I’ve had it, I’ve held my tongue long enough. This is a rant on all you “ban-smoking” Nazis.
The catalyst of this is the loss of Winston as the primary sponsor of NASCAR’s elite racing league. But much more as follows, let’s try to follow this logic class.
In 1971, R.J. Reynolds became the primary sponsor of the highest rated/ most followed race circuit in the world, to the tune of $41 Million per year. It will next year be in the hands of Nextel at $70 Million. Surely RJR didn’t leave because of financial concerns, they need cash. Why?
As a smoker, some of my brethren were suckered into suing a company that offered warnings of the product. Some won (but later lost all in appeals) and every “journalist” looking for the next Watergate was all over the story. Now smokers are the next Satan.
Two cases in point of the mad-dog mentality.
I own season tickets to Lambeau Field. Last year at the Lion’s game I had a man seated across the aisle. Lambeau went smoke-free last year, even though it’s an OPEN-AIR STADIUM!!! He complained of my smoke and I promptly snuffed it. Then I get pissy. I asked what kind of car he drove and he replied a Caddillac SUV. After he drank 5 more beers I asked if he was concerned about his SUV having a greater chance of killing my son in an accident or the added exhaust we’d all have to inhale from his gas-guzzler. He replied “When I’m driving, the exhaust is swllowed into the air.”
A few weeks later I’m sitting in a Ground Round (restaurant). Enjoying a cigarrette after my meal, the man sitting next to me at the bar demands I put my smoke ut after ordering his 4th martini, citing concern for his health.
I’VE HAD IT!!!
I’m all for being against the smokers. You smokers hold out as long as you can - as soon as you are all gone, they’re gonna come for me, only I don’t know what excuse they’ll use.
j.c. according to the logic, yu won’t be here because of my second-hand smoke ( I still want to know how they come up with those numbers) But if you do survive my attempt on your life,you can sue restaurants for making you fat!
Not obese? Sue them for making others obese and therby increasing your health insurance premiums.
The NASCAR thing really pisses me off. From what I heard, RJR advised them to end the deal because they were worried about the unknown future of the tobacco industry. I don’t think I could even conceive of stock car racing without thinking of Winston, and Winston actually did alot for the sport. It was a sponsorship, but the name association was a justified one. Wrigley Field and Busch Stadium are corporate names, but considering what those families did for those teams, it’s sensible. The last 30+ years, when Winston accompanied stock car racing as it grew into one of the biggest sporting events in America, made it truly the Winston Cup. Nextel is just some johnny-come-lately no better than those corporate sponsors who tack their name onto a college bowl game every year.
I agree in general that banning smoking in open air stadiums is kind of stupid. Even if there was more to the second-hand-smoke theories than there is, surely getting a whiff of smoke in public from a guy a few rows down isn’t going to kill you. But I understand these stadiums can get pretty packed, and some people might get annoyed, so I understand the policy. Faurot Field, home of the Missouri Tiger football team, has gone over the top though. Now they won’t even let you smoke on the concourse, you are expected to go all the way outside of the stadium for a smoke.
As for that last guy, if the bar allows smoking, I’d tell him to go to hell. If he doesn’t like it, he can go somewhere else, or sit in a private booth rather than at the bar, where you expect people to be smoking.
I think the first thing we need to do is bust the myth of second-hand smoke, inform the public of it’s dubious merit. Then things might start to change.
(BTW, I agree with your complaints but if I owned season tickets to Lambeau, I probably wouldn’t be complaining about anything too fervently, you have a charmed life.)
I smoked for over a decade and I was never that whiny, pissy, I get to do whatever I want prick … so it is it the cigarettes or the people who are the problem.
Deal with it. Owners of establishments (like stadiums) can make the rules. If you don’t like it, sell your tickets and chainsmoke in the comfort of your own livingroom while watching the game.
Health, schmealth. Even when I was smoking I didn’t paricularly like have smoke blown in my face. It’s irritating for everyone but the smoker. If I ever went somewhere where I was forbidden to smoke, you know what I did? I didn’t smoke. I may have even groused about it privately, but I didn’t make a stand “demanding my rights.”
Open air stadiums … yeah, there should at least be a smoke area, but smoking in the stands is irritating. Even as a smoker I knew that.
And drop all those phony analogies. If the guy wants to wreck his liver by drinking all those martinis, that’s HIS problem and he’s the only one affected. But if you’re smoking in the restaurant, then I can smell your smoke – and the health implications are not determined.
Suppose there was someone sitting in the table across from you in a restaurant who had just been shoveling pig manure, boots and pants covered in it, and it stank to high heaven. Do you think you would enjoy your meal if you could smell the stench? You would be justified in asking the restaurant to do something about it – like not let him in, say.
You want to smoke in your own home where only you breathe it in, that’s fine. Otherwise, why should I have to endure your stink?
Another “Awwwwww, too freaking bad!” here. I smoked for over 20 years, and quit two months ago. Even when I did smoke, I either stayed out of places that didn’t allow smoking or I didn’t smoke while I was there. I don’t want your freaking smoke around me, and no one else does either. Quitcher bitchin’ and go smoke outside.
Assuming the bar allowed smoking, you put it out on your own, You didn’t have to.
If I am anywhere where smoking is permitted, and someone DEMANDS that I put it out, I tell them to get fucked. If they ask politely, I may consider it.
Tell you what, you can smoke near me if you keep the lit end in your mouth at all times and use your lungs to absorb all the fumes.
I’m beginning to realize my dislike for smoking includes that fact that some fucked-up addict who got inadequate parental supervision as a teenager takes a puff, then sits there with the cig in his hand for two or three minutes, letting it pollute the air around him and annoy people (including me) who don’t smoke, aren’t interested in smoking, and would be perfectly happy if tobacco vanished from the Earth. Fuck, if you’re gonna smoke, at least have the courtesy to make it a private poisoning, willya? Maybe you could just chew tobacco instead.
Whiny bastard asshole.
Ah, that felt satisfying. And look, I don’t even need to light a cigarette to celebrate. Putz.
I read the article about the Winston NASCAR thing in the USA Today. The article said that Winston dropped out because of the television rules restricting where they could put signage. Bottom line: it’s no longer profitable for Winston to support NASCAR. Get it?
Prior to the recent TV rules, it was profitable for Winston to support racing. That is, they made lots of money off of the advertising. More money than they were investing. Yes, it was anti-smoking legislation that made it unprofitable, but Winston was hardly promoting the sport out of the kindness of their heart.
Pfft. That’s what Winston was when they began sponsoring the old Grand National Championship. They were trying to find a refuge from the increasing restrictions on tobacco advertising. That’s all.
Of all the reasons to get upset at smoking restrictions, it seems to me that which mega-corp sponsors a mega-sport would be pretty far down there. And I say that as a smoker (Camels, not Winstons, but still) and a NASCAR fan. Get over it. There’s probably more mullets at a typical NASCAR race than smokers anyway.
And, apparently, there seems to be some confusion about the Brownshirts. Pay attention:
I don’t smoke, and i never have. At the same time, i’ve also never been a big supporter of government-mandated bans on smoking in restaurants and bars, a la California and, now, New York City. I admit it’s nice to go to a bar in California and not come out at the end of the night stinking of other people’s smoke, but if smoking were still allowed it wouldn’t stop me from going to bars, just like it doesn’t stop me here in Baltimore.
All that said, your rant is still lame and, as far as Lambeau Field goes, is only part of the truth. According to the Green Bay Packers’ own website, smoking is still allowed in certain areas of the stadium, to wit:
Also, you say that Lambeau is an “open-air stadium.” Now, i’ve never been to Green Bay, and i’m sure you know the place better than i do, but the same website makes it very clear that the new smoking policy was impelled by changes in the design of the stadium:
Now, i’m not sure exactly how the decisions about smoking at Lambeau were made, or by whom. But surely, as someone who’s been to games there, you must be aware that the field itself, and the football team, are publicly owned by Green Bay and its citizens. Maybe, if the smoking policies are such a big deal for you, you should try and rally support in Green Bay to have them changed. Or could it be that the majority of the fans–who are also the owners of the team and the stadium–are quite happy not to have smoke blowing over them during football games?
And regarding your restaurant experience, there are two possibilities:
That you were seated in a non-smoking section, in which case that is the restaurant’s call and you have no cause to whine when someone asks you not to smoke.
That you were seated in a smoking section, in which case you should have politely (or not) pointed that fact out to the guy who was complaining, and continued to smoke your cigarette.
A final general note:
For those who think bans on smoking in restaurants and bars, such as those enacted recently in NYC, are stupid, may i recommend the current (July) edition of Harper’s magazine, in which editor Lewis Lapham spends a few pages slamming Michael Bloomberg and his anti-smoking crusade.
Yeah, I smoke. I am embarrassed to admit it, even to strangers. I feel like I am going to be the last one in the world still smoking. I’m the last one in my social circle, by far. I keep hoping one of the following will occur:
The government will classify tobacco as a “controlled substance” and it will be banned, or
The tobacco companies will be sued into bankruptcy and cease to exist. I sure as hell ain’t going to grow the weed myself.
Of course, I should just summon the will-power to end this hideous addiction. Give me the strength O invisible being in the sky.
On topic: I haven’t smoked indoors in years, even in hotels. The stink gets on everything, especially clothing. I don’t smoke in restaurants even if it is permitted. I appreciate the feelings of others, even if I’ll never see them again. I wouldn’t fart in an elevator, either. I don’t know whether or not secondhand smoke is dangerous. That is not the issue, really. I mean, if you were eating and someone set a newspaper on fire and the smoke drifted into your face, would you find that tolerable?
I must quit. :mad:
I did not do the “Opal” thing because I don’t understand it and it would be silly and presumptious for a newbie to adopt a foriegn custom just for a wild stab at acceptance.
I’m not sure anyone who watches NASCAR racing can complain about the air pollution of someone else’s car, even vicariously. But it is oddly ironic that the sponsorship went from appealing to one of the most vilified classes (smokers) to the next most (cell phone users).
If the establishment allows smoking, a smoker should be considerate, BUT… it doesn’t give a non-smoker carte blanche to be an asshole and demand a damn thing.
If it isn’t a non-smoking establishment, take yourself and your precious lungs somewhere else in the place.