Poll for "smoking ban" (Isis thread) -- how biased are we?

I'm not making light of anything. I don't go to bars and restaurants where country music is playing if I can avoid it. You're ignoring the fact that even without the ban, there are bars and restaurants that don't allow smoking.

I am the hostest with the mostest!

That is true to an extent. Most stadiums & arenas also received public funding of some sort or another.

It is also true that bar owners do get the right to refuse service to anyone they please. Now of course if they refused people based on gender or ethnicity onh an ongoing basis, it would probably attract unwanted attention and ultimately a fine .. but as a general rule they can tell people they dont like to leave.

Of course unless they become a private club. Which is generally what happens. After smoking bans, a few places become private clubs with minimal requirements ($1 annual membership fee etc) and circumvent the laws. They do great business, the other places dont do so hot.

Many people will point at California as an example of how smoking bans do not affect club business but the figures used to support that argument fail to take into consideration many other economic forces that were occuring at that time as well. A better example is New York. People are losing income from it .. and as a result having trouble feeding their families.

If you want to discuss actual environmental hazards, lets talk about bus exhaust. Far worse than second hand smoke wafting from an open door. And ya can't escape it.

No, smoking is not good for anyone, and second hand smoke does indeed make some people sick. However, there are real people losing real jobs because of it. Smokers are an easy target these days and so bans pass without any real thought. The issue is far more complex though.

As an aside, at least in the United States, the econmoy *depends* on smokers. The tax revenue from the tobacco industry is mammoth. Without it, the US economy would indeed crumble, overall state health care costs would rise and the tax burden that is now placed on the smokers & the tobacco industry would have to be spread out among everyone.

Smoking is nasty... I dont argue that. However, the latest demonizing trend is a bit excessive & counterproductive. Like many other things, it *sounds* good but when it comes down to it, accomplishes little positive.

Perhaps a good first step would be forcing the tobacco companys to adhere to more regulation. Currently they are permitted to put whatever they wish in cigarretes with no accountability. It is widely speculated that the additives in tobacco products are far far worse than the tobacco itself While we wont ever get a safe cigarette (probably), we could at least regulate them a little bit & set minimum standards for tobacco production.

Bottom line is that smokers will always find a place to smoke and certain bar owners with large bankrolls and/or local political contacts will find ways around bans (private clubs is one example). The net practical result is that a few businesses get increased revenue and the rest lose revenue.

Why not have an alcohol ban as well? After all, booze causes a LOT of deaths each year as well & is arguably as dangerous as smoking ... and serves no public good

The problem with such a suggestion is that even the smoking nannys like to have a cocktail from time to time and heaven forbid they shouldn't be allowed to

Forgive me if I dont buy into the whole "for the greater good of the community" argument. It is pretty much bunkum & hand waving.

-AP

Some rather productive points. Touche.

One of my problems with smoking is this:

I'll walk into a bar, order a drink, sit down, and breath and be content. My sitting there having a drink isn't affecting anyone else. The only way it will is if I get far too drunk and get myself into an altercation or accident with another person. However, the bartender is there to try and make sure that I don't get that drunk and that if I do -- they make me leave.

Now a smoker comes into a bar and sits at a table across the aisle from me and lights up. Orders a drink and sits there smoking away; nice and content. That smoke slowly wafts into my face while the smoker sips their drink and is careful not to drink too much.

-- The issue then becomes this: while enjoying myself, I suddenly have a hard time doing so with the smokers' cigarrette smoke blowing in my face. Sure, it's not a problem to get up and go to another table or ask them to move to another one since I was there first if the bar isn't full and busy. However, in bars where there is smoking allowed and it's full -- that smoker isn't going to be the only one... and moving isn't going to do much.

Infact, if there are even a dozen smokers lighting up cigarrette after cigarrette for a few hours, I'm going to go home and wake up the next day coughing a little and feeling a little woozy. I might even hyperventilate a little on the way home (the reason why I quite smoking is because it makes me hyperventilate for some reason). If I was my gf, I'd have to put up not only with coughing the next day (she has mild asthma), but dry skin and possibly a rash. Great.

So simply allowing smoking in bars is obviously going to be an issue if your a non-smoker for more reasons than being a self-riteous protest-happy nazi.

The comparison with booze doesn't quite work out because it is heavily regulated... which is why I think your idea of regulating the tobacco industry more than we have been is a good one. Maybe if we did, we can get them to take out the several carcinogenic agents they put in there -- the ones they list on the side of every cigarrette pack are only the few that they are required by law to list. In the average cigarrette there are more chemicals than there is in car exhaust. By a lot -- around 4200 in a cigarette compared to roughly 2300 in car exhaust.

However, it still doesn't solve the issue of mutual co-existence and respect in regards to smokers/non-smokers sharing the same venue.

So far a smoking-ban on bars/restaurants/casinos seems to work for most places. This doesn't mean one can't smoke outside or in a seperated and properly ventilated room, it just means that in a shared space with non-smokers, a smoker can't just walk in and tell everyone to leave because they want to smoke. The ban is working well in Ontario and despite the doom and gloom in the months preceeding it -- it has actually made bar/club life better here. A lot of smokers I know who were decrying the end of the universe when the ban was around the corner have actually changed their mind and like it better.

So... are there better ideas to smoking outside or in special smoking rooms? (Other than kicking nazi-non-smokers out!)

What I am not getting here is the nanny state philosophy. Pro-ban folks sound a bit like whiney 2 year olds who only want the toy someone else is playing with and so they ask the state to give them the toy by passing laws which require the other child to hand it over. Why force silly regulations on bars when you have every right to patronize bars or open a bar of your own that does not allow smoking? Why because everyone thinks the "cool" bars with the best music and atmosphere allow smoking. Is it the bar or the smoking clientele that make a bar the hot place to hang? Obviously the non-smokers cannot get together and make a club or bar into the flashpoint of the area...otherwise they would not be trying to claim the smoking establishments.

Nannification is not the answer. Patronize non-smoking bars, make them hot and all us non-smokers will promise not to try to force any pro-smoking legislation down your throat. We will be the ones with our noses pressed to the glass outside.