoric. the choice of establishments to be smoking or non-smoking should be the exclusive demesne of the owners of these establishments and their staff. not legislators. not so much a question of rights, but of duty of care.

neo-conservatism has really damaged the american idea of liberalism, hasn't it? don't worry. us aussies have got it just as bad.

steve wrote:

run joe, run wrote:I think it is nuts to increase the people around you's chances of getting cancer because of your personal habit/preference.I don't think the length of time it's been around validates it, if that's what you're getting at.

This applies to a lot of things. Why is this your target? Ignore for a moment that the only second-hand smoke study that I know of has no results outside its margin of error (eg we don't have reason yet to believe that it causes any health risks), and explain why this is your target. Not automobile exhaust, not open fire grilling, not dust, not aromatic solvents. Is it because you don't like the smell of smoke?

Weirdly, I actually enjoy the aroma of smoke when I am in a restaurant. I feel that it enhances the enjoyment of my meal in some way, but I write this off as a quirk. I can't pretend I enjoy coming home stinking of fags, but my problem with the activity is more to do with the health issue, which I take seriously. If, as seems to be the case, you are discounting the possibility that smoking harms those around you, then that renders most of what I have to say pointless to you. Like I said, I can't provide you with medical statistics. If it harms the smoker, though (you do accept that bit, right?), it doesn't seem to be a huge leap of the imagination to think that it might also damage someone else who is breathing the smoke in. Do you not even consider it a possibility, and one worth bearing in mind?

I accept that there are other hazardous substances in our atmosphere, and probably ones more deserving of attention. The reason why smoking in public venues is my target is because something is happening about it right now, and I've picked a side. I'm no political activist, I admit; when the next big thing comes along - be it solvents or exhaust fumes or whatever - I'll put my insignificant weight behind that, too.

If I'm breathing your smoke, that's pretty much my business. I don't object to people smoking, although it saddens me a little. I also don't object in principle to an activity like kickboxing, but I don't want to get kicked in the nuts when I go for a bevvy.

Then don't go places where you will be offended by the conduct underway there. Don't go to bars that are too smokey for you. The conduct was underway happily for long before you made it your concern, and you are not entitled to change it to suit you.

You make it seem so black and white. Smoking is so integrated into our culture that to completely stop patronising smokey venues would have many other implications in my life. It would mean there would be friends I'd never see. Bands I would never get to hear play. What you're suggesting is that I conveniently opt out of a big chunk of my life, just so people who smoke can carry on, with no other reasoning than it's been happening a long time. If plain longevity is your main criteria for validating smoking, I could put forward the many more years humans have existed without smoking. The tobacco era is feasibly just an insignificant blip.

It does stop me from going out sometimes...but yes, I suppose you're right. I could just quit being in a band and playing gigs and going to watch concerts if I hated it that much. But smoking in venues is so commonplace that everyone - including me - takes it for granted. When we're used to something that is readily accepted in our society, it seems normal. There are many things which at certain times in history have seemed normal to the people of that time and culture, but which can be seen for the madness it really was in hindsight. I get what you're saying: the fact that I do choose to tolerate it means it can't be of paramount importance to me. I would argue that both smokers and non-smokers are culturally conditioned into accepting it as a nice recreational activity/tough shit/unfortunate nuisance if they want to enjoy something they love (live music). I'm sure women thought it was normal that they couldn't vote at the time. It's difficult to see outside your own historical context when you're in it.

So, you agree with me then. Smoking in bars is normal, not crazy, and everyone is used to it. There are places where there is no smoke, and if it is a big deal, then you can just go to those places.

No, I don't agree with you. I think smoking in bars is nuts. I think it is perceived as normal. Everyone being used to it does not make it acceptable. Because something in your life is normalised doesn't mean it isn't bad, dangerous, or crazy. What about the bloody studio techniques used routinely in, say, the 1980's? I wasn't around, but I'll bet they were perceived as normal at the time, because they had become standardised and accepted, and people ended up with a distorted frame of reference. Just because it seemed normal then to most people to put whatever ridiculous effects they were dolloping over their tracks doesn't mean we don't listen now, with a bit of cultural distance, and laugh incredulously at the madness of it. I hope this example isn't too glib.

You don't think smoking in a confined public space is selfish? Last time I checked, disapproving of something didn't fuck up the next guy's lungs.

I didn't say it wasn't selfish, only that it is the established norm. If you want to disrupt centuries of leisure for everyone to suit your conception of what ought to be allowed, then please find a compelling argument first. I might even listen. So far the public health argument is wanting.

You know - and I'm not kidding here - I have heard this very same argument from people (of an older generation than me) on the subject of drink driving. Okay, so that hadn't been happening for hundreds of years, but the basic idea is the same - "we did it before, therefore we should be able to do it now." It isn't a very strong argument.

Where I grew up, drinking and driving wasn't illegal, only being drunk and driving. That makes some sense to me, but I understand that most folks wouldn't want to make that distinction.

Well, you'll have to pardon my rhetoric there. I meant drunk driving. Technically in the UK you could drive down the road swigging on a bottle of Jack Daniels, as long as you're not over the legal limit, but that's not what I'm talking about. There are people who are genuinely miffed that they can no longer drive home rat-arsed from the pub, because that's what they used to do and it was fine and you could take the corners better because you felt more confident, etc. This seems very silly to me.

As I understand it, there is significant proof that passive smoking can fuck up your lungs and contribute to giving you cancer. Is your habit that important to you to inflict this possibility onto someone else?

As I understand it, there is no statistically-significant link between "passive" smoking and any health risks. Penn and Teller even did a whole episode exposing this public policy charade.

It's not like I want the walls painted in my favourite colour and only my songs played on the jukebox, y'know? I don't want to take people's rights away. To defend your "right" to smoke in an unventilated, crowded, enclosed space - where people who choose not to smoke will also be - is unreasonable. If you disregard the potential threat to other people's health, then that's something else, and I don't have statistics or facts to enter into that discussion.

If I saw a bar where everyone was doing something I didn't want to do or be around -- kickboxing or curare darts or HIV infection night -- then I wouldn't go to that bar. I wouldn't make them stop so I could.

You're being facetious here. If I walked up to my local pub and there was a sign saying "FUCKING HEAVY SMOKING NIGHT! Come In And Re-Live Those Childhood Asthma Memories! Free Sandwiches", I would not go in, as I wouldn't to any of your suggested advertised events. Thing is, the smoking isn't the main attraction (for me anyway). It's something that's there when I'm trying to do something else, like watch High On Fire, or play with my band, or support a friend's band. If a bar manager advertised a night of full on smoking and nothing else, I would consider myself warned and go elsewhere.

If you do acknowledge that your habit is potentially very harmful to others, a continued insistence on being allowed to smoke in these places seems far more selfish than the desire to have it banned.

I think the health issue is secondary to the "my clothes smell" issue, and the health angle is used as cover. There is a strong case to be made for not drinking in a bar all night, if health is one's primary concern.

I agree about the drinking thing, although generally speaking the man who chooses to prop himself up at the bar plying himself with alcohol is mainly harming himself. I realise there are wider implications: alcohol fuelled violence (I live in Britain and I've been on the wrong end of it more than once); nasty effects on families and the like. But there's something so brazen about someone absent mindedly blowing smoke in your face; a guy doesn't, as a rule, drink a pint and then take a piss on your leg.

Ultimately, if you discount outright the health factor, then we're stuck. If there was categorical proof that there was absolutely no health risk from passive smoking, then there's no discussion: smoke in my face all you like. I'll put up with the stinky clothes (hell, I do anyway).

To deny the potential risk of the harm you might be inflicting on others is cavalier, and unecessarily inconsiderate. I wish my conscience was as clear as yours when it comes to my bad habits.

vockins wrote:

steve wrote:As I understand it, there is no statistically-significant link between "passive" smoking and any health risks. Penn and Teller even did a whole episode exposing this public policy charade.

You're taking the word of a cable tv show that employed talking heads from the Philip Morris/R.J. Reynolds funded Cato Institute to prove it's point over The New England Journal of Medicine.

No, the New England Journal of medicine article cited the same study as everyone else, and this study didn't show any risk outside the margin of error. I learned this from Penn and Teller though. Do you think these two non-smokers, who don't like smoking, and don't allow it in their homes, and think it causes cancer are just lying publicly to be cute, in a way that would destroy their biggest success and make fools of them?

steve wrote:

vockins wrote:

steve wrote:As I understand it, there is no statistically-significant link between "passive" smoking and any health risks. Penn and Teller even did a whole episode exposing this public policy charade.

You're taking the word of a cable tv show that employed talking heads from the Philip Morris/R.J. Reynolds funded Cato Institute to prove it's point over The New England Journal of Medicine.

No, the New England Journal of medicine article cited the same study as everyone else, and this study didn't show any risk outside the margin of error. I learned this from Penn and Teller though. Do you think these two non-smokers, who don't like smoking, and don't allow it in their homes, and think it causes cancer are just lying publicly to be cute, in a way that would destroy their biggest success and make fools of them?

I could bring up myriad studies, but let's make this simple.

Let's take Robert Levy and Rosalind Marimont, whose Cato Institute funded article titled "Lies, Damned Lies, & 400,000 Smoking-Related Deaths" was the basis for Penn and Teller's "Bullshit!" episode on second hand smoke, at their word.

Levy and Marimont suggest that the "correctly calculated number of smoking-related deaths" nears 100,000 per year.

100,000 deaths per year is acceptable for other men's leisure activity?

Fuck that shit.

...

Banning smoking in pubs, is a big fat white elephant, it's a total non issue.

If you want to ban something, lets talk about banning cars.

I don't drive because it causes pollution on a global scale, it's bad for health, both through pollution and lack of exercise. Cars run people over and kill them. The need for fuel causes wars.

I don't drive but i still have to breath in a tonne of shitty fumes every time I walk down the street, and dodge idiot drivers who run red lights at pedestrian crossings.

When everybody starts using public transport/bicycles/their legs, maybe I won't mind it so much when they whine at me for smoking.

...

i live in ottawa. the smoking ban has been in place for a while. it's fucking incredible. you don't smell like shit when you leave a bar/club/venue. some people bitched at first about not being able to smoke in restaurants, but i mean a lot of restaurants aren't that well ventilated and it's just a matter of respect not smoking indoors when you're in public. and anyway things are normal, i haven't seen any businesses shut down because of the smoking ban, and any backlash from restaurant/club owners totally subsided within the first 4-5 months.

and like i said, it's fucking amazing. i go to toronto/montreal for shows and it sucks to have to come home and shower before you go to bed because you smell like smoke.

also the argument that it's the perogative of pub/restaurant owners to make their establishment smoking/nonsmoking is just stupid in my opinion. if you're going to have a public establishment you have to cater to all audiences allowed to patronize your place. i mean would you dudes be cool if restaurant owners decided they didn't want to put in a wheelchair ramp? it's more or less the same thing. smoking jeopardizes the health of everybody in the building and a lot of people should have the right not to experience that and still be able to patronize anyplace open to the public


also, andrewwd, a lot of people are trying to fix all the pollution that cars make. you think most people think what cars are doing to the planet is acceptable? don't try and use it as an excuse; 'this shit isn't perfect so what i'm doing is excusable'. that's weak.