Starting January 1, a new law went into effect here in California, that you may not drive and smoke with a child under 18 in the car.
Personally, I'm all for laws restricting smoking as much as possible. I know, I know smokers have a "right" to smoke, however, of the hundreds, or maybe thousands of smokers I've seen, a bare handful get that their "right" to smoke ends where my right to breathe begins.
I put right in quotation marks in regards to smokers because while that's an argument used by smokers; I don't necessarily believe it's a right. I do however, seem to remember a certain document used to found our country guaranteeing my right to life. Since breathing is absolutely essential for life...well, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see where I'm going with this...
I have asthma that's induced my environmental factors, such as smoke. One of the reasons I love California is that most public places are non-smoking. I can live a fairly normal life and not have to worry about frequent asthma attacks.
Beyond that, one set of my grandparents smoked for years, and had cancers and heart disease and other health issue which can be attributed to smoking. I do get that it's an addiction, but I don't really get how/why people start in the first place.
Yes, I have tried it. When I was in high school and right out of high school, my asthma wasn't as bad as it is now, and I've probably smoked about a half dozen cigarettes in my life. A part of me wonders if that had some effect on worsening my asthma. But it was gross, and I just fail to see the appeal.
To the few dozen smokers who are courteous about your smoking, I don't get you, but I respect your right to choose to smoke. Unfortunately, the vast majority of dumbasses who think the world is their ashtray, and the rest of us have to deal with their 'right' to smoke make it so we need laws restricting smoking. Since those laws make me able not to live my life as a hermit, damn straight I'm all for them.
3 comments:
This is something I can agree with you 100% about.
I started smoking in college myself. Rather than go into my long boring story, I quit, cold turkey, before I had children.
Now that I've stopped, there is nothing I hate worse in the world than cigarette smoke. It drives me BATTY. When we shot pool the smoke was so terrible that I'd have to come hoem and shower before I could touch any of my children. We looked around for a non-smoking pool hall (ya right) but when we found none we had to give up something we love very much.
I truly don't like the comment, "You're taking away my right to smoke". I could care less if someone else wants to smoke. But it's not as simple as them lighting up and getting a fix.
First you have the smoke itself. As you said, it upsets many with severe allergies (like yourself and my own children). But then you have the SMELL.
Once I was at a movie with Jimbo and a man and his family walked in. I smelled the smoke on him and it was pretty bad but seats were full and I decided to just bear it. The guy gets up and leaves and comes back 5 minutes later as the previews are on and the smell was coming off in WAVES. I almost gagged. It was so bad we had to move to crappy seats. I was pregnant and couldn't stand it anymore.
And here in the South, I see people driving around and smoking with their children all the time. Once when shooting pool I wanted to slap a woman who was drinking a beer and smoking a cig and patting herself on the back by telling everyone she nurses her baby. WTF??
Wow. The stupidity of people never ceases to amaze me!
Maybe in a few years the no-smoking thing will trickle down to the south. I know Denver's gotten a LOT better in the past 5 years, so it's moving east!
You said you don't know how/why people start in the first place, so here's MY story...
Ali bet me that I couldn't buy a pack of cigarettes because I looked too young (I was 17 at the time). He said that the guy would definitely card me. I bet him 10 bucks I could do it, then gave my sister 2 bucks (that's how cheap they were back then!) and she bought me a pack of Marlboro Menthols (yuck!). I brought them to Ali and he gave me 10 bucks per our bet... I made 8 dollars!!! Of course, 10,000 packs later...
So there you have it! Take that story and smoke it!
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