Posted on 12/16/2005 10:57:51 AM PST by kingattax
Anti-smoking activists who are driving cigarettes from public places across the country are now targeting private homes -- especially those with children.
Their efforts so far have contributed to regulations in three states -- Maine, Oklahoma and Vermont -- forbidding foster parents from smoking around children. Parental smoking also has become a critical point in some child-custody cases, including ones in Virginia and Maryland.
In a highly publicized Virginia case, a judge barred Caroline County resident Tamara Silvius from smoking around her children as a condition for child visitation. Mrs. Silvius, a waitress at a truck stop in Doswell, Va., calls herself "highly disappointed" with the court's ruling.
"I'm an adult. Who is anybody to tell me I can't smoke or drink?" she said in an interview yesterday.
An appeals court upheld the ruling, but not before one judge raised questions about the extent to which a court should become involved in parental rights and whether certain behavior is harmful or simply not in a child's best interest. Mrs. Silvius says she complied with the decision by altering her smoking habits.
"My children know not to come around when I'm on the front porch with my morning coffee, tending to my cows or out in my garden, because I'm having a cigarette," she said. Still, she thinks this was not a matter for the courts because it was not proven that she posed a risk to her children's health.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Well, that's Maine's Child Services for you! It was in the paper! Stupid, right? Standing up and no booster seats.
Heck if I know. Maybe more kids go to the doctor and are identified as having it, while the actual percentages haven't really changed.
You know what it is? It's because parents keep their kids in a bubble trying to "protect them from the ills of the air" and they can't build up their immune system! So, they are open to all KINDS of sickness.
Heck, my mom caught ME eating DIRT one day. Boy, did I get it. But it sure didn't hurt me!
With my 5 kids. All non smokers, now in their 30's and beyond. Surprisingly, my 4 boys were easy, but my daughter was a little more difficult. When she brought a pack home, we argued, I took the pack and threw them out the window, and said, next time it's going to be you.
Looking back now, ~25 years, she often thanks me for my resolve. She says the experience was priceless in raising her 7 children.
I read your profile, very very well done, it doesn't portend that you were prone to being nasty or vulgar. You're, if that's a picture of you in your profile, on the attractive side. Even with that advantage, it follows you would get, IMHO, more second glances if you weren't lighting up all the time.
Merry Christmas
You just gotta love this place.
I must have wandered into a smoking room on this thread. Sorta like getting to a party when everyone's already drunk. But that's alright, it's part of the therapy, getting you guys riled up.
Merry Christmas
I am not nasty and I am not vulgar. But I have been fighting this issue and doing research on the war on the smokers for over 12 years. I have heard it all!
Up here, where I live, EVERYone smokes. No one thinks anything of it. Even the ones who do not smoke, have no beef with it. ............. So unlike the "Conservatives" in FRee Republic.
Yes. I am Conservative. I am also a Christian.
I have two kids who smoke. It was a losing battle trying to hide my smokes and lecture them about how hard it would be to quit, how much money they'd waste, etc.
I found out my ex was buying cigarettes for the boy on visitation weekends. Several years ago, I lasted two months on the patch, strictly to keep cigarettes out of the house. I lasted two months.
However, what I do in my own home is my business. Tobacco is a legal product, and the government has no right to tell me what to do in my home. I kept all the windows cracked, even in winter, to make sure that fresh air was circulating though.
California is a lousy state to be in if you are A)conservative, B)religious, C)a parent, D)a smoker.
I think that for the time being I will stick with the evidence around me and from the AMA and NHI rather than "forces international"
"know it all attitude?" I suspect a little bit of knowledge envy on your part.
As for who will be at my wake...I won't hold my breath that you'll come.
Merry Christmas!
Good point. Hand sanitizers, air purifiers, anti bacterial soap, are good ideas, but are they going to do more harm than good in the long run? We all want a spotless house, but how sanitary does it have to be? I can see if a family member has allergies, to buy an air purifier, and vacuum daily.
How many people do you remember being deathly allergic to peanuts? I remember a couple of kids who were allergic to shellfish and strawberries, but peanuts? My kids lived on PBJ sandwiches. Now we have young people who go into shock from a kiss from a peanut breath bf. Schools have turned into PB free zones.
Speaking of bubbles, Maine DHS is full of bubbleheaded idiots. Do foster parents have a special ID on their cars for monitoring? Do they have to go in for random nicotine testing? No smoking for 24 hrs in the car, prior to transporting these special little darlings? DHS would be better off developing a more thorough screening process to identify child abusers applying for foster care licenses.
I'm one who will say that ANYTHING we do carries a risk. Hell, stepping out of my house carries a risk that someone will either shoot me, run me over with their car, hit me while drunk, etc.
Life is full of risks, we cannot have people act like nannies and try to protect us from life. Good grief, these people who act like they know better than we do about our own lives need a life of their own. They need to seriously get a hobby that does not involve their noses in my life.
By the way, I'd rather see a person get behind the wheel after leaving a bar that has been smoking all night long rather than one who has been drinking all night long.
I think that for the time being I will stick with the evidence around me and from the AMA and NHI rather than "forces international"
You are making a big mistake. The AMA and the NHI's life goal is to bash and trash smokers. Forces has done extensive research just to prove that they are WRONG!
Especially when we have our own kind (Conservatives) against us!
Sorry you are the one who's wrong on this. Smoking is dangerous and hurts people...ask the millions of families who have lost loved ones to lung cancer/emphysema/etc caused by smoking.
I'm amazed that you still don't know this. Or maybe you don't want to know....
Well, pick your progaganda source, then.
Maybe Forces is more truthful, maybe AMA and NHI are.
Sorry you are the one who's wrong on this. Smoking is dangerous and hurts people...ask the millions of families who have lost loved ones to lung cancer/emphysema/etc caused by smoking.
I'm amazed that you still don't know this. Or maybe you don't want to know....
Oh my. Yes, smoking is not good for us. But I really haven't found anyone that it has "hurt" as you suggest. And many of my friends and relatives smoke. And some relatives are quite old in my family.
How about asking families of an obese member that suffers with so many ailments and have even died?!
"I don't KNOW??" Listen. I have heard it all. And I have run across people like you more times then I care to remember. I have been fighting the war on the smokers and doing research for over 12 years. You can't tell me nothing new!
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Darlene Brennan - The Smoker's Club, Inc. - New England Regional Director
The United Pro Choice Smokers Rights Newsletter - http://www.smokersclubinc.com
Maine Smokers Rights - http://www.geocities.com/shelioness/mainerights.html
mailto:darlene@maine.rr.com - Respect Freedom of Choice!
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