Can I Buy You a Drink and Light Your Cigarette? (Cathryn Crawford)

The Washington Dispatch ^ | January 2, 2004 | Cathryn Crawford

[Scenic Sounds]

It seems that everyone has an opinion on the smoking bans that have been put into place in the last year. From Dallas to New York City to California, smokers are no longer allowed to smoke inside bars and restaurants. These bans have been met with great resistance, not only from smokers, but from the owners of the bars and restaurants, who say that the restriction is harming their business and causing profit loss. The opponents of such a ban also say that the bans are unconstitutional, because they prohibit legal behavior in privately owned places of business.

Most people rightly characterize this issue as having two sides - those on the side of property rights and liberty, and those who are on the side of public health. (I am without the scientific qualifications to resolve that issue, but I am comfortable assuming that cigarette smoke doesn't become safer just because one person has inhaled it before it gets to me.) Granting that assumption, which deserves priority – the right of a proprietor to control what legal activities happen in his bar, or the right of a member of the public to live and work in the safest environment possible?

Those who endorse the public health side of this issue contend that health issues outweigh every argument. They believe that people have the right to always be in the safest environment possible (whether they want to be or not), and that legislation is the proper vehicle by which to ensure public health. Their basic belief is that nothing is more important than health and safety for everyone, not even the idea of personal choice. They are willing to have their personal liberties curbed because they believe that it will improve the quality of their lives.

However, I believe that it really comes down to personal choice and responsibility. When someone makes a decision (any decision), they must decide for themselves what risks are involved, and weigh them rationally against the benefits. This applies to the decision to eat, drink, or work in a certain bar or restaurant, just as it does when someone makes the decision to drive a car, eat junky foods, or drink alcohol – all activities which are potentially dangerous but very legal. A ban on smoking takes away the choices of all three parties involved – smokers, nonsmokers, and owners. It also assumes that people are not sufficiently reasonable or rational enough to make their own decisions regarding their health.

Are there are ways to allow both sides to have a say in public smoking? Of course there are. Why not just require restaurants and bars that permit smoking to post a notice advising prospective customers of the hazard?

Until smoking is banned altogether, the decisions regarding the right to smoke in privately owned businesses should be left up to the individual discretion of the owner. Otherwise, choice is removed and replaced with full control by the government, which invalidates the entire idea of private ownership.

Cathryn Crawford is a student at the University of Texas. She can be reached at CathrynCrawford@WashingtonDispatch.com.

[the_french_gynecologist]

in quebec the drinking age is 18 and but is usually ignored if you look older than 16... restaurants are required to have a seperate non-smoking section... bars are exempt and attempts to restrict owners from advertising their video gambling units have also failed... the ban on smoking in the workplace is still very new and so far has been successfully ignored

all food and drink establishments must conform to the french language law and have french signs, menus and french speaking personnel... protection of the french minority is older than the canadian constitution itself... so far the non-smokers, ex-smokers, and the we know what's good for you lobby does not yet enjoy similar protection and we can still smoke without being harassed by constitutionally protected "non-smokers"

so why don't bars have no-alcohol sections for recovering alcoholics

a friend of mine once said that the degree to which you're allowed to break the law is an indicator of the freedom of a society... we pay a lot of taxes and aren't allowed to make right turns on red... but rarely is anyone locked up for smoking a joint... i quit smoking years ago but i don't preach or harp on anyone that wants to light up in my home or a company truck... i play the good host or crack open a window...

i hope the anti-tobacco lobby doesn't succeed because that's what the government would love... another moral excuse to judge and sentence americans

[TigersEye]

... a friend of mine once said that the degree to which you're allowed to break the law is an indicator of the freedom of a society.

Your friend must be a criminal or an idiot or both. Describing a dysfunctional society as free is like saying monkeys don't have to worry about math homework.

[Cathryn Crawford]

Makes sense to me!

I'm glad you liked it. :-)

[Rebelbase]

"Down here, most bars won't even allow anyone that's under drinking age to come in the bars."

Chuys has experience in allowing under age drinkers into the establishment.

[Don W]

Have I been dropped off the Smoker's Lounge list, or is/was Joe too busy to open up today?

[Gabz]

the Lounge didn't open up today....I think Joe is away for the weekend and forgot to ask one of the regulars to open up.

[Gabz]

i hope the anti-tobacco lobby doesn't succeed because that's what the government would love... another moral excuse to judge and sentence americans

I'm with you!

[schmelvin]

Where is the support for these prohibition laws coming from and what do you understand their interests to be?

If you want a clearer view of the big picture, all you have to do is go to the United Nation's website. All these so-called grassroots movements taking place in the US [the campaign against urban sprawl, the anti-smoking movement, the anti-obesity (anti-fast food industry) campaign, etc.] can be traced to the UN or a UN affiliate.

Alcohol's next from the look of things. I went to the WHO site and found their Alcohol Policies "Under Construction", but their "Declaration on Young People and Alcohol" made it pretty clear the direction they intend to take. It's full of statements such as: "...there is no scientific evidence for a safe limit of alcohol consumption...", "all people... have the right to be safeguarded from pressures to drink and be supported in their non-drinking behaviour", "all children... have the right to grow up in an environment protected from the negative consequences of alcohol consumption and, to the extent possible, from the promotion of alcoholic beverages", etc. You get the drift. Here's the URL: http://www.euro.who.int/AboutWHO/Policy/20030204_1 (Sorry I don't know how to post a link.)

Here's an even better URL: http://www.un.org/unfip/philanthropies.htm

This lists all the major philanthropic foundations that are in bed with the UN. Didn't someone on this thread already mention the Robert W. Woodruff Foundation? Because it's on the list.

[schmelvin]

Oops! The foundation mentioned was the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

(No biggie, though. It's on the list, too.)

[patton]

I am proactive on the alchohol thing - I already taught the kids how to build a still.

Sometimes..the only way to be free, is to defy authority.

[Scenic Sounds]

I mean, I am never, ever going to drink. Ever.

;-)

Another great column, Cathryn. You're still the best!

[Cathryn Crawford]

Thank you! You know how much your opinion means to me.

[lockjaw02]

Why must smoking be banned in hospitals at all? Why can't there be smoking lounges.

This poem from a cancer ward patient in Ireland, a "non-smoking smoker" as she called herself, shows exactly why anti-smokers hate us, because of the craic, the comradery, the life.

Now some antis will use that poem to say the cancer wards are only filled with smokers, but that's pure horse-pucky. Even if they were, that still wouldn't be valid justification to ban all smoking in hospitals, but would rather show that action to be barbaric. They say that smokers are over represented in lung cancer cases with Harvard and the Mayo clinic claiming smokers comprise between 85-90% of lung cancer cases, but that is only because they group smokers and former smokers together, the latter including anyone who has ever smoked over 100 cigs in a lifetime. The fact is that age demographics for most lung cancer patients today means they come from the generation when over 50% of the population of the US smoked, back in the 50's and early 60's (and there were many former smokers back then too). So you would expect that over 60-70% of the population over the age of 15 some 40 some odd years ago in 1960 would fall into that group of smokers andformer smokers. Most lung cancers occur in people over the age of 50, according to Cornell.

The US was also a mostly industrial based economy 40 years ago, with extremely high levels of air pollution from factory based emissions. As the US transformed into a service and technology based economy, exporting the dirty manufacturing segments to cheaper labor markets in third world countries, the air pollution has cleared up. Anti-smokers base falling lung cancer rates solely on falling smoking rates, but the fact is there has been a steady increase in population and the pure numbers of smokers in the US has stayed pretty consistent at right around 50 million for the last 50 years. Yet the pure numbers of annual diagnosed lung cancer cases have continued to climb throughout the last 30 years and have only recently begun to level off. These numbers can easily be researched on the net for those in search of the truth, which is why I haven't provided specific links. If you do need help with any, just ask.

Another fact the antis will not admit is that all mammals get lung cancer. When was the last time anyone saw the sheep and the cows smoking up a storm behind the barn when Farmer Brown wasn't looking? Sheep also get a form of "contagious" lung cancer caused by a retro-virus which causes a malignancy similar to that of 25% of the lung cancer cases in humans. Lung cancer has also been linked to prevalence of viral diseases in humans, such as to the prevalence of human papillimoviral (HPV) infections in Okinawa.

I'm not trying to show that smoking isn't at all linked to lung cancer, but merely showing that those undertaking the present anti-smoking crusades seek to hide the truth about real risk and prevalence levels. There is absolutely no reason to ban smoking entirely in hospitals. To do so would be as I said before, simply barbaric.

[lockjaw02]

Great post, freeeee. I plan to use that in letters to my reps in NY who voted for that miserable ban, some who were in the service fighting the "Cold War" against communism. How easily they forget.

Let's play a little game.

Welcome to Jeopardy. Please pose your "answer" in the form of a question.

I'd like "Famous Quotes" for a $1000, Alex.

Alex, "It takes a village."

[longtermmemmory]

The tobacco settlement was a cash out value of future tax revenue.

The states "cashed out" future revenue for a lump sum right now.

In exchange the tobacco companies were able to eliminate the nuisance suits. The states also go the added benefit from having their "assets" handed to them.

The real scam was the original insider agreements of the big lawyer companies. The fee agreements were nothing spectacular. The governments were stupid enough to sign without thinking and then wanted to renegotiate.

The governments simple cut the goose open because they wanted all the golden eggs at once.

What happens when they start marketing a safe cigarette? Will we have nicotine gum suits in the future?

[lockjaw02]

Actually, the tobacco wars have been going on for many centuries. It's only because of sheer numbers of users that it wasn't included earlier in the modern day war on drugs.

Also a percentage of marijuana users are pushing for more restrictions and controls on tobacco. It seems hypocritical to decry the restrictions on them but support it for others. One reason being is that the anti-smokers will fight to their dying breath and government has to side with them, because the arguments we are using for freedom from state-sponsored oppression also correlate to those for legalization of marijuana. So, I assume, some are doing it just to awaken the masses of complacent tobacco consumers who don't foresee the eventual prohibition of all growth, manufacturing, transport, and sale of tobacco as with other drugs. Many will switch sides as smokers begin winning more battles and try to be included in the general arguments to help repeal all war on drugs laws.

The collective Governments' are in a catch-22 situation. They can't really oppose tobacco restrictions with their support for other drug restrictions, yet to fight consumer tobacco interests, they are awakening the nascent masses to oppose their total control.

[Gabz]

I'm not trying to show that smoking isn't at all linked to lung cancer, but merely showing that those undertaking the present anti-smoking crusades seek to hide the truth about real risk and prevalence levels. There is absolutely no reason to ban smoking entirely in hospitals. To do so would be as I said before, simply barbaric.

Just goes to show the antis and their paid for legislators are barbarians.

[Gabz]

To do so would be as I said before, simply barbaric.

Just goes to show the antis and their paid for legislators are simple barbarians.

(sheesh - trying to do too many things at one time.)

[philman_36]

They got their foot in with the smoking bans...........what ELSE is on their agenda?
The foot was in the door with the WOsD in all its various facets. 60 odd years of perfecting "the technique of prohibition" has helped too. Cigarette smokers were the most likely targets after that.
WHO else are on their agenda.
JMO, but the most likely target now will be the alcohol industry, again, with the sex/porno industry running a close second. Two "health costly" activities...(cough, cough)
Think about it.
I have and I do..quite often.
reference Martin Niemoller

[CSM]

Great post #81. I am glad I was able to read it!