California Town Banning Smoking on Beach

AJC.com ^

[ChemistCat]

That public beach was so ugly it made me angry. It didn't have to be.

Private beaches, on the other hand, where people must pay money to use them, stay nice and neat.

People do not take care of common property unless they're forced to do so. Look at your public restrooms. People get the seats wet and don't care. Leave their unmentionables everywhere for someone else to clean up. This degradation in public decency doesn't bother you? Then please don't bother trying to tell me I'm over the top.

There's a public park not far from me that has been taken over by gay men for their meetings. The parking areas wind through lots of pleasant trees, and day and night you see cars and trucks parked there; people meeting each other to have sex their families and employers would never know about. It's not enough that they are having sex in public in restrooms next to play equipment meant for children; they must leave used condoms on the ground everywhere. It's the same thing: making other people pick up after their unsanitary, filthy habits.

[patton]

Yeah, the butt problem.

I was a young kid - raised in VA. Sort of a conservative place.

I was a student at the Defense Language Institute in CA, walking the beach, arm-in-arm with my girlfriend.

She stops. "I think we have gone to far."

I look around. (I had been looking at the tall ships at sea.)

Yeah, CA has a butt problem.

What in the heck does that have to do with cigs?

[ChemistCat]

I suppose it does depend on what the meaning of 'is' is, Mr. Clinton. Or rather, on what the meaning of 'butt' is.

There is a third meaning....

[Madame Dufarge]

Perhaps you missed my post where I stated that littering has always disgusted me.

Common public areas have never been as well maintained as private property.

This is why Communism was such a huge success.

Because smokers are the new Beelzebub, why not shift the blame to them for everything from typhus to bad taste in clothing?

It's a new feeding frenzy, and a ready-made group for the perpetual free-floating anxiety crowd to attack.

[Graybeard58]

"I was taught, both by my parents and in the Boy Scouts, that you leave a place cleaner than you found it"

...I was taught that way too. I smoke and when I go to the beach I have a large soft drink cup. When I am ready to leave I pick up all my own butts plus any others I see around me, put them in the cup and dump them in a trash can on the way out. It just makes good sense. Unfortunately not all smokers have good sense.

[visualops]

Non-smoker does not = non-litterer.
A non-smoker just won't be littering cigarette butts.

I'll take cigarette butts over broken glass, metal can pull-tabs and bottle caps, or soda cans and food garbage that attract flies and wasps.

[patton]

If I need to spell it out for you, it was 1983, and the two of us were the only ones on the beach in clothes.

We were also the the only ones not actively engaged in sex.

But, but all means, don't smoke afterwards.

It might be harmful to your health.

[ChemistCat]

How else are you going to get rid of the cigarette butts, that are the bulk of the litter? Come up with a plan.

[Madame Dufarge]

How else are you going to get rid of the cigarette butts, that are the bulk of the litter? Come up with a plan.

Though I don't agree that cigarette butts are the "bulk of the litter," I have no plan. It's the local government that's responsible for maintaining public property. If they can't control litter, it's their problem.

And that's all it is - a litter problem, not a smoking problem, despite your name-calling effort to characterize it as such.

[ChemistCat]

IF the smokers disposed of their butts properly it wouldn't be a smoker's problem, but it is, because the vast majority do not.

So you admit that the local authorities have the right and responsibility in this case to the cheapest solution--banning the source of the problem. No smoking=no butts.

[Sir Charles]

How about a class action suit by all us smokers against the Attorneys General of our states for, say, $25 Bil or so, for pain and suffering due to forced withdrawal symptoms caused by all the laws limiting the use of a legal product in areas which were open to smoking at the time we became addicted?

[chuckwalla]

If this is a trash issue why not ban all eating and drinking of any kind on all beaches in order to prevent littering.
Actually to prevent trash all people should be banned from all beaches.
Isn't that the way to completely solve the problem?

Ban driftwood and all the other trash that floats up too.
The beaches will then be quite clean without exception.

Government certified clean

[Pharmboy]

Well, you know, all that SAND!! (Remember the ashtrays in hotel lobies and hallways with sand in them?)

[at bay]

"How about a class action suit by all us smokers against the Attorneys General of our states for, say, $25 Bil or so, for pain and suffering due to forced withdrawal symptoms caused by all the laws limiting the use of a legal product in areas which were open to smoking at the time we became addicted??

And the winner of the "All-time biggest whiner" category is.....

[Hot Tabasco]

The smokers who are filthy littering pigs

Since you could not support a previous comment by whomever regarding the wafting of cigarette smoke down the beach you now conveniently choose unsightly cigarette butts. Grasping for straws CC!

I've driven many a highway throughout this country and the states that do not have deposits on their cans and bottles are littered throughout with these items. Given your rationale, I think we had better ban alcohol and pepsi, and coke, etc. After all, we must clean up the place.

Sorry pal, I can go to any given outdoor spot you may choose and I guarantee you that there will be a most abundant quantity of trash that will certainly catch my eye before I notice cigarette butts. As I stated previously, get your priorities straight and clean up your town's trash before you come after us smokers!

As for the joker who complains about smoking on the beach, well just sit up wind of us...........but then again, if he has bad hygiene then I have to PUT UP WITH him don't I?

[Hot Tabasco]

"People do not take care of common property , People get the seats wet, Leave their unmentionables everywhere, This degradation in public decency doesn't bother you?

There's a public park not far from me day and night you see cars and trucks parked there; people meeting each other to have sex their families and employers would never know about. It's not enough that they are having sex in public in restrooms next to play equipment meant for children; they must leave used condoms on the ground everywhere. unsanitary, filthy habits.

You know ChemistCat, you seem to have an awful lot of unresolved hatred built up inside of you, seems to be a lot of things that piss you off. Once again I urge you to set your priorities straight and leave us smokers alone. Given the amount of animosity that appears to building up inside of you, you might just choose the wrong person at the wrong time to spout off against for their smoking habit......

Maybe you should take up yoga or something......

Tell you what, why don't you "SHARE" your feelings of what makes you really happy, what you would perceive to be the idyllic society to live in if you would have your way? Don't be shy now, we are all hear to listen and lend a helping hand.....

[Hot Tabasco]

No smoking=no butts.

I think you have hit on something here...

No eating = no trash

No drinking = no cans

No drinking = no bottles

No babies = no discarded diapers

No fat people = no offences to those who dislike fat people

No talking = no chance of profanities being vocalized

No Jews = no offended anti-semites

No Blacks = no offended white racists

No Whites = no offended black racists

No Homosexuals = no offended homophobes

No Heterosexuals = no offended heterosexualphobes

No me = no offended you

Conclusion: Your own perfect world with your own perfect beach where you and only you can go to enjoy it......

[at bay]

"As for the joker who complains about smoking on the beach, well just sit up wind of us..."

I don't need no stinkin anemometer to walk on the beach. The quote captures your arrogance in a nutshell. We have no duty or inclination to accomodate your filthy, deadly habit.

[chuckwalla]

Wow hateful aren't you.
Just ban everything you don't like.
Have troopers in brown shirts patroling and arresting everyone you don't like.
But hasn't that been tried before?
Haven't we fought wars to stop people like you?

Does the concept of freedom come into play at all in your vision of society?

Perhaps you should think of moving to a communist country like North Korea.

[merry10]

I spend a lot of time at the beach in the summers, and people smoking there generally doesnt' bother me but leaving their dirty nasty butts DOES bother me. I agree with this ban.