newprotest.org: YOU REALLY SHOULD STOP SMOKING

YOU REALLY SHOULD STOP SMOKING

August 31, 2006
by: jovial_cynic
Some folks don't care about the health reasons for not smoking, siting that they have a complete freedom of choice in regards to their own health.

That's fine. Apart from that fact that many smokers become a huge drain on the economy as their lungs fail and they go on unemployment or start seeking public health benefits, and apart from the fact that I have to breath the putrid smoke-filled air that comes out of smokers' lungs as I walk past them downtown, I suppose they can do what they want.

But when the tobacco industry has continually increased the levels of nicotine in their cigs, particularly the type of cigarettes known by the tobacco industry as most likely to be smoked by teens and the minority population, why on earth would smokers continue? Or start? Why would anyone willingly support a corporation that continually makes their products more addictive, just to keep people buying their products? I mean... DON'T YOU PEOPLE REALIZE THAT YOU'RE BEING TRICKED?!

I don't get it.

np category: personal
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COMMENTS for YOU REALLY SHOULD STOP SMOKING


wonder said:
umm.......

well....

it seems to me like a self-ansewring question.....

August 31, 2006


jovial_cynic said:
haha... please excuse the rhetoric. :)
August 31, 2006


wonder said:
well... see... it doesn't really make sense to rail at smokers for continuing to smoke as "willingly supporting" a corporation that is, in your own words INTENTIONALLY KEEPING ITS CUSTOMERS ADDICTED TO THEIR PRODUCTS. addiction has a biological basis, after all....
September 01, 2006


wonder said:
"You really should stop smoking"

easier said than done... confirmed by even more new evidence...

September 01, 2006


jovial_cynic said:
I'm going to play devil's advocate here, because I'm on the other side of that fence.

I smoked. I don't smoke now. There are programs to help people quit. I'd reason that if you were adaquately pissed off at the tobacco industry, you'd do everything you could to stick it to the industry.

September 01, 2006


Mark Glesne said:
One thing that often aggravates me about fellow conservatives is their often compulsive defense of smoking. Dennis Prager, one of my favorite conservative columnists/radio talk show host is a perfect example of this.

His defense is almost always that people who are preoccupied with smoking should worry about great moral issues.

Smoking is obviously a detriment to ones health. I am proud to say that I have never even as much as taken a drag from a cigarette. (Hell, I was even a bonafide teetotaler until the age of 23!) Conservatives should not be in the business to defending something so disgusting and obviously harmful.

In this sense we agree.

BUT... (you knew a 'but' was coming)

Where we possibly disagree is when it comes to smokers' (and private business') rights. While I would love for the entire world to stop smoking, government restrictions have gotten out of hand.

Example: I used to live in the Midwest where smoking was allowed indoors if the private business allowed it. I now reside in California where the government has decided that it knows what is best for private businesses more than the private business itself!

A private business should have every right granted to it to decide what kind of environment it provides its patrons. As much as the Left hates to hear it, ALLOW THE MARKET TO DICTATE.

If you don't like a smoke-filled bar, go to one that doesn't allow smoking. Or, better yet, open your own!

Okay, I could go on and on, but I think this diatribe is long enough.

And cut.

September 01, 2006


jovial_cynic said:
Ah yes... you are a capitalist, after all.

I'm actually a little on the fence about the whole smoking ban issue. Washington State has a smoking ban in some counties, including the one in which I live... and I LOVE it. I go to bars with my friends, and I went before the ban was in place, so the experience is much better for me now that the ban is in place. As a social setting, I don't think my friends would all bend to my desire to go to a non-smoking bar if there was no ban on it, you know?

But in this case, I'm arguing for my convenience, and not really any political ground. My political side says that people with the greatest resources require the greatest amount of regulation, because they can do the greatest amount of harm... so I instinctively appreciate some regulation. Take the whole Net-Neutrality issue... the telco's have total control over the internet lines, and for them to applied tiered speed based on price... that would throw the democratic system of the internet right out the window. So... I vote for regulating the telcos to force Net Neutrality.

But yeah... smoking. Not a big fan.

September 01, 2006


betmo said:
as someone who has watched my mother suffer from the effects of a hard life and smoking- i can't tell you how baffled i am that people start. when she started in the 1950's, it was the thing to do. she is 64 and started when she was 15. she has spent the last 5 years or so trying to quit. she attempted to go cold turkey and nearly had a fit. the least she has smoked has been 8 a day. yes- people have a right to do as they choose- but i can't see that the tobacco companies should be able to get away with marketing geared towards kids and teens either.
September 03, 2006


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