How long until people stop hating smokers and drinkers?

A bar is open to the public, yes, but it's privately owned. It should be up to the property owner whether or not smoking is allowed inside their establishment, IMO. I'm sure it'd go both ways, some choosing to ban it, others to allow it. If you don't want to be around smoke, go to one of the bars that has a no smoking sign posted.

Public bars are also licensed premises, and in many places segregating smokers from non-smokers would be a license condition.

Sodaholic said:

one of the bars that has a no smoking sign posted.

I've never even seen such a thing - at least until Britain introduced a smoking ban several years ago, after which there was one in every pub.

IMO it's a public health issue. I understand why a laissez-faire attitude sounds attractive but sometimes it's right for the government to step in to do the right thing.

fraggle said:

I've never even seen such a thing - at least until Britain introduced a smoking ban several years ago, after which there was one in every pub.

IMO it's a public health issue. I understand why a laissez-faire attitude sounds attractive but sometimes it's right for the government to step in to do the right thing.

I agree. Nobody has the right to poison others who don't want to be poisoned. And since a bar can make more money by making it accessible to more people health wise it will. If u want to smoke go outside. But if a bar is open to inside smoking and a non smoker goes in there knowingly that's on them. No room for griping.

dew said:

Then why call him out on belonging to those people? There surely must be something wrong about them to denigrate a supposedly evil man by belonging to them.

Because I tried to make a pointless joke... but I guess it wasn't so funny.

EDIT: Dew post helled my post while i was in the process of replying.

Mr. Freeze said:

I hope the taxes on cigarettes and alcohol continue to climb. Have fun paying for my roads, you addicts.

Edited version: (I actually would like to have a conversation about this): More taxation/regulations on cigarettes can lead to bigger black markets of the distribution of single cigarettes.... In NYC, smuggling and selling un-taxed cigarettes is rampant. Police are now cracking down harder than ever (& You can thank Ex-NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg & current NYC Mayor Bill DeBlasio for this) to prevent the unlawful distribution of cigs on the streets. It's a waste of taxpayer money to catch and jail these guys.

Sodaholic said:

If you don't want to be around smoke, go to one of the bars that has a no smoking sign posted.

VGames said:

But if a bar is open to inside smoking and a non smoker goes in there knowingly that's on them. No room for griping.

Except that in my case virtually all bars and restaurants choose to explicitly allow smoking. No room for choice. Some have better ventilation and can make the smoke go away though.

Well either go to another one in the next town or stop going to bars. I'd say the second choice is best. Overrated and over priced anyways. What happened to hanging out at a friends house and having a few drinks?

darknation said:

I fucking love smoking and drinking. I'm going to do more of it because it annoys moralist little pissants like yourself.

Seconded. Smoking and drinking kicks ass. My lung and kidney feel great.

I'm sure she said the same thing at one point in her life.

VGames said:

What happened to hanging out at a friends house and having a few drinks?

I prefer to go out downtown than into someone's parents' (where one often lives) apartment in the slums.

printz said:

I prefer to go out downtown than into someone's parents' (where one often lives) apartment in the slums.

U need better "friends".

kb1 said:

My lung and kidney feel great.

Heh.

VGames said:

Scary anti-smoking demotivational poster

The funny thing is that smoking does nothing so extreme to the majority of people, or if it does, it will happen in such an old age where you wouldn't be able to tell whether smoking had really got anything to do with it. Besides, we all have heard stories about "grandfathers that smoked like Turks and lived to be 100", amirite?

There has even been a research claiming that about 25% of people actually benefit from smoking, and there are some recognized potential benefits from smoking. Smoking can be good for you!.

So perhaps it's time to split the human race in two factions, since what's good for one harms the other?

The X Men that feed on smoke like elsen, the Y Men that feed on caffeine like most everybody, and the Z Men that hrmhrmwhatever

Maes said:

The funny thing is that smoking does nothing so extreme to the majority of people, or if it does, it will happen in such an old age where you wouldn't be able to tell whether smoking had really got anything to do with it. Besides, we all have heard stories about "grandfathers that smoked like Turks and lived to be 100", amirite?

And fucking Turks used coal as fuel in their hookas.

Beyond The Brink: How The Israeli Occupation Has Made It Impossible For Palestinians To Score Drugs @ The Onion

Arctangent said:

So is water.

The difference is that water, sugar, and fat are fundamental parts of the human body and, despite what some fad diets might claim, the latter two are required nutrients. Nicotine isn't.

So what? Sugar and fat will still kill you if you eat too much of it. You think the fact people naturally have fat in their bodies means obese people who eat shitloads of salt, sugar and fat, aren't harming themselves or costing us large amounts of money in healthcare costs?

Arctangent said:

Unless you're literally shitting in other people's mouths, that would be because the aftereffects of consuming sugar and fat have absolutely no impact on the people around you.

Arctangent said:

With less people buying cigarettes and alchohol comes less drunk driving accidents and less cases of lung and throat cancer.

If nobody could buy guns, there would also be no gun accidents. If fast food was banned, fewer people would be obese. If you care so much why not just ban everything that is bad for us?

scifista42 said:

Both sugar and fat are vital nutrients that all of our bodies need. They can be unhealthy only if the person eats either too little or too much of them. This is clearly not the exact same case like with alcohol and cigarettes, so your comparison is strange.

What the hell are you talking about? Barely anybody is harmed as a result of light or moderate alcohol use. In fact research suggests that moderate amounts of alcohol is actually good for us. Smoking I don't think is ever going to be healthy, but casual smokers don't just automatically get cancer and die, or suffer horrible illness. Comments like this is one of the reasons I can't stand anti-smoking/alcohol zealots, generally you have no idea what you are talking about.

Wagi said:

Sorry, I should also be complaining about the cancer-causing fumes that people who eat excessive sugar put off too. How inconsistent of me.

You don't need to be around smoke anymore so than you want to, unless you are in a publicly OWNED area and some douche decided to smoke in front of you. Get this into your fucking heads: You have no right telling others what to do on their private property. Regardless of if it is open to the public or not.

Wagi said:

I think you're the one who needs an economics lesson. People are addicted to smoking. That means they'll pay a fuckload of money for it pretty much no matter what the price is, because they need their fix.

Wow! You gotta love this fucking argument. So not only do you just assume that most people who drink and smoke are addicts by default even though this has no bases in reality, but you also try to defend the idea of super high taxes on those things by claiming the state can always rely on people's addictions to make sure they still pay the tax! Jesus fucking christ. And why would those people buy the super expensive booze anyway instead of just buying moonshine or some other crap?

Wagi said:

And even if they did buy less of the product, we'd still be making more money in taxes than if we didn't tax them at all, and it would keep healthcare costs down for anybody who IS deterred, so this is an idiotic argument.

Even if I agreed that there should be some kind of tax (and I don't), this still isn't a valid argument for super high taxes. You still haven't explained how the state saves money by lowering healthcare and social costs if the savings are just made redundant by the fact that tax revenue has dropped. What is so fucking hard about grasping the idea that if the state saves a X amount of dollar in expense but loses similar or even more amount of revenue then nothing has been saved? Is there just some kind of a liberal gene that makes it biologically impossible for you people to have responsible fiscal policy?

fraggle said:

Either people buy less of it and the public health cost goes down...

...along with the tax revenue.

fraggle said:

or people continue to buy the same amount and you make the money from taxes you need to pay the burden on public health.

And even then, you aren't saving money, because in order to make this money people need to pay the tax which means buying the product. More people buying alcohol means more social cost but also more tax for the government.

fraggle said:

Or another way of putting it is that it's about being fiscally responsible.

No, it's about telling others what to do while proving how ignorant liberals are about fiscal issues.

VGames said:

This is a thread to defend hipsters who think smoking and binge drinking is still ok to do. Grow up already.

I got news for you, smoking and drinking isn't going anywhere. If anything, the kind of obnoxious behavior demonstrated by nanny-state supporters is more likely to increase hostility towards it's cause rather than increase it.

darknation said:

I fucking love smoking and drinking. I'm going to do more of it because it annoys moralist little pissants like yourself.

:)

Bucket said:

global warming

A liberal hoax intended to mask their desire to increase government control of the economy and raise taxes.

myk said:

It's a public service. It doesn't need to be vital. It often involves necessity, though. Suppose you are summoned to a social meeting at a bar and the bar was chosen by the meeting organizers. If smoking is allowed, you'll be forced to bear it because you had to go to the meeting.

Then hold the meeting someplace else.

myk said:

In the end, private establishments comply with anti-smoking laws and it's convenient for them.

Bars can decide for themselves what is good for them.

hardcore_gamer said:

...but casual smokers don't just automatically get cancer and die, or suffer horrible illness...

...you just assume that most people who drink and smoke are addicts by default even though this has no bases in reality...

...liberal gene...

...you people..

...ignorant liberals...

...nanny-state supporters...

...A liberal hoax intended to mask their desire to increase government control of the economy and raise taxes...

I really love alcohol and tobacco on occasion, but hardcore_gamer's idiocy is turning me off of them by mere association.

I may never enjoy another drink or smoke in my life and it's all your fault.

hardcore_gamer said:

tl;dr

Will @doom_txt be able to handle all that post? This is important.

The funny thing is that smoking does nothing so extreme to the majority of people, or if it does, it will happen in such an old age where you wouldn't be able to tell whether smoking had really got anything to do with it.

About 80% of lung cancers come from smoking. That's after you adjust the data to exclude cancers that would happen regardless.

If you die at 50 while fighting oiled muscled men with spears, as should be expected of a proud Greek warrior, I suppose this is irrelevant. I'm a coward and I want to live until the Singularity uploads GoatLord's brain to my pinkie finger, so no smoking here.

Fedora fad

teen writes thoughtfully
grown man posts internet memes
are you winning, son?

Patty Cake is a meme.

hardcore_arguer

hardcore_gamer is my dummy account.

Technician said:

hardcore_gamer is my dummy account.

the dummy part at any rate

Are you implying that hardcore_gamer has Technician's hand up his ass?

No, the invisible hand of the free market is already wedged up there.

Phml said:

Smokers and drinkers cost tax money (cancer medical expenses), put other people at risk (road accidents, second-hand smoke). All for the sake of their personal pleasure. Let me grab my violin for you, might take a while because it's really tiny.

Let's be honest, if our species weren't a bunch of fucking retarded assholes, us smokers/drinkers probably wouldn't be depressed enough to smoke and drink.

Mr. Freeze said:

I hope the taxes on cigarettes and alcohol continue to climb. Have fun paying for my roads, you addicts.

Nothing is more annoying than vapers though.

Can you even see me from that horse O' so high?

hardcore_gamer said:

So in this thread I have heard 2 common anti-smoking and anti-alcohol arguments, both of which are bullshit:

1. "These things need to be taxed to make up for the cost."

2. "Smokers don't have the right to make me smell or make me be around smoke."

1. Sugar is also bad for you. So is fat. And yet there is no special fat tax, and the sugar tax in my country was actually abolished recently on the bases that it's other peoples concern what you eat. THIS WAS SAID BY THE SAME PEOPLE WHO SUPPORT THE ALCOHOL AND SMOKES TAX!!!

In addition, the nanny leftists who defend super high taxes on these things also fail at economics. If you tax something so much that people buy less of it then you just make less money of it. This means that even if the state may not end up spending as much money on healthcare costs it won't matter because they will also make less money of booze/smokes. Nanny leftists know this even if they pretend they don't, so their main goal is merely to tell others what to do.

2. I agree with you if you are in a public place, like when you are waiting for the buss. But using this argument when you are located on another individual's property just makes you sound like self-entitled pieces of shit. A bar is not a vital public service. Nobody owes you the right to go to a bar and not be around smoke. If you can tell a bar owner to not allow smoking just because you don't want to be around it, then why not also tell people they can't smoke in their own homes in case you are visiting?

Wow... Other than the unwarranted bashing of "the big old mean Left" (may be more relevant in your home, though it's not really here in mega-conservative AUS) this is a hardcore_gamer post that I totally agree with. AND I'm disagreeing with Mr. Freeze and Phml - I think the world just flipped upside down..

Arctangent said:

Unless you're literally shitting in other people's mouths, that would be because the aftereffects of consuming sugar and fat have absolutely no impact on the people around you.

Diabetes is a thing. A thing with a very high price for you and your loved ones. So... Yeah. The point here is not whether something is required for the human body to function, the point here is differentiating use from abuse. I can eat a fuckton of McDonalds and die essentially the same way a smoker can have a pack a day and die.

If we start outlawing things just because they're unhealthy, we're going to live in a right fucking angry world. Many people readily acknowledge that these bad habits are unhealthy and enjoy them in a responsible way that doesn't harm others. I can't imagine why anyone would want to remove such a basic freedom.

I want to be clear here, I'm totally okay with smoking being fuly banned indoors. However, I think it's obvious restaurant/bar owners should have the basic choice of rather or not their patrons should be able to enjoy a cigarette outside. Just as you have the basic right to choose not to go to a premesis that allows outdoor smoking..

I dunno, every anti-booze and anti-smoking opinion I've seen here AND elsewhere usually just boils down to "Your freedoms end where my feelings begin" with the occasional sprinkle of good points, like reduced car accidents. Even then it's a case of "Welp, a miniscule percentage of the population can't handle the responsibility, so let's ban it!" Which just spawns a black market and doesn't remove demand at all. In fact all it does is increase crime. Definitely not a winning formula.

My opinion is this - If someone chooses to consume alcohol and tobacco in a way that doesn't pollute other people's air or whatever, that's their choice and if you want to deny them that basic fucking freedom in this insane world, you're a big selfish meanie head! Oh and don't give me that fucking "the sick tobacco smokers are wasting our tax dollars" horse shit, the government obviously doesn't need any help wasting tax revenue, they do that above and beyond WITHOUT the assistance of smokers, thank you very much.

Maes said:

Just stop providing state-funded healthcare. Problem solved. Whoever wants to fuck his body up, is free to do it. As he is completely free to pay for his own health expenses, if he can afford them. No? Well, then drink & smoke to forget and dull your pain, duh! It worked just fine up to the 20th century, and nations thrived just fine.

I hope this is tongue-in-cheek, Maes - Always hard to tell with you :) If I break a bone on the job, it's nice knowing the government will help me pay for it. It's nice knowing the government at least sorta-kinda has your back in some cases. I never knew what that felt like til I left the US and came to AU.

Phml said:

Shame the fatties, shame the drunks, shame the nicotine addicts. Shame us all for playing video games. A little bit of self-reflection never hurt anyone.

I agree with this too, however a stripping of freedoms is quite a few rungs up from mere self reflection.

darknation said:

I fucking love smoking and drinking. I'm going to do more of it because it annoys moralist little pissants like yourself.

You're suddenly my favorite DW user.


Doomworld really blows my mind sometimes. I identify quite firmly with "The Left" (cue horror music) but some of you - Even those ones I love to death - are such SJW fagoids about this kind of stuff that you don't see the problem with removing freedom of choice from our lives. If you're that concerned about your health, that's wonderful, but don't sit there and judge the rest of the world like you know something we all don't. You don't know what someone's gone through that leads them to smoking or drinking. If you do and want to help them, that's great, but if you know even the most fundamental basics of psychology then you also inherently know the best way to do that isn't to "outcast" other human beings. It's ironic when the people who are always patting themselves on the pack as progressive, open-minded, etc. are trying to strip away basic fucking human rights.

Attempt, just attempt to see things from other perspectives. Yes, regulations, restrictions and laws need to be in place. No, it should NOT be outlawed or banned, thus spawning a black market.

I lost a very good friend recently to smoking enduced lung cancer. I love him very much and wish he were still here, but I STILL don't think it ever would have been my right to tell him what he can and cannot do with his own fucking body. He knew the risks. All smokers know the risks. He had a very difficult life through and through and smoking was one of his ways of dealing. Hell, the only place he ever smoked was in his home too, so screw anyone who thinks they have to right to tell someone they can't do that just because they don't like it.

Let me be doubly clear here: I drink a few beers here and there and smoke pot, but not tobacco. I think big tobacco is evil. Growing your own tobacco is illegal and that should be stopped but won't because all the guys who make the decisions only care about money anyway, literally nothing else. Those of you pointing your figners at smokers and calling "global warming" while you use your computers and cars.. That's just a fucking laugh and a half.

While you're playing Doom you're doing nothing but wasting power, pulluting the enviroment (that powers comes from somwhere, you know) and wasting your life away on an addiction while you could have been doing something healthy. Rgular use of a computer is known to have negative effects on the eyes, hands and even brain in extreme cases. Does that mean Dooming should be illegal, since some of us do it in excess/to the point of wastefulness/to the point of health issues such as RSI, or should basic fucking human rights be left alone?

Maybe we should just ban public Dooming - I know a lot of people are offended by the sounds of imps dying, and I need to make legislature based on that so I can say I did something with my political career. BRB.

I have two different opinions on smoking and drinking so...


Smoking:

Smoking is one of those activities that should be allowed in bars and restaurants as well as private clubs. It's part of the atmosphere. But there are other issues.

1: Littering. I have seen many a people take a cigarette and toss it out the car window. The roads ain't the ashtray buddy. Go find a receptacle and use it.

2: Smoking in the home WHEN there are kids and animals. This one is a big one for me. Don't do it around your fucking kids or animals. The same rule applies if you are pregnant. It takes two to conceive but it only takes one to harm the baby by smoking while pregnant - so don't do it.

3: When all the entrances outside are blocked by smoking areas. My office has a smoking area near the non emergency entrance to the office. So what other way do I have?

4: Fires. There have been fires linked to careless smoking, and that's all I need to say. My main concern here isn't so much the fires but rather sleeping in your apartment with a burning cigarette in your mouth waiting to drop onto the bed or sofa.

As far as taxes go, I support taxing cigarettes. They aren't food, and should have a tax imposed on them. Just like alcohol.

Drinking:

Completely different from smoking altogether. I drink casually. Alcohol is fine, but the problem is that people abuse it. And once that line is crossed, then it gets bad. Keep in mind though, that anything can be abused, but alcohol abuse is extremely common.

1: Drinking and driving. Yeah, it's fucking common. More than you think. Don't do it. Not as bad as texting and driving, but it's not safe, period.

2: Alcoholism. This is essentially drug addiction and has been known to cause violent tempers. Would you want to work with or live with an alcoholic?

3: Peer pressure. Another issue is just the pressure - I'm thinking frats in colleges where they pretty much encourage stupid behavior.


In other words, both should be legal but there are issues that must be addressed.