Yeah.

But as our vinyl spinning dino said, there are lots of things that are harmful to people that are unregulated. Why are people's diet's not regulated? There are a good number of people who practice diets that are unhealthier than smoking.

Not disagreeing with you, just pointing out that smoking is a lot like candy, no nutritional value at all, but it's a recreation thing.

Smoking is like Candy?

Yes. I mean candy is obviously not as bad for you but they are both things you consume simply for enjoyment and/or something to keep your hands and mouth busy.

This.

But candy isn't addictive, or cause impending doom upon you.

I do apologize, I'm sure you're right, but I just don't understand it.

But I'm sure the ciggy companies would love you for marketing

Yes people will think that they can be as awesome as me and not get addicted and also maybe they will have as sexy of a jawline as me if they smoke.

Everyone is doing it.

Do it.

Come on bizzle.

None. None cigarettes.

Uh...no? There's been parallels drawn that cigarettes are worse for you health and more addicting and they're legal while marijuana isn't, but I don't think cigarettes should be illegal. I think marijuana should eventually be slowly introduced in legality, but not like "LOL MAKE IT LEGAL NOW!" Honestly, the pace it's going is fine. Nevada and Cali have medical marijuana legal, Denver made it legal to have an ounce in possession for personal use if you're over 21...laws have been getting progressively better. But the reason I want it legal is more because of the time/money it costs the US people in tax dollars. Seriously, we spend billions a year because a few kids got busted with pipes and a quarter bag. It just doesn't make any ****ing sense.

But I digress--how is that funny...at all?

It's not so much the act of smoking itself. It more of a chance to put the hurt on "big tobacco."

There is no one that thinks that, stop making **** up.

Candy however is fine in controlled amounts, as is nearly any food. Smoking is bad for you regardless of how much you smoke.

Also, being obese doesn't have the potential to harm others... unless you sit on people.

Not necessarily...I mean, I suppose technically yes, but I'd have a hard time believing that occasional smoking (social smokers, especially cigar smokers since they don't inhale) is anywhere near detrimental to human health.

If you eat a lot of candies but then exercise vigorously to burn the excess energy (and clean your teeth), theoretically no harm has been done at all.

But if you smoke cigarettes... What could you possibly do to reset the situation to the state it was before you inhaled tar and other poisons into your lungs? Cough really hard?

I'd say this is the distinct difference here, like CM said.

Obesity DOES harm others--their special status on insurance bills costs americans millions a year in insurance premiums and taxes for research, medicare et al. Smoking does what...? Oh, right, it affects you and you alone. Detrimental to YOUR health (as long as you're considerate, and let's be honest, the occassional bit of secondhand smoke isn't going to do **** to your lungs), costs YOU in insurance premiums, and doesn't cost anyone else taxes. Hell smokers pay ****loads of sin taxes that pay for your roads and ****. If nothing else, thank them for giving you new roads to drive on every year.


Smoking does do a lot of damage to your lungs, over time, but it's way over-exaggerated. If you quit smoking in the first year, at the average of half a pack a day, you're supposed to be completely healthy and untouched by smoking a year after that. When you think about it, that's not really as bad as people make it out to be.

Most smokers don't quit though. Youknow, because its addictive.

The tissue would heal. It would be no different than any other short-term exposure of toxins or carcinogens to the lungs. Prolonged effects are only what you need to worry about. Which is most smokers, of course, but I'm not talking about them.

I understand smokers as I'm pretty much addicted to candy. It's the sugar that you become addicted to, obviously. Eating sugar-free candy doesn't satisfy the craving for me.

Well, I am. Or can you name lots of (normal) people who only ate candies once in their life..? I have inhaled my own share of smoke around campfires, and that's just as bad for your lungs if not worse due to the fact campfires aren't sold equipped with filters and thus you get microparticles in addition to the molecular toxins. But it's not like I would cough in that smoke every day multiple times.

A quick trip to the bathroom to wash your hands with soap and some chewing gum is plenty to deal with that. Lots of people I work with have no idea that I'm a smoker until they actually see me with a cigarette because I don't smell of it all day.

I smoke, I know it's gross, I really don't care. Like every other irritating and possibly unpleasant habit I have, either you decide I'm worth knowing despite them, or we won't hang out. And I make the same judgment about you. 'tis how the world works.

Thank you.

Also, there's a lot of wonder drugs out there if you really wanna quit. Chantrex stops nicoting from binding to your serotonin receptors, not eliminating cravings for nicotine but basically keeping you from doing anything about them. Eventually you find you don't even want cigarettes. I've also heard that Piracetam does wonders for it.

these debates/arguments/back and forth's are like religious debates. non-smokers, especially born again non-smokers, will never see the smokers side of the debate as anything but 'blah, blah, blah' as they stick their fingers in their ears and sing 'lalalalalalalalalalalalala'.

let's say 10 years form now, just for a lark, that some research shows they were all wrong about cigs. non-smokers will never believe it just like if you killed a christian and reanimated them showing them that there is no god or heaven, they still wouldn't believe you.

it's pointless. there's a million studies funded by a millions groups. what the **** does anyone care? i like smoking so i'm gonna do it. anyone who says it's suicide doesn't know what they're talking about. there are millions of people who die from old age at 70, 80, 90, 100yr. and there are millions of people who get lung cancer and die at 30 from living in urban areas. :/
seriously, who gives a ****? if you're a non-smoker you avoid second hand smoke. most of us live in north america where laws prohibit non-smokers from taking in second hand smoke. ease the **** up. everyone is on your side.

That would be like some research showing that the earth doesn't actually have a moon. The evidence against cigarettes is that strong.

Most non-smokers are whiny little turds about the smoking issue. I don't smoke but other people may do as they please. I remember when every restaurant used to have a smoking section. It's no big deal, you just ask for a seat in the non-smoking section. You go outside and hang out with the smokers at work once in a while. Most people who claim that smoke is bothering them to the point of sickness are full of it, guaranteed.

Except I know a lot of people who have been smoking for years, decades even, and haven't gotten lung cancer or emphysema. Granted, their lung functions are a bit impaired, but depending on who you are, and your history, smoking honestly isn't as bad as everyone says. From what I've seen.

You mean to tell me that all those patients diagnosed with lung cancer, emphysema, asthma because they smoked for X years of their life have absolutely no impact on the cost of insurance, medical costs, what not?

I'll just flat out say it honestly. I think smoking is gross. I hate the smell of it and it clings to your clothing like none other (at least mine). I will applaud and cheer the day when human society finally wakes up and sees that sucking on dried out tobacco is bad for themselves and does actually harm others either physically or financially.

Win.

My lungs can't handle ciggy smoke, it makes my lungs lock up. I can't handle it breathing it for more than 20 seconds before I get an attack.

But at the same time, the more people that smoke the faster they die ^_^

I used to be like that. I didn't care a bit. In fact in the army I was kind of glad there were smokers because due to them we got extra breaks a lot. And so even the tobacco smoke in winter air began to associate with breaks and leisure in my mind.

But then I moved into this apartment which is otherwise really nice but apparently I'm surrounded by smokers and I can hardly keep in summer my windows or balcony door open for 10 minutes without tobacco smoke starting to get it. And moreover, there's some bloody hole somewhere where the smoke from the apartment below gets inside all the time, and it must be some real tobacco lair down there. Sometimes it stinks here like somebody was actually really smoking right behind my back.

And so I slowly became a smoking hater. Because I have to suffer here in my own home even though I'm not interested in smoking myself.

that's why i said just for a lark. just trying to make a point about non-smokers.

i think he clarified that.

i know in canada where a pack of cigs costs between $8 and $11, at least 80% of that is tax. and in canada as opposed to the US, those taxes contribute to the social health care we have. obese people are just an unnecessary drain on the system. they don't pay anything extra into the system. some studies show they're more of a burden than smoker when you don't take the taxes into account. fat people are at the doctor's more and cost the health care system more.

On average, 0.000214 a day.

Well, not always. Many establishments had VERY poor separation of smoking sections. Denny's usually had a series of glass windows that extended about 3 feet above the top of the booths, the rest was just open space. It was basically useless.

In Ohio, it's now illegal to smoke in any restaurant. I find this piece of legislature appalling, because it takes away the rights of the owners of said establishments. It should be up to them whether or not smoking is allowed.

Smokers pay higher premiums on insurance, and may have to pay more to be covered for that kind of stuff. Sin taxes also contribute to Medicare and the general welfare of our society.

The problem with that is the problem of competition.

If one club decided for itself to ban smoking indoors, but one nextdoor didn't, all the smokers (and their friends) would end up just going to the other one. Sure, the first one might get a reputation for smelling nice (which, actually, it won't. smoke-free clubs now just smell of beer, sweat and vomit which were previously covered up by the smoke smell) and have more customers in the future, but they would make immediate losses from losing all the smokers that it's easier for all clubs simply to allow it.

It was up to the owner's descretion before, in Britain, and I don't know of a single establishment that did. You could smoke in all pubs and bars before the overall ban, no-one would decide to be a non-smoking club by choice.

You know what they say about smoking sections.

Having a smoking section in a restaurant is like having a peeing section in a pool.

(Of course, as far as I know, urine in public pools has never killed anyone)

Some restaurants, and I think this should be mandated by law if they have a smoking section, completely section off the smoking section. Makes it a lot nicer.

Unless a restaurant is deserted, I generally like to eat in the non-smoking section just because it smells nicer.

Yeah, I remember back when smoking sections still existed; they had moved towards having their own rooms and ventilation systems.

It's weird the difference that a few years makes. The idea of being able to smoke anywhere inside any public building feels so antiquated now. Hell in some places you can't smoke within 5 meters of buildings (which I'd guess is pretty hard to do in the city, but it doesn't stop anyone).

So, coming back state-side yesterday I came through Denver Int. Air., and the only smoking lounge in the airport is this fairly nice restaurant & bar. Halfway through my lunch and about two beers in, I heard a man in a suit with a bluetooth earpiece in yelling at the hostess "Where the **** can I sit in here that's not around these goddamned smokers?!" When the hostess replied "at the tables outside our doors, sir, our staff serves food and drinks out there away from this smoking lounge" he screamed "that's ****ing ridiculous, I can't believe this bull****!" Seriously, what the **** do people expect walking into the one and only smoking lounge in a massive airport? As if it wasn't enough that non-smokers can go anywhere else in the entire facility without running into smoke, this guy thinks it's ridiculous he has to sit outside of the restaurant to eat away from us "goddamned smokers."

Somewhere around 5 or 6 a day I'd say.

Yeah, I'm sure a guy named "Roach" is only smoking cigarettes.

Maybe I'm putting things too bluntly though.

Yeah, remember how I said I was backpacking around Europe? That turned into "wandering around Amsterdam for about a week." I love the Dutch, they're officially good people in my book.

...You've never seen "Hostel" have you?