Smoking vs Drinking

[Delta40]

Look, smoking is a legal activity. As long as the Government want to rake in the revenue from the taxes they put on cigarettes then I can blow smoke in the face of a baby if I want to. Perhaps fat people should be put down because christ knows how much they cost the health system. They're ugly to look at, repulsive actually and I can't believe they're allowed out during daylight hours. They certainly shouldn't be served supersized meals in restaurants when its so obvious that they're fat gross greedy pigs. They probably drink and smoke too! Yet the industry thrives on their self destructive behaviour and we have to foot the bill. Can't anyone stop these people?????

[Volya]

Yes, lets kill all fat people, because that's exactly the same as stopping people from smoking.

[Adolescent09]

Look, smoking is a legal activity. As long as the Government want to rake in the revenue from the taxes they put on cigarettes then I can blow smoke in the face of a baby if I want to. Perhaps fat people should be put down because christ knows how much they cost the health system. They're ugly to look at, repulsive actually and I can't believe they're allowed out during daylight hours. They certainly shouldn't be served supersized meals in restaurants when its so obvious that they're fat gross greedy pigs. They probably drink and smoke too! Yet the industry thrives on their self destructive behaviour and we have to foot the bill. Can't anyone stop these people?????

Erm..My healthcare 'sermon' extends to *ahem* overweight people as well. After reading your extremely offensive rant I had to check the username twice to see if it was written by the same intelligent and usually polite Delta40 I've seen around here. I'll just assume you're having a bad day... Not only do you blatantly dismiss the fact that, to a small extent, hereditary traits and other genetic factors contribute to the overweight/obese epidemic, but you also either don't realize or choose not to realize that even though there are many more people with bad health who eat too much, a sizeable number of people aren't "greedy pigs". In fact, there are overweight people who haven't eaten for 2 days (I know someone from personal experience) who involuntarily GAIN weight as opposed to losing it.

I'm not trying to start an argument, but your post clearly went way over the line. It was uncalled for. Frankly, I wouldn't be surprised if someone hacked Delta40's account and typed that.

[Grit]

This is a valid, although slightly dismissive point. People should be allowed to do whatever they want and they should be willing to address the consequences of their actions. Instituting legal regulations to the already adverse effects of substance abuse is just adding insult to injury. Good point.

That being said, it is not merely the individual who is effected by making a poor choice, but society in general. The people that you claim should be "allowed to kill themselves" are the same people who contribute to the work force and who use their salaries to purchase goods. This, in turn, not only fuels businesses, but enhances company productivity while increasing individual independence. Even more apparently, the almost immediate negative effects of substance abuse substantially increases health-care costs for average laborers investing in medicaid/medicare or similar government programs (I don't know if you live in Vancouver, WA or Vancouver, BC, but I'm sure what I say applies to Canada as well.)

Ado, you've come back with what I believe to be the only good argument against universal legalization. People killing themselves with drugs is bad for the economy and for society on the whole. Still, like Delta points out, there's massive hypocrisy in limiting substance suicide in some ways but allowing it in others.

I think Delta's presentation was more tongue-in-cheek than serious, but still Del makes a great point. Obesity is the number one cause of death in the United States. Why is it that these people are allowed to eat themselves to death, taxing the health care system and contributing less to society on the whole (they receive less oxygen to the brain) while a chronic marijuana smoker isn't allowed to devolve into abuse of he/r vice. Ditto for cigarettes. For those, the government is more than happy to let people kill themselves. Then it comes to heroin or ecstasy (a drug which would be safer, and result in less overdoses if it could be legalized and regulated) and they 'draw the line.'

I just read through your newest post. Yes, for some people obesity isn't a choice and more genetic but for many, it's simply a case of too much cheese and not enough movement.

For me, it's less about the economic or sociological impact of widespread drug abuse and more about basic human rights. Why should one wo/man be allowed to drink the poison he likes to dull the pain while another wo/man is told their poison is bad for you? They're both poison.

It should be either one or the other and I certainly don't advocate prohibition, so I advocate universal freedom in all mind-numbing substances and activities. You know what? People will get those substances anyway, it's not working.

[Delta40]

No it was me. I'll tell you why I typed it. My brother weighs in at 200kg and is King of the Hill on people who smoke. I just started again 4 weeks ago. I've been fighting addictive behaviour for a lifetime. I start then I go through the process of quitting but addictive behaviour is more than the practice of smoking itself. I'm sure you understand that. I was having a rant because my brother who would crush me if he fell over has the same addictive problem that I do but it's expressed through food. He can't just lose 100kgs no more than I can just quit without a solid comitted plan in place and then maintain that ongoing change in my life.

His views on the unhealthy practice of smoking is nothing new but it's the pot calling the kettle black when without realising it, him and I struggle with the same problem. He feels we have nothing in common and I make bad decisions while he is a nice guy who is deluded about his size and problem. Perhaps he needs to feel superior or something. I don't know but what I do know is that addictive behaviour isn't about the practice. I chose smoking as the outlet. I could just as easily decided to drink, cut myself up, take illicit drugs etc. At the end of the day, confronting addiction and managing it is the only thing that will make a difference in our lives.

[Adolescent09]

No it was me. I'll tell you why I typed it. My brother weighs in at 200kg and is King of the Hill on people who smoke. I just started again 4 weeks ago. I've been fighting addictive behaviour for a lifetime. I start then I go through the process of quitting but addictive behaviour is more than the practice of smoking itself. I'm sure you understand that. I was having a rant because my brother who would crush me if he fell over has the same addictive problem that I do but it's expressed through food. He can't just lose 100kgs no more than I can just quit without a solid comitted plan in place and then maintain that ongoing change in my life.

His views on the unhealthy practice of smoking is nothing new but it's the pot calling the kettle black when without realising it, him and I struggle with the same problem. He feels we have nothing in common and I make bad decisions while he is a nice guy who is deluded about his size and problem. Perhaps he needs to feel superior or something. I don't know but what I do know is that addictive behaviour isn't about the practice. I chose smoking as the outlet. I could just as easily decided to drink, cut myself up, take illicit drugs etc. At the end of the day, confronting addiction and managing it is the only thing that will make a difference in our lives.

Now THIS is the Delta40 I know . The sophistication you show in this post is diametrically opposite to that, which you revealed in your previous post. I have nothing against venting since we all need to do it, but the source of a complaint is made more apparent when it is put into context (typically personal, which is no different in your case). I would make my reply longer but I can't. You made a truly well thought-out argument, and for that I applaud you.

[E.A Rumfield]

You can't drink a beer without a cigarette.

[Phocion]

That is a good question Scher. The smoking restrictions have only been around for the most part in the United States in the last ten years. Here are some ideas on the disparity between the two vices:

1. More than 50% of the people have at least a mild drink every so often, but cigarette smokers are about 1/3 the population here in the US, so they are a minority. The power of a majority to make laws against a minority, despite minority protections, are part of the democratic system.

2. Like I said on that other thread, alcohol is interwoven into our culture. Cigarettes are mostly a 20th century phenomena (I know they date further back, but it was not as wide spread). So you have alcohol that dates back thousounds of years versus smoking which is a century or two.

3. Second hand smoke bothers people who are not smoking. I work in a one story very long building. I remember when I started working here 20 years ago and smoking was allowed in the office, by the end of the day my clothes smelled of smoke and could see a cloud hovering the ceiling all the way down. Drinking (other than drunk driving accidents) don't usually affect other people. Perhaps except for family members of alcoholics.

4. Alcohol in moderation doesn't affect your health. In some cases like wine, studies show it helps your health. There are no health benefits to cigarretes and if you smoke long enough and live long enough you will get cancer. And it contributes to heart disease. And I know. My father was a smoker and he recently died of heart disease, and the only factor he had against him (he was thin and had low cholestorol and good blood pressure) was that he was a smoker.

I'm sure I can think of more, and if I do i'll add it to the thread.

1. Absolutely correct: drinking is a majority pursuit, whereas smoking is not. This is a case of the majority enforcing their views upon a minority.

2. Not true at all: tobacco is a big part of our culture, and has been for a long time - some people have just taken it upon themselves to airbrush it out of our history.

3. Fair enough as a reason for banning smoking in offices, planes, trains etc. not for an absolute no exceptions ban that disallows the existence of even a smoking room in a bar or restaurant. Drinking does affect other people far more than smoking does. If you think for one second at all the harm caused by social drinking (fights, drunken accidents, std's, drunk drivers etc.) then you would not believe it more harmful than social smoking. You rubbish the deaths caused by drunk drivers, but these are far more damaging than anything caused by second hand smoke. Alcohol makes people reckless, and having loads of reckless people in the same place is never good. If 'public' smoking is banned, then there is no reason that 'public' drinking should not be banned also.

4. Neither do cigarettes. In fact its has been shown you can be a chronic smoker up to the age of 30 without increasing your long-term health risks. Nor if you just smoked a cigarette every now and then would it be harmful. Don't get me wrong, cigarettes are bad for your health, but the modern health furore about it is greatly exaggerated. Plenty of people have smoked their whole lives and lived spryly into their nineties, and this would not be possible if smoking were as deleterious to your health as many people like to say.

Well I'm not an idealist either. I understand the short term benefits of legalizing drugs. What I worry about is codifying it into our culture as acceptable behavior. I think that in the long run will be disasterous for society. So I'm willing to accept the crime and small percentage of illegal behavior. As long as we codify it as morally wrong, it will not be absorbed as a cultural rite.

So everything that is legal is codified into our culture as acceptable behaviour? Please. These drugs were legal and unregulated for a long time and they never became widely used. The only reason they are in vogue now is because they are illegal. But i guess you'd just rather have it codified into our culture that 'drugs are bad' and that it's ok to ruin people's lives simply because they've taken them?

Just ignore the wasted money and lives caused by the drug war because you seek to impose your morality on others? Usually on already oppressed minorities at that (it is well known that cocaine became illegal because of the fear of its use by black men, opiates because it came from the Chinese, and Cannabis because the Mexicans used it). How can you be morally serious when your pseudo-morality is strongly rooted in racism, oppression and flagrant discrimination?

Your argument boils down to 'people should only consume the drugs i like because drugs are vices and we shouldn't allow any more.' Sorry, but what a load of crap.

Yes, lets kill all fat people, because that's exactly the same as stopping people from smoking.

You have no more right to stop people from smoking than you do killing fat people. It may not be the same, but it is the same principle of getting rid of what you don't like, when in fact, it has nothing to do with you, or anyone other than the person who smokes for that matter.


edit: and btw the 'scientific' evidence for the dangers of 2nd hand smoke is incredibly weak. It's all things like in a study to see the the rates of lung cancer in partners of smokers - this one showed a rate of 6 in 100,000 for partners of non-smokers and 9 in 100,000 for partners of smokers. That tiny percentage difference (which is not even close to being scientifically significant) is then multiplied by the population of the country, and wham, a headline like: '2nd hand smoke kills this (insert big number) Americans a year.' Those whose studies show no correlation between 2nd hand smoke and death will likely not find a publisher, and if they do will be maligned by the anti-smoking lobby.

When science becomes politicised it becomes worthless.