The Great Smoking Debate & Freepers

March 9, 2003 | me

[Im4Starr]

And, if smoking does kill you, why isn't it completely illegal?

[gcruse]

Smoking will kill you. But it's your choice and the state should have no right to outlaw your choice of demise, anymore than what vegetable you can grow legally in your garden. It's up to you.

[Leisler]

Well Tacky, why do you go there?

Oh, it was from your imagination, fake, untrue, false.

You're really effective. Not.

[Madame Dufarge]

This place is depressing at times......

I don't think so.

Why do you say that?

[Madame Dufarge]

Feel free to live your life or not as you choose.

Thanks for the permission.

[hunter112]

And, if smoking does kill you, why isn't it completely illegal?

The simple answer: politics.

Its the same reason heroin and marijuana are illegal, and abortion is legal.

It takes a lot of political pressure to keep drugs illegal, to keep tobacco legal, and to override the Supreme Court.

Don't think that tobacco will always remain 100% legal, with Jesse Helms out of the Senate, its days are probably numbered.

Me, I don't care how you all choose to live or die, I'm just disappointed in how these threads become battlegrounds for those who insist on the right to smoke anywhere, anytime, and under any conditions, and those who have lost loved ones from cancer blamed on tobacco.

I'd hope that we could abide by conservative principles that support personal freedom, coupled with the responsibility to keep your activities (not speech, but conduct) from abusing your neighbors.

[Walnut]

life kills peoople get over it

[Madame Dufarge]

If smokers would simply avoid non-smokers and stop trying to argue that smoking is not bad for their health they would get more support from "conservatives" that waffle about the entire debate.

Smokers don't argue that "smoking is not bad for their health" (thanks for caring so much).

We argue that it's none of your business if we choose to engage in an activity that has risks involved that we opt to assume.

Because this is such an alien concept to some, and apparently paralyzingly frightening also, the "Mother Theresa" argument was dragged out, whereby smokers are killing the people who apparently will live forever if only they didn't have to be within 1,000 yards of a smoker, given the "carcinogenic effect" of "second-hand smoke."

Thank heaven there are plenty of agenda-driven "scientists" available to take on no-heavy-lifting jobs at good wages to provide "studies" to bolster the control freaks' argument.

[Madame Dufarge]

I'm just disappointed in how these threads become battlegrounds for those who insist on the right to smoke anywhere, anytime, and under any conditions, and those who have lost loved ones from cancer blamed on tobacco.

Please post specific examples of those who "insist on the right to smoke anywhere, anytime, and under any conditions."

Thank you.

[gcruse]

Feel free to live your life or not as you choose.Thanks for the permission.

It's not as much a given as you think.  The WOD is an excellent
example of being denied life as one chooses and the federal
overruling of state enacted suicide laws shows that one is not
allowed to end life as one chooses, either.  You may have my
permission to do these things, but not that of many, many others.

[Walnut]

over weight kills people .livung kills people
give it a break

[Walnut]

You think smokings a curse
How aboout the impending war. thats not more of a conern

[ladyjane]

Feel free to live your life or not as you choose. Just don't expect others to breathe the stuff against their will.

People may feel free to smoke, but it's not free. Look at the cost of medical insurance. It's gone through the roof. Part of that increase is due to illness caused by smoking, alcoholism and...oh yes, illegals who get free medical care!

[Madame Dufarge]

You may have my permission to do these things, but not that of many, many others.

How breathtakingly arrogant.

Last I looked, but perhaps I blinked, I don't need your permission or the permission of "many, many others" to live my life as I choose.

Why would a "conservative" even entertain such thinking?

[gcruse]

Actually, you do. Look at all the laws applying to your lifestyle. I'm a libertarian. Freedom to me means things that conservatives just don't countenance.

[Walnut]

what are you saying ? it seems like a mixed message. to meNo I don/t want too loud music but again I can leave just the same just as you can leave if people are smoking and you object , If I don't like it I can leave. There's nothing wrong with staying at home or going some place else . dn't try too control the world. If you succeced then you have commumnism.my
spelling may not be on the money but my point is

[Madame Dufarge]

I'm a libertarian. Freedom to me means things that conservatives just don't countenance.

So, as a libertarian, you think that an adult engaging in a legal activity requires the permission of "many, many others" to do so?

I've subscribed to Reason and Liberty for many years, and I must have missed the articles bolstering this particular argument of yours.

Could you further explicate?

[gcruse]

We are miscomnunicating, I think. What I failed to state clearly is that, given the many victimless crimes, our ability to live our lives as we choose in the absence of doing violence to others, is restricted by the law. These laws were passed and are supported by many, many others. In other words, many others have a hand in telling the individual how he can live.

[Madame Dufarge]

We are miscomnunicating, I think.

I apologize; I believe we are miscommunicating.

Your point, I believe, is that the glories of "democracy" are overcoming the common sense of the republic?

[gcruse]

I think it distills down to the 'community' has no rights. Only the individual.