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Smokers Beware! Proposed New York City Smoking Ban Targets Outdoor Facilities

Well, you know what they say. If you don't need a nanny, you shouldn't act like a child. IMO, when people act like kids, they ought to be treated like them. I don't see why a Nanny State is a bad thing, when so many adults act like irresponsible, stupid children. People cannot really handle "freedom", nor do they really want that. They perform best under an illusion of self-direction and abundant choice and freedom, while they actually need and want structure, rules, and limitations in their lives. Adults NEED a nanny state. It's fundamental to the human psyche. Too much choice and freedom is bad for you, so what people say they want isn't really what they want. They just think they want "Freedom," because they don't know any better.

When people have too much freedom, they hurt themselves, society, and then regret it later. But then it's too late.

The problem here is that you are using an opinion. What one person finds hilarious another will find childish. For example: I think that South Park is the stupidest, most idiotic, most childish "cartoon" to EVER have existed, yet others obviously find it funny and worth watching. Is my opinion of it more valid than theirs? No it is not. My opinion should not effect some other persons enjoyment.

There certainly have been fat people throughout history, but there hasn't been the epidemic of obesity until recently. It's not that people have not been fat, but not on the scale and scope of today.

Yes but people do not drink as much as they use to either. It sort of evens itself out. ;)
 
If you can't handle freedom, that's your problem. Check yourself into a nursing home if you're really serious about it.

It doesn't give you the license to start revoking my freedom, though. Some of us are actually mature enough to deal with life.

Most people can't. So therefore, policy must deal with statistical scope of the problem. Some people may be able to, but policy cannot be based on the few. They are bombarded by far too much choice and freedom to make reasonable decisions, which is why they often do not. If people could handle freedom and choices at the level we expect, we wouldn't have a massive obesity crisis.

We also wouldn't see mass advertisement work so well if people would truely rational, or responsible enough, to handle that level of choice/freedom.

Studies confirm the behaviour of masses of people. Even in educated college students, those who perform best are those with authoritative instructors who limit freedom and provide structure. Adults out of college are no different.
 
Most people can't. So therefore, policy must deal with statistical scope of the problem. Some people may be able to, but policy cannot be based on the few. They are bombarded by far too much choice and freedom to make reasonable decisions, which is why they often do not. If people could handle freedom and choices at the level we expect, we wouldn't have a massive obesity crisis.

We also wouldn't see mass advertisement work so well if people would truely rational, or responsible enough, to handle that level of choice/freedom.

Studies confirm the behaviour of masses of people. Even in educated college students, those who perform best are those with authoritative instructors who limit freedom and provide structure. Adults out of college are no different.
Let me guess, you're one of those few people who can handle it, right? What a coincidence. :roll:
 
The problem here is that you are using an opinion. What one person finds hilarious another will find childish. For example: I think that South Park is the stupidest, most idiotic, most childish "cartoon" to EVER have existed, yet others obviously find it funny and worth watching. Is my opinion of it more valid than theirs? No it is not. My opinion should not effect some other persons enjoyment.

Well, true to an extent. Some things are a matter of taste, but not everything. Some behaviours really do objectively hurt oneself, and others by extension (directly or indirectly) and thus they become a public problem or nuisance. I don't think anyone should control somethng like South Park, because entertainment is just that, no matter how stupid. It has no objective, negative consequences to society. Smoking, alcholism, poor diet, etc all do. It puts stresses on the economic structure and healthcare networks. Obesity specifically does that, as well as puts extra strains on the transportation system. Fat people cost more to transport, and they have more environmentally unhealthy consumption.

When people can't, or won't, act responsibly, someone needs to take the decision out of their hands. That's why I support the Fat Tax and price manipulations on food items to shape public behaviour. If people were rational, the issue wouldn't even exist.
 
Let me guess, you're one of those few people who can handle it, right? What a coincidence. :roll:

Not entirely, no, but I am better than a lot. I have my weaknesses. I recognize the problem, and my limitations and needs, which gives me an advantage. A lot of people don't understand what they don't know, don't know how to change, and don't know any better. That's what the State is for. To help people live better lives.

Ads don't fool me. So that puts me ahead of the game already. People fail at consuming rationally, which is why ads work in the first place. YOu cannot seriously assume things will work out if people are left to their own devices when they can't even navigate consumer products intelligently. There are millions of people who buy certain things purely because of medica rhetorical devices and propaganda. That's sad.
 
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Well, true to an extent. Some things are a matter of taste, but not everything. Some behaviours really do objectively hurt oneself, and others by extension (directly or indirectly) and thus they become a public problem or nuisance. I don't think anyone should control somethng like South Park, because entertainment is just that, no matter how stupid. It has no objective, negative consequences to society. Smoking, alcholism, poor diet, etc all do. It puts stresses on the economic structure and healthcare networks. Obesity specifically does that, as well as puts extra strains on the transportation system. Fat people cost more to transport, and they have more environmentally unhealthy consumption.

When people can't, or won't, act responsibly, someone needs to take the decision out of their hands. That's why I support the Fat Tax and price manipulations on food items to shape public behaviour. If people were rational, the issue wouldn't even exist.

Actually from my own experiances South Park is a detriment to society. Kids see it and think that it is OK to emulate such behavior. After all...if it is allowed on the air then certainly it is allowed for people to actually do it...right?

Now here's a question for ya, what happens when a government becomes too controlling? IE, nanny state.
 
Not entirely, no, but I am better than a lot. I have my weaknesses. I recognize the problem, and my limitations and needs, which gives me an advantage. A lot of people don't understand what they don't know, don't know how to change, and don't know any better. That's what the State is for. To help people live better lives.

Ads don't fool me. So that puts me ahead of the game already. People fail at consuming rationally, which is why ads work in the first place. YOu cannot seriously assume things will work out if people are left to their own devices when they can't even navigate consumer products intelligently. There are millions of people who buy certain things purely because of medica rhetorical devices and propaganda. That's sad.

Bold part: exactly. The State is there to help. Not control. When a government passes laws they are controlling what people may/may not do. That is not the type of help a government should provide. You yourself state that...

A lot of people don't understand what they don't know, don't know how to change, and don't know any better.

So instead of trying to control people why not try to educate them? Which would you prefer? Being controlled...or being educated?

Since people started being educated there have been less people that smoke. If I remember correctly obesity has dropped..though it is still high. And drinking has dropped also. And not because of any bans.
 
Actually from my own experiances South Park is a detriment to society. Kids see it and think that it is OK to emulate such behavior. After all...if it is allowed on the air then certainly it is allowed for people to actually do it...right?

Now here's a question for ya, what happens when a government becomes too controlling? IE, nanny state.

Well, I am not sure there are any empirical studies that show South Park to be a serious detriment to public safety or health. Have you? I wouldn't say it's any worse than video games, which have yet to have any solid data showing they "cause" bad problems.

When the government gets too controlling? Well, the only thing I would be concerned about is if the controls don't have the proper justifications or data to back them up. If there is excess control, control needs to be scaled back. But it's a balancing act. Sometimes, lesser controls work, but sometimes, you need stronger methods.

I don't really have a problem with the concept of a Nanny State. My problem is that some policies don't fix anything or target issues inefficiently. That's why I propose a technocratc scheme for policy making. Policy ought to be made by experts, not politicians specifically.
 
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Bold part: exactly. The State is there to help. Not control. When a government passes laws they are controlling what people may/may not do. That is not the type of help a government should provide. You yourself state that...

Well, I think "help" is vague, and people require help along a continuum. For some things, I think the government should directly intervene and control, because other lesser methods are not working or would take too long. For other things that are not yet as serious, perhaps lesser strategies could work. Depends on how much time and how much harm you want to happen in the transition process from behaviour A to B. For many things, I do not belieive public "persuasion" and education will seriously change in time, so people need to have limitations set upon them. And not just limitations, but active strategies to shape behaviour (economic incentives, for example). They work better than education short-term.

Education won't suddenly cure obesity, and the problem is serious enough to warrent stop-gap nanny controls alongside education. Environmental protection is another area where controls are necessary, because even when properly educated, people don't care when they are on the front lines shopping, eating, etc. People will go for what's cheap and convenient. No amount of education will change that any time soon. People who claim to be green aren't even as green as they percieve themselves to be. Someone needs to step in. People often have a hard time evaluating their own status or changing behaviour, but an outside force that has no interest or stake directly in their lives will not have such a problem.


So instead of trying to control people why not try to educate them? Which would you prefer? Being controlled...or being educated?

Obviously, the preferable one is to be educated, but I'd also love to be a millionaire. Never going to happen, though. Education can only do so much, and it takes a long, long time. By then, we'd all be dead.

Since people started being educated there have been less people that smoke. If I remember correctly obesity has dropped..though it is still high. And drinking has dropped also. And not because of any bans.

Yes, education was partially effective. But it took an enormous boatload of time, money, and legal battles. But recent studies have shown that the best type of education isn't even factual, it's emotional. For example, people do not respond nearly as well to statistical data or reasoned analysis of the harms of smoking. They DO respond to how smoking will impact sexual performance or looks.

If you want to wait forever for education and mass marketing to slowly change behaviour, okay,but price manipulations, taxation, regulation of product quality/content I think will work faster in the meantime as you do the teaching. I am not proposing to really ban anything. That's not the type of controls I have in mind. But I realize that people are lazy, resistant to education, or any change in behaviour, which involves effort and inconvenience. In those cases, control must be from the top down. Voluntarism may work eventually, but we don't always have that kind of time.
 
But here's the thing. The government is suppose to be "of the people". Not just a select group of people that happen to save it money because they are more healthy than others.
But isn't it the people who want cigarettes banned from public places? And it isn't it a representative government? Because I don't think the government would lift a finger if a consensus of the people didn't want it and lobby their representives in government to get it. And while some non-smokers say they dont care, I don't see them calling their congressman to protest the banning of cigarettes. And smokers, well they don't really voice their protest either because they know the risk to smoking and so they must recognize the right of others to breath clean air. You yourself respect and recognize their right over yours, simply by being a considerate smoker.

Please consider my argument as an excercise as I'm just trying out this line of reasoning and welcome your rebuttals.

And what you seem to be advocating here is a nanny state government. Yet the US is suppose to be about freedom. Freedom and a nanny state government is not compatible. Yeah it may be stupid to smoke or drink or eat until you're 500lbs, but that is a persons right.
Well, of course and people should always have that right to do whatever they want with their own body. But those same people can't expect businesses to invest in a community whose labor pool is either morbidly obese, chronically ill from smoking, high on pot, or drunk all the time if the business won't get a fair day's labor in return for the cost of wages and benefits they have to pay. So essentially, if a large portion of the population are making poor health choices, it can effect the entire community because businesses won't want to locate and invest there. Contrary to popular belief, taxes aren't the highest cost of operating a business, paying for labor is.


Also, what you said in your post is not what has been shown to be true in reality. People have smoked cigarettes, been obese, done drugs, and drank alchohol for centuries. Yet society has not been destabilized because of it.
Well, it's kinda happening now in a large section of SLC called West Valley where a good portion of the population is either morbidly obese or hooked on meth and as a consequence few businesses want to locate there. Which means the people either aren't working at legitimate jobs or they're working at low skill jobs for low wages. And as a consequence of that, the tax base is low and so their schools aren't getting the funding they need, and the crime rate, domestic violence and teen pregnacy has gone up. Now I don't know if the obesity and meth problem came first because of the lack of education and low wages or visa versa but it all seems to be connected, imo.

So I'm just thinking that we as a society and more broadly as a nation that we do have the choice: to exercise our right to be obese, cronically ill and live a substandard life or we can strive to be a more competitive labor force with other nations and keep our higher standard of living.
 
Well, I think "help" is vague, and people require help along a continuum. For some things, I think the government should directly intervene and control, because other lesser methods are not working or would take too long. For other things that are not yet as serious, perhaps lesser strategies could work. Depends on how much time and how much harm you want to happen in the transition process from behaviour A to B. For many things, I do not belieive public "persuasion" and education will seriously change in time, so people need to have limitations set upon them. And not just limitations, but active strategies to shape behaviour (economic incentives, for example). They work better than education short-term.

Education won't suddenly cure obesity, and the problem is serious enough to warrent stop-gap nanny controls alongside education. Environmental protection is another area where controls are necessary, because even when properly educated, people don't care when they are on the front lines shopping, eating, etc. People will go for what's cheap and convenient. No amount of education will change that any time soon. People who claim to be green aren't even as green as they percieve themselves to be. Someone needs to step in. People often have a hard time evaluating their own status or changing behaviour, but an outside force that has no interest or stake directly in their lives will not have such a problem.




Obviously, the preferable one is to be educated, but I'd also love to be a millionaire. Never going to happen, though. Education can only do so much, and it takes a long, long time. By then, we'd all be dead.



Yes, education was partially effective. But it took an enormous boatload of time, money, and legal battles. But recent studies have shown that the best type of education isn't even factual, it's emotional. For example, people do not respond nearly as well to statistical data or reasoned analysis of the harms of smoking. They DO respond to how smoking will impact sexual performance or looks.

If you want to wait forever for education and mass marketing to slowly change behaviour, okay,but price manipulations, taxation, regulation of product quality/content I think will work faster in the meantime as you do the teaching. I am not proposing to really ban anything. That's not the type of controls I have in mind. But I realize that people are lazy, resistant to education, or any change in behaviour, which involves effort and inconvenience. In those cases, control must be from the top down. Voluntarism may work eventually, but we don't always have that kind of time.

Since government has a history of trying their best to gain power and keep it I would prefer the longer and more expensive route. Because then freedom still reigns. Since humans have survived centuries of smoking, I doubt that taking the longer route will make any difference.

Out of curiosity, what exactly do you think would be something that "we don't have time" (<----paraphrasing there)to wait for?
 
Since government has a history of trying their best to gain power and keep it I would prefer the longer and more expensive route. Because then freedom still reigns. Since humans have survived centuries of smoking, I doubt that taking the longer route will make any difference.

Out of curiosity, what exactly do you think would be something that "we don't have time" (<----paraphrasing there)to wait for?



Peak Oil, Climate Change.

All of which would take waaaaaay too long to educate the problem away or let the market deal with. People, and markets, are incredibly short-sighted and shallow. The only real solution to all of that is government planning ahead of time to prepare for the problems before they happen. Unfortunately, both are approaching end game already and society is still moving like it's in a set of leg braces. People are all rah rah rah for change until they learn it involves actual changes of behaviour, sacrifice, or inconvenience. We needed to do something decades ago, but no one did or wanted to, and "education" hasn't seriously changed behaviour. It's just changed knowledge. What we really need is a government movement on an epic scale neverbefore seen. We cannot let people eventually learn and change through formal education. We need much more massive-scale, immediate fixes. A type of "5 year plan."


Both of those issues also relate to obesity, consumption patterns, energy issues etc. We need to tackle the latter as part of the plan for the former two problems. For example, we should have been constructing nuclear power plants to mitigate both, but no one did. We should already have modified agricultural policies and manipulated consumption habits, but we didn't.

The average person really doesn't have the slightest clue just how royally screwed we all are right now because of lack of systematic socioeconomic planning to solve the world's, and our nation's, most pressing concern. We've had all the debate, and the teaching, but there is no more time for dilly dally.

Our way of life just can't continue. Is this unpleasant to think about? Yea. That's why no one does, and doing something about it voluntarily is too inconvenient. They'd rather watch American Idol and be "free."
 
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But isn't it the people who want cigarettes banned from public places? And it isn't it a representative government? Because I don't think the government would lift a finger if a consensus of the people didn't want it and lobby their representives in government to get it. And while some non-smokers say they dont care, I don't see them calling their congressman to protest the banning of cigarettes. And smokers, well they don't really voice their protest either because they know the risk to smoking and so they must recognize the right of others to breath clean air. You yourself respect and recognize their right over yours, simply by being a considerate smoker.

Yes and no. There are people that want it banned. Maybe even the majority. But there is still peoples rights to consider. The US constitution, even though it was made to where the majority rules, wasn't just about the majority ruling. It was also about individual liberty and rights. That is why there are so many checks and balances in our system. So that the majority could not take away an individuals freedom.

Now while smokers may limit themselves in order to respect other peoples choices to not be around that type of stuff we do it of our own free will. That is perfectly acceptable because it is a personal choice. And not forced upon them by taken away their right to use something that is perfectly legal to use and own. If cigarettes were illegal then it would be different. But since they are legal then by banning the use of cigarettes in certain areas you are taking away their right to use something that is considered legal. It doesn't matter that the place is public or not. By keeping it legal then they have the right to smoke it in any public area or non-public area where the owner doesn't mind (talking about restaurants and bars for the non-public areas).

Please consider my argument as an excercise as I'm just trying out this line of reasoning and welcome your rebuttals.

Exercising is good. :)

Well, of course and people should always have that right to do whatever they want with their own body. But those same people can't expect businesses to invest in a community whose labor pool is either morbidly obese, chronically ill from smoking, high on pot, or drunk all the time if the business won't get a fair day's labor in return for the cost of wages and benefits they have to pay. So essentially, if a large portion of the population are making poor health choices, it can effect the entire community because businesses won't want to locate and invest there. Contrary to popular belief, taxes aren't the highest cost of operating a business, paying for labor is.

Well, it's kinda happening now in a large section of SLC called West Valley where a good portion of the population is either morbidly obese or hooked on meth and as a consequence few businesses want to locate there. Which means the people either aren't working at legitimate jobs or they're working at low skill jobs for low wages. And as a consequence of that, the tax base is low and so their schools aren't getting the funding they need, and the crime rate, domestic violence and teen pregnacy has gone up. Now I don't know if the obesity and meth problem came first because of the lack of education and low wages or visa versa but it all seems to be connected, imo.

So I'm just thinking that we as a society and more broadly as a nation that we do have the choice: to exercise our right to be obese, cronically ill and live a substandard life or we can strive to be a more competitive labor force with other nations and keep our higher standard of living.

I agree that businesses shouldn't be expected to invest in those areas. But here's the thing. Over all those businesses will still want those peoples business. So what they will do is move into another area that is fairly close by but still has a decent standard of living. Eventually that area that is currently "sick" (saying that just to shorten the post :) )will become healthy again. While the area that the business moved into may become "sick"...so they will just move into the area that was sick but is now healthy....or some other similar business will. Society as a whole has a tendency to fluctuate like this all the time. Yeah it may take years...possibly even a few decades for the area to change into a healthy area. But it will eventually. Weather it is due to new laws or the people themselves wanting to change.

Standards of living also always change. 200 years ago someone like me could have been considered "well off" or maybe even rich. Today though I am considered poor.

Really that is the great thing about societies though. They are always changing and are never the same.
 
Peak Oil, Climate Change.

All of which would take waaaaaay too long to educate the problem away or let the market deal with. People, and markets, are incredibly short-sighted and shallow. The only real solution to all of that is government planning ahead of time to prepare for the problems before they happen. Unfortunately, both are approaching end game already and society is still moving like it's in a set of leg braces. People are all rah rah rah for change until they learn it involves actual changes of behaviour, sacrifice, or inconvenience. We needed to do something decades ago, but no one did or wanted to, and "education" hasn't seriously changed behaviour. It's just changed knowledge. What we really need is a government movement on an epic scale neverbefore seen. We cannot let people eventually learn and change through formal education. We need much more massive-scale, immediate fixes. A type of "5 year plan."

Those two items deserve a thread all by themselves really. Let me just say that I would have to disagree with you on those two and leave it at that hmm? :D

Both of those issues also relate to obesity, consumption patterns, energy issues etc. We need to tackle the latter as part of the plan for the former two problems. For example, we should have been constructing nuclear power plants to mitigate both, but no one did. We should already have modified agricultural policies and manipulated consumption habits, but we didn't.

For the moment lets say I agree with you on those above issues. How are they relateable to obesity? The above issues are quite literally about "the end of humanity" for climate change and the "end of society as we know it" for oil. Obesity is not the type of thing that will destroy society..even if every single person in the world was fat humanity and society would still easily survive.

Our way of life just can't continue. Is this unpleasant to think about? Yea. That's why no one does, and doing something about it voluntarily is too inconvenient. They'd rather watch American Idol and be "free."

But our way of life...when talking about obesity, smoking, and drug usehas been around for centuries..heck thousands of years. I honestly do not see it ending or even just civilization collapsing due to those issues. Society has its own balance regardless of any government intervention. Indeed society has been known to overthrow governments, yet no government has ever overthrown society.
 
Those two items deserve a thread all by themselves really. Let me just say that I would have to disagree with you on those two and leave it at that hmm? :D

Sure, it's too complicated to talk about anyway in this thread, and off topic lol.

For the moment lets say I agree with you on those above issues. How are they relateable to obesity? The above issues are quite literally about "the end of humanity" for climate change and the "end of society as we know it" for oil. Obesity is not the type of thing that will destroy society..even if every single person in the world was fat humanity and society would still easily survive.

Well, obesity is indirectly related, because it causes stresses on the system that, if reduced, would reduce those stresses. For example, obesity results in increased pollution and resource consumption (ie fuel, among other things). It costs more energy, and pollutes more, to transport, maintain, and service heavily obese and unhealthy populations. It takes a lot of energy to produce the food obese people overconsume, as well as to transport it and them.

By targeting obesity, as well as its causes, we can reduce the footprint our society has. Therefore, we need to target government intervention at several levels: production, retail, and individual behaviour. The biggest changes to the latter can be gained by a change in agricultural policy and retail procedures. We need to regulate what is sold, how it is sold, how it is made, while implementing price manipulatons at production and consumption points to force changes in behaviour.

For example, we need to make it more expensive to make food, or regulate how much people can consume of what, so they eat less, while making healthier, more sustainable foods and production methods more desirable simultaneously. This will reduce stresses on the environment and on the energy network, which ultimately, will tank anyway "solving" the problem. I'd rather solve it a better, less wasteful and traumatic way first. We need to switch over to sustainable production and consumption behaviours, and the one's causing obesity are counterproductive to that, and harmful during the transition.

There are problems caused by consumer behaviour, retail behaviour, and industrial behaviour. To an extent, the government chose not to help, but to make the problem worse (food subsidies [corn]). Businesses take advantage of the cheapness of food due to cheap oil and subsidies to create obesity, and consumers want super sized portions. They all are the problem, and we need to fix it.
 
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The first part of my plan would be to end all agricultural subsidies, especially to corn. This will help raise the price of food and make it harder for agribusiness to produce in volume, and thus cheaply make available for "supersizing" by retail. Which in turn will help cut obesity. If the price of foreign foods decreases relative to this due to subsidies in other countries, the solution would be the application of a tariff to increase its cost relative to domestic produce.

Then, I would immediately follow with a "fat tax," on people above a certain BMI.

I would then tax junk foods during the transition at a higher rate than non-processed foods, while giving tax breaks or rebates for consumption of fruit, vegetables, etc. Perhaps, even, configure a tax based on the nutritional content of the food.

I would follow this up with a blanket ban on certain ingredients that are replaceable in certain foods, but don't really change the quality of the product.
 
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There is a big difference between vaporizing and smoking. (and yes I know its real name..MJ is just quicker :) )

Even if one is smoking it, MJ doesn't cause cancer. :shrug:
 
Yes and no. There are people that want it banned. Maybe even the majority. But there is still peoples rights to consider. The US constitution, even though it was made to where the majority rules, wasn't just about the majority ruling. It was also about individual liberty and rights. That is why there are so many checks and balances in our system. So that the majority could not take away an individuals freedom.
Rights are a man made construct and for them to exist, they have to be recognized and respected by other people. And currently the individual right to smoke is not being recognized or respected by other people. So how much of right is it really?

Now while smokers may limit themselves in order to respect other peoples choices to not be around that type of stuff we do it of our own free will. That is perfectly acceptable because it is a personal choice. And not forced upon them by taken away their right to use something that is perfectly legal to use and own.
I like the free choice aspect, but would smokers limit themselves of their own free will if it weren't for others exercising their right not to breath the smokers SHS? IMO, I don't think they would because like you said, as long as smoking is legal then they have the individual right to smoke. And too, because smoking is a highly addictive substance, many smokers don't really have the free will to choose not to smoke unless it is forced upon them by others. Which probably explains why people are resorting to the government for intervention to protect their right not to breath another's SHS. And lets face it, an individual's right to breath trumps another's right to smoke, don't you think?

If cigarettes were illegal then it would be different. But since they are legal then by banning the use of cigarettes in certain areas you are taking away their right to use something that is considered legal
It doesn't matter that the place is public or not. By keeping it legal then they have the right to smoke it in any public area or non-public area where the owner doesn't mind (talking about restaurants and bars for the non-public areas). .
I'm not sure if just because something is legal that you have the right to do it anywhere you please, even in public spaces. Alcohol is legal, but public intoxication isn't legal in many places, nor is drinking and driving. The rules seem to change when individual freedoms are abused or infringe on the individual rights of others. And apparently, that is what is happening now with smoking.

But I don't think tobacco will ever be illegal, because if prohibition taught us anything about human nature, it's that when a substance is illegal, then people will do it all the more. And then all we're doing is making criminals out of people who weren't before.

I agree that businesses shouldn't be expected to invest in those areas. But here's the thing. Over all those businesses will still want those peoples business. So what they will do is move into another area that is fairly close by but still has a decent standard of living. Eventually that area that is currently "sick" (saying that just to shorten the post :) )will become healthy again. While the area that the business moved into may become "sick"...so they will just move into the area that was sick but is now healthy....or some other similar business will. Society as a whole has a tendency to fluctuate like this all the time. Yeah it may take years...possibly even a few decades for the area to change into a healthy area. But it will eventually. Weather it is due to new laws or the people themselves wanting to change.
Yes business would still want the people's business but I was thinking more in terms of a business that was looking for a good labor pool to hire and I don't think they would find it in area where the population has grown obese, smokes, does drugs and are poorly educated. I'll use myself as an example, I own rental property but I wouldn't want to own rental property in West Valley because I would be afraid the renters wouldn't take care of the place because of their bad habits, problems, crime, etc. So I hesitate to invest out there.

Standards of living also always change. 200 years ago someone like me could have been considered "well off" or maybe even rich. Today though I am considered poor.
If it weren't for technology, I don't think the standard of living would have changed that much for the vast majority of people from 200 years ago. So unless you owned property back then, you would still be considered poor even by today's standards since owning property is where the wealth is. Thats why property rights were the number one protection in the constitution.

Really that is the great thing about societies though. They are always changing and are never the same.
Hmmm, I don't know. It doesn't seem like societies change all that much unless it's forced upon them either through war or some major upheaval. I think our society is still pretty much the same as it was 100 or 150 years ago because we're still fighting the same battles of class struggle, racial discrimination, state vs religion, business vs labor, economic freedom vs societal needs and environmental preservation, etc.
 
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Only if you assume people who do not like smoke will stop going to facilities where smoking is allowed. This however is not always true.

Off topic:

There was a show on the other day where they did a little experiment. They had an actor who had down syndrome stand in for a bagger at a grocery store. They then had another actor play the part of a customer who would heckle and make fun of him to other customers. The results? Even though (by testimony from interviews following the experiment) an overwhelming majority of people thought it was wrong, hardly anyone said a thing to the actor portraying the bigot. Here's what gets interesting; when they had an intimidating looking actor play the bigot part, it was only the women who stood up to him!

off topic but interesting. i've seen that sort of experiment done with teenaged girls harassing another girl, the only people who intervened were women. maybe we have a stronger urge to protect the weak? makes sense, that's what moms do.
 
Let me preface this by saying I am a smoker who almost always moves away from random non-smokers before I light up (If they know me, they know being around me means being around smoking and if I'm in a designated smoking area, they are responsible for their exposure to my smoke).

Anyway, I also have a very deadly shellfish allergy. I have had reactions from being in the vicinity of people shellfish (especially because people eat shellfish like ****ing savages, tearing at the shells and spraying that poisonous **** everywhere). I have had two experiences where I had to be rushed to the hospital and in neither instance did I actually consume shellfish. I ate food that was cooked in the vicinity where shellfish was cooked. I also have reactions just talking to people who have eaten shellfish recently. My face will break out in hives. I could actually be used as a shellfish detector. Just hold me near the place where the shellfish is suspected and if I break out in hives, it's shellfish alright.

Anyway, unlike second-hand smoke, second-hand shellfish can quite literally kill me immediately. My throat swells up and I lose my ability to breathe. I can go into anaphylactic shock in a very short period of time. If you've never had an extreme allergic reaction to somehting, I hope you never do. Its miserable.

But all of this means I have to take extra-special precautions when I go to restaurants. Before I order anything, I ask about their cooking practices, find out what amounts of shellfish they serve, learn if they have separate grills and fryers for people with shellfish allergies (surprisingly, seafood restaurants are more likely to have these things than other restaurants, but for me to even go in the door of these places I need to have taken allergy medicine and have some emergency medicine on hand for immediate use in case my food somehow becomes contaminated or the air in the room has too much allergen in it).

It's a huge inconvenience for me when I go out to dinner. My life would be MUCH better and safer if shellfish were banned from being served at restaurants. If the ignorant shellfish eaters want to eat shellfish, they can do so in their own homes and not expose me to something that can kill me within minutes. At the very least life would be safer and easier if any restaurant that cooked shellfish in the vicinity of non-shellfish food should be closed down as a public danger and that every restaurant should have non-shellfish cooking utensils, plates, silverware, fryers, grills etc.

But I don't think like that.

I realize that I don't have a right to go to any business establishment with an expectation that they will automatically cater to my desires, even though my issue is a life or death issue. And again, I'm not talking about an unlikely even that will occur years after exposure, but an immediate reaction that is very life-threatening and guaranteed to happen if I'm exposed to shellfish. My right to not be exposed to shellfish does exist, but it ceases to exist when I make the choice to put myself in a place where exposure to shelfish is possible. This includes public places. I've had milder allergic reactions being in the same general area as someone grilling shrimp on a barbecue at a beach or tailgating. But I have no control, nor do desire to have the control, over whether or not people can cook or eat shellfish in public.

My physical inability this regard should not be the basis of removing their rights to enjoy a legal product wherever they wish to do so in public. Nor should it be the basis of removing a business owners right to allow people to use this legal product in their establishment if they so desire.

I take complete responsibility for protecting myself from exposure. Granted, if I make a request at a restaurant and they say that they will fulfill that request and fail to follow through on that, I get very angry. That's only happened once at a wedding that had a surf and turf dinner (I will say that who has surf and turf at their wedding is a total asshole if they don't put that on the invite. Anything with nuts in it too should go on the invite. It sucks to get to the wedding to learn I'm just dropping off the card and getting the hell out of there. After my experience at the aforementioned wedding that ****ed up my request for turf-only cooked separately from the shrimp, I no longer attend weddings with surf and turf as the dinner). But the point is that the responsibility is IMO, entirely my own.

I feel the same way about cigarette smoke. In fact, I probably have less sympathy fro non-smokers because if you put me in a room full of shrimp and a non-smoker in a room full of smoke, I'd bet every dime that I have that only one of us will end up dead within a couple of hours (it'd be easy to bet every dime that I had in that situation because I'd be dead and would no longer need the money :2razz:).
 
Tucker, I honestly sympathize with your allergy, but you can always make the choice to not eat at restaurants and prepare your food at home. People with allergies to peanuts have it worse than you; many can't even smell peanuts or be exposed to their residue without being sent into anaphylaxis. Many packaged foods now say "may contain traces of nuts" and that has been a relatively recent innovation to packaging. There is a lot of cross-contamination in food production and it's something that industry and restaurants are gradually becoming aware of. If you have a severe allergy you should always carry an epi pen or two (each one will give you approx. 15 minutes of leeway before an ambulance can arrive if you're in a severe anaphylactic state).

That said, I would still not compare this to outdoor smoking. What happens in private establishments is fine. If a restaurant has smoking, I don't have to go there; just like if a place might have cross-contamination of shellfish, there is nothing forcing you to go there. But smoking outdoors is in public spaces. What am I supposed to do, stay at home? At least with your shellfish allergy, your exposure mostly relates to eating the stuff, and not breathing the scent. You can go to a park and enjoy yourself without worrying about it. Smoke disperses into the air, and I can't stop myself from breathing.
 
People with allergies to peanuts have it worse than you; many can't even smell peanuts or be exposed to their residue without being sent into anaphylaxis.

:confused: Did you miss the part where I described how this is true of my allergy as well?

Many packaged foods now say "may contain traces of nuts" and that has been a relatively recent innovation to packaging. There is a lot of cross-contamination in food production and it's something that industry and restaurants are gradually becoming aware of. If you have a severe allergy you should always carry an epi pen or two (each one will give you approx. 15 minutes of leeway before an ambulance can arrive if you're in a severe anaphylactic state).

I have an epipen.

That said, I would still not compare this to outdoor smoking. What happens in private establishments is fine. If a restaurant has smoking, I don't have to go there; just like if a place might have cross-contamination of shellfish, there is nothing forcing you to go there. But smoking outdoors is in public spaces. What am I supposed to do, stay at home? At least with your shellfish allergy, your exposure mostly relates to eating the stuff, and not breathing the scent. You can go to a park and enjoy yourself without worrying about it. Smoke disperses into the air, and I can't stop myself from breathing.


The bolded and underlined portion indicates to me that you might have missed large swaths of my post.
 
Let me preface this by saying I am a smoker who almost always moves away from random non-smokers before I light up (If they know me, they know being around me means being around smoking and if I'm in a designated smoking area, they are responsible for their exposure to my smoke).

Anyway, I also have a very deadly shellfish allergy. I have had reactions from being in the vicinity of people shellfish (especially because people eat shellfish like ****ing savages, tearing at the shells and spraying that poisonous **** everywhere). I have had two experiences where I had to be rushed to the hospital and in neither instance did I actually consume shellfish. I ate food that was cooked in the vicinity where shellfish was cooked. I also have reactions just talking to people who have eaten shellfish recently. My face will break out in hives. I could actually be used as a shellfish detector. Just hold me near the place where the shellfish is suspected and if I break out in hives, it's shellfish alright.

Anyway, unlike second-hand smoke, second-hand shellfish can quite literally kill me immediately. My throat swells up and I lose my ability to breathe. I can go into anaphylactic shock in a very short period of time. If you've never had an extreme allergic reaction to somehting, I hope you never do. Its miserable.

But all of this means I have to take extra-special precautions when I go to restaurants. Before I order anything, I ask about their cooking practices, find out what amounts of shellfish they serve, learn if they have separate grills and fryers for people with shellfish allergies (surprisingly, seafood restaurants are more likely to have these things than other restaurants, but for me to even go in the door of these places I need to have taken allergy medicine and have some emergency medicine on hand for immediate use in case my food somehow becomes contaminated or the air in the room has too much allergen in it).

It's a huge inconvenience for me when I go out to dinner. My life would be MUCH better and safer if shellfish were banned from being served at restaurants. If the ignorant shellfish eaters want to eat shellfish, they can do so in their own homes and not expose me to something that can kill me within minutes. At the very least life would be safer and easier if any restaurant that cooked shellfish in the vicinity of non-shellfish food should be closed down as a public danger and that every restaurant should have non-shellfish cooking utensils, plates, silverware, fryers, grills etc.

But I don't think like that.

I realize that I don't have a right to go to any business establishment with an expectation that they will automatically cater to my desires, even though my issue is a life or death issue. ......
You must be an absolute joy to go out to dinner with. LOL But I can empathize.

When I was single I went on a Caribbean vacation with a fellow I was interested in, only to find out after we got there he was allergic to the sun. LOL So there we were sitting on the beach, I in my bikini and he in his long sleeved green hospital scrubs. It still cracks me up thinking about it. But again, he couldn't expect the sun to be outlawed anymore than you could shellfish. But I think the point here is that smoking is a choice, not an affliction that you can't do anything about except deal with it.
 
You must be an absolute joy to go out to dinner with. LOL But I can empathize.

When I was single I went on a Caribbean vacation with a fellow I was interested in, only to find out after we got there he was allergic to the sun. LOL So there we were sitting on the beach, I in my bikini and he in his long sleeved green hospital scrubs. It still cracks me up thinking about it. But again, he couldn't expect the sun to be outlawed anymore than you could shellfish. But I think the point here is that smoking is a choice, not an affliction that you can't do anything about except deal with it.

Eating shell fish is no different of a choice, people can not eat shell fish at restaurants, nor cook it outside.

It's pretty clear, we tolerate some things even though they can immediately kill people but we don't tolerate other things because they annoy some people.
Screw that crap, America was built with the concept of free choice and free association.

Not this cry baby banning nonsense.
 
You must be an absolute joy to go out to dinner with. LOL But I can empathize.

When I was single I went on a Caribbean vacation with a fellow I was interested in, only to find out after we got there he was allergic to the sun. LOL So there we were sitting on the beach, I in my bikini and he in his long sleeved green hospital scrubs. It still cracks me up thinking about it. But again, he couldn't expect the sun to be outlawed anymore than you could shellfish. But I think the point here is that smoking is a choice, not an affliction that you can't do anything about except deal with it.

My allergy to shellfish is not a choice, but other people choose to eat shellfish despite that it can kill many people.

The comparison is that I'm like the non-smoker, and the shellfish eaters are like smokers.

The difference is that being around smoke outdoors is, by and large, mostly just an annoyance that has an extremely unlikely risk of causing a medical problem at some future time and date far off and not immediately. Whereas being around shellfish is a much higher risk for me and the medical problems will be immediate.
 
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