Jamie Riley wrote:
I am so tired of self righteous people trying to protect me from myself.
I am no longer able to smoke in a bar, but i can get drunk till 2:00 get in my car and kill someone.
You may need to jog my memory, but i can't recall anyone smoking a cigrette and then killing anybody! excuse me for living in this world full of crass, arrogant, asinine, do-gooders!
Fair enough, everyone is entitled to an opinion. That said, here is my reply:
You also live in a world that if you do get drunk and go out and kill someone, you can be prosecuted for murder and be put away. So, I wouldn't say you're 'allowed' to do it.
I have asthma. I can't be around smoke without it severely impacting my dining experience or my ability to breathe afterwards.
No one has ever said being around one smoker would kill anyone (well, short of being on an oxygen tank and going boom)...but over time, it can. I have lost two people in my life to smoking-related illnesses. It was their choice to smoke, but it did impact our lives as well.
If I were working in a business that had me spending 8-12 hours a day surrounded by many smokers for that time, I would probably be on disability within a short time. The smoking ban was not enacted to punish smokers. The smoking ban was enacted because it is an occupational and public health issue.
No one is telling you that you can't smoke. They're just telling you that your right to smoke ends where it impacts upon the rights of others to breathe. You can smoke to your heart's content in your house, your car, outside, etc., etc. I'm simply expressing my joy at being able to actually go to places, socialise, and not worry about winding up in an emergency room.
Personally, I am tired of smokers whinging about how their rights to inhale a toxin are being impinged. Get over it. You know what you're doing is not healthy. Most smokers try to quit at some point. It's a lifestyle choice, and a stupid one, but I'm not going to tell someone who's an adult that he or she can't do it, just like I'm not going to tell someone who's an adult not to pour acid onto his or her skin. I assume that he or she should know better, and is choosing to do something stupid, for whatever reason. But I don't go around putting pissy comments onto smoker's blogs just because I don't agree with that choice. I suggest you channel some of that righteous indignation into something more constructive.
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