Man has always had a love of fire. It started with the caveman, when he invented the flame thrower for killing mammoths and other cavemen, and continues to present day, with the frying of steaks and various daredevil stunts. Man has always had a deep love and need for fire and the death it brings; perhaps this is why many people still enjoy super slow motion death in the form of smoking.
As of 1 July 2007, there will be a complete ban on smoking in all pubs and clubs in Victoria and NSW, leaving the Northern Territory as the only remaining Australian location where the pleasures of smoking and shelter may be experienced simultaneously. The new laws will have advantages, disadvantages and vantages (such as the view you get of smokers standing outside in the rain while you’re sitting inside).
The laws are well intentioned, I guess, but according to the Australian Hotels Association, the changes could result in the loss of 8,000 jobs and half a billion dollars a year in gaming and alcohol tax revenue. The same smoking ban in New York cost 2,650 jobs and $71.5 million in the first year. So just watch small businesses here follow suit. Well, not literally. Don’t just stand outside your local and watch, that’s rude. Buy a drink, at least, if you’re going to be witnessing their descent into bankruptcy. You sadist.
I hate cars. They’re bad for the environment. And your lungs. And they cost lots, they’re noisy, dangerous, and car commercials regularly ruin good songs. But I accept that living in the city means putting up with cars, despite the potential danger. If I wanted, I could move away from the city I guess. Live in the hills and grow a beard and eat berries and grubs. Just like a non smoker can choose to walk away from a smoky bar, or put up with it if they wish to stay. Like in Amsterdam. Everyone knows what’s going on in the coffee shops, and if you ain’t into it, you don’t go in. But you respect the fact that others have made their own decision.
So while this is an overall win for health, many smokers feel as though the will of others is being imposed upon them. Smoking is still legal, at least for now. You read correctly, some fun activities remain legal. So there’s hope.
No one has given me a decent reason why there shouldn’t be a small number of venues just for smokers, where only smokers and people who don’t mind smoke would go. ‘To encourage quitting’ isn’t good enough. Encouragement should be: ‘Hey, guy, you should take better care of yourself.’ It should not be: ‘So you suffer from an addiction? Go stand in the rain!’ The health of staff is an obvious and valid point, but it ignores the fact that some workers take no issue with the risk involved, not to mention the fact that there are far more dangerous professions kicking about.
Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal, speaking of the same ban in New York, rightly stated that the pub is ‘…the last public place you can go to be a dropout, a nonconformist, refusenik, a time waster, a bohemian, a hider from reality, a bum, a rebel, a bore, a heathen.’ I’m pretty much all of those things, and I’m not about to move to the Northern Territory, so what should I do?
Quit?
…nah.
How do I know this?
Enstrom, J & Kabat, G 2006, ‘Environmental tobacco smoke and coronary heart disease mortality in the United States—a meta-analysis and critique’, Inhalation Toxicology, i18, pp.:199–210,
http://www.scientificintegrityinstitute.org/IT030106.pdf
Forces International, Health before liberty — the continuing campaign to make tobacco illegal,
http://www.forces.org/smokingbans/smoking_bans.htm
Freedom Organisation for the Right to Enjoy Smoking Tobacco (Forest), FAQs,
http://www.forestonline.org/output/Page103.asp
Noonan, P 2002, ‘Them.The one group for whom liberals have no tolerance at all’, Wall Street Journal, 15 November,
http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/?id=110002624
O'Malley, N 2004, ‘Pubs rocked by total ban on smokers’, Sydney Morning Herald, October 13,
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/10/12/1097406573786.html
Ridgewood Economic Associates 2004, The economic impact of the New York State smoking ban on New York’s bars,
http://www.faac.ca/content/economic%20impact/smokingbanreport.pdf
The Smoker’s Club,
http://www.smokersclub.com/home.html
