Have we been lied to about secondhand smoke?

Great Debates
61

There would be fewer smokers “walking around outside” or standing next to the entrance to your building if you and your ilk had left them inside. That should be obvious to anyone but the control freaks.

Of course not. If you think it is, call a cop and tell him you’ve been forcibly assaulted. When he stops laughing at your idiocy, if you’re lucky enough to avoid a mandatory mental exam, he’ll explain the difference between “force” and “happenstance.” I’m sorry to hear you have no windows in your own car to roll up.

MOST people can figure out ways to get along in society, even with those whose habits they don’t particularly like. Those who can’t fall squarely in the anti-smoker nico-Nazi camp, tight hairnets and all.

62

I clicked on ivylass’s cites in her op. Humph. Several are slides claiming some study but without any details available of methods or if these were published, peer reviewed or what. And the one that she claimed was proof that second hand smoke was not harmful in a workplace was no such thing. It merely showed that in one workplace in which smoking was unrestricted, exposure was not great. So what? Nothing to with whether or not second hand smoke is harmful and if so to what degree. Now I’ve been aware that second-hand smoke is a major risk factor for SIDS, for asthma, and for ear infections … but I am no expert on the effects on adults. Surely studies disproving such effects have made it to recent peer reviewed literature.

So I did a little PubMed search of my own.

Of note: documentation of the increased risk of asthma from second-hand smoke;a comprehensive review sponsered by the EPA that conclude that second-hand smoke kills 53,000 nonsmokers a year; a survey that disputes JohnBckWLD’s contention that bar workers like to work with the smokers (three quarters of bar workers wanted smoking restrictions in bars)

Maybe they are all part of the nonsmoking industrial complex and all fuding data or misinterpreting. But I’d like to see some peer reviewed studies that contradict these conclusions rather than tobacco company sponsered unpublished claptrap. Maybe I missed it. Please provide some cites that contradict this from real peer reviewed sources.

How much risk and/or irritation to others warrants how much limitation upon smokers? Is it such a big deal for a smoker to refrain for an hour or so and wait to light up til they are outside or is it prefered that nonsmokers just don’t breathe for that length of time?

63

Here’s a test that you can make that may indicate why smoking may be harmful to smokers and SHS not harmful. Have a smoker take a napkin and put it over the end of his cigarette and inhale as normal. Then look at the napkin. I’ve done this and it scared the hell out of me back in 1959, before the surgeon general came out with the first warning. Now take another napkin and cover your mouth. Have the smoker blow smoke in your face and at the same time you inhale thru the napkin. Now look at the napkin and the amount of residue. I’ve never done the second part of this test, but I’m willing to bet that the difference is off the chart. :stuck_out_tongue: [sup]Ain’t it horrible the things one must do in the name of science?[/sup]

In answer to your question Max I can remember when smokers smoked pretty much where and when they wanted to and non-smokers had to put up with it. That wasn’t right and making smoking off limits in certain places is fair. It is not fair to pass laws that make smokers go outside to smoke at all. Hell it seems that pldennison won’t be happy until we have to put fishbowl-style helmets on in order to smoke outside. Smokers have accepted a lot of restrictions and the anti-smokers keep pushing for more. People with a cause are dangerous at the end of a crusade.

64

No, what you’d want to try is this: tie that napkin so that it covers your mouth and nose and spend three or four hours in a smoky club or bar. Then look at the napkin.

I don’t doubt that smokers get orders of magnitude more smoke in their lungs than non-smokers. What I’m saying is that non-smokers will get a significant amount as well if they spend any length of time in smoke-filled rooms.

-fh

65

No, the jury is not still out on secondhand smoke, the jury was never empanelled.

Anybody who is a toxicologist will tell you that there is a threshold level of exposure to any substance, and certainly cigarette smoke, that will harm a person of average sensitivity. They will also tell you that this level of sensitivity differs among people for any given substance, such that some people will be adversely affected at levels that would not bother other people in the slightest. The threshold level of observable effects in sensitive people is much less than for most people, and they will suffer damages, including all of the damages suffered by sensitive smokers.

Most of the pro smoking argument seems to ignore the fact that these public places have workers who have no choice to be there.

Next you need to study the economic effect of banning smoking in public places. I live in a city that has a lot more restaurants than surrounding communities. We were the first city in our area to ban smoking completely in public restaurants and bars. Need I tell you what happened to the business of these fine establishments? Not what you expect. Business dramatically increased.

Line the smokers up put out their butts.

66

Hey, Max, remember what you said about people not being able to read? Why don’t you go back and look at my repeated statement, “I would not support such an amendment,” before you sling accusations about what I or “my ilk” ( :rolleyes: ) have done to anyone? Or does the non-reading thing only work when it supports your position? Looks to me like you’re more interested in being an ideologue than in having a dialogue.

67

I’ve stated in this very thread that I support the right of smokers to smoke on their own property, on common property unless there is some other legitimate reason to disallow it, and on other people’s property where they have permission from the property owner. Therefore, please either provide support for this ridiculous statement, or retract it and apologize.

68

So you are either arguing that smoke (second hand or otherwise, let’s not pretend their’s a big difference between the two) is either;

  • beneficial?
  • has no impact at all on those who breath it in?

Either way, it makes me wonder why my eyes smart and my lungs spasm into coughs when encountering smoke. Stupid body organs. Are they just prejudiced? Don’t they know it’s harmless? Suck it up lungs! The jury is still out as to whether it’s bad for you or not! Stop watering eyes! Smoke gets rid of those bloodshot veins and actually improves your appearance!

Anyone who drives and complains about speeding is a hypocrite. There you are, risking a crash by driving. So you have no right to complain about others who want to take it up a notch and do a little racing as well. If you have a problem with this then you should go build your own roads. Stop attempting to infringe the liberty of speeders!

Just because you are prepared to accept one moderate risk to your health does not mean others are free to impose their higher risks onto you as well.

As previously explained, your comparisons are totally invalid. Smoking is bad for your health. There is no such thing as ‘smoking in moderation’ that is good for your health, unlike eating or drinking.

69

Let’s all pretend that that says “there’s”, shall we?

:rolleyes: How did that get in there? :smack:

70

The workers always have a choice. They can choose to find another job. “Protecting the worker…” I see. So waitresses and waiters and bartenders cannot decide for themselves what their tolerance level is for secondhand smoke…we must decide for them.

Doesn’t anyone find this presumption that someone else knows what its best for you disturbing? We all have free choice here…to decide where we want to eat and work. Why are we so willing to let someone else make that decision for us?

71

You mean back to the days when no gentleman would ever light up in public without asking permission from those around him? The days when gentlemen put on “smoking jackets” so their suits wouldn’t be permeated with smoke when they rejoined the ladies after their after-dinner smoke? I fully agree.

72

quick point -
the smokers argument that non smokers are free to leave a bar and go to one that does not allow smoking is a bit unrealistic. I’ve never even heard of a bar outside of CA that did not allow smoking. This is not due to the “free market”. It’s just the status quo. I’m not going to open my own bar either.

The jury may still be out on the degree of harm that SHS causes, but surely the pro smoking crowd should have to prove it’s harmlessness as it is the health of the non smokers that could potentially be affected. We currently have contradicting medical opinions regarding SHS, it makes more sense to me to marginally restrict one groups freedoms for the sake of not harming the majorities lungs. Is it really that much of a burden to have to step outside to smoke?

One final point - the argument has bben made that those in bars should not complain about smoke as they’re harming themeselves with the alcohol anyway. Not everybody drinks at bars. Some people socialize, try to pick up members of the opposite sex, watch sports, shoot pool, play darts, dance, or they may just be the designated driver for a group of people. You can choose not to drink in the bar. You can’t choose whether to breathe or not.
I’m in favor of enforced smoking/non smoking areas in bars. I really wouldn’t mind if the smoking went away completely though.

73

One of the central tenets of toxicology is something that, too often, public health alarmists either don’t know or cenveniently forget:

THE DOSE MAKES THE POISON.

Below some level, a substance that would otherwise be lethal can be totally non-toxic and non-carcinogenic. Curare is a deadly poison, for example, but only when taken in sufficient quantity. When taken in small quanitites, it can act as nothing more than a mild euphoriant. Similarly, sleeping pills when taken at the recommended dose will do nothing more than make you sleepy, but taking a whole bottle of sleeeping pills can kill you. The same is almost certainly true with cigarette smoke.

One thing to keep in mind is that risk usually does not scale linearly with dose. That is to say, if smoking 10 cigarettes a day has a 14% change of giving you lung cancer, this doesn’t mean that smoking 5 cigarettes a day has a 7% chance of giving you lung cancer. It would probably scale much more severely than this; 5 cigarettes a day would probably only have 1/4 or 1/10 the chance of giving you lung cancer than 10 cigarettes a day would.

In even the densest smoke-filled environment, I doubt that a non-smoker breathing the air would be getting the equivalent of even one cigarette a day worth of tobacco smoke, let alone 5.

74

Would someone please explain to me why the nonsmoker’s “right” to go to a bar and not smell smoke trumps the smoker’s “right” to go to a bar and smoke in peace and the owner’s right to allow smoking there (right not in quotes because I feel it actually IS a right, unlike the first two)?

No matter how you slice this one, what you are eventually left with is that a bunch of people don’t like tobacco smoke (I can’t blame them fr this) and rather than merely avoiding exposure to it (which I’ve never found to be particularly difficult), they’ve decided that they’ll just ban it. I find this absurd.

Oh, and keith, why again isn’t the current situation an example of the free market? I missed that part of your argument.

75

It’s called adapting to your environment instead of demanding the environment adapt to you. I fear we have lost that knack.

76

the current situation isn’t an example of the free market because there are no alternatives whatsoever - you cannot go to a non smoking bar. Bars have traditionally been establishments where smokers congregate. There are fewer smokers these days than in the past due to education, social trends…whatever. No bar owners, however, have made the switch to owning non smoking/ smoke outside establishments because of the fear of lost profits, alienating smoking customers, breaking from tradition…etc.

The majority of people do not smoke. I am unaware of any bars outside CA that are smoke free. Non smokers are unable to make a choice, so there is no consumer sovereignty. The consumer cannot make the choice because no choice is offered.

Of course you could argue that the bar owner is the one with the choice as to wht kind of establishment to offer. This may be valid but as I’m a non smoker deprived of the choice I naturally see the customers choice as the one that matters.

77

Yeah, but then all the ladies would have to smoke cigarettes through those humorously long cigarette holders, which would make them look like Phyllis Diller.

78

Not that far back, then your getting into the end of the last anti-smoking era. It’s cyclical you know, this present movement being the third in US history.

I mean the late 50’s when I started smoking to the mid 80 's when a smoker could light up and no one I ever ran into gave a rat’s ass. I’m talking about a time when you went to visit a nonsmokers home and they offered you an ashtray and some good conversation instead of sending you outside regardless of the weather. A time when restaurants didn’t have to segregate smokers from non-smokers and nobody seemed to mind. I’m talking about a time before the health Nazi’s put the scare into non-smokers with their phony EPA junk science report on SHS and turned many of you into frightened pansies.

Well maybe my time is over, but if it continues to be cyclical, in about 20 years so will yours. Enjoy it while it lasts.

79

Poppycock. Of course the choice that matters most is the owner’s, not yours. The fact that no one has in fact opened smokeless bars is immaterial in that no one is prevented from doing so. If I were to open a bar tomorrow and wanted to allow smoking, I would be free to do so. If I were to open a bar tomorrow and wanted to ban smoking, I would also be free to do so. Why should the choice of which option I take be yours rather than mine?

I find it terribly terribly ironic that because the status quo is unacceptable and it is consumer choice that matters, you are willing to… deny smokers consumer choice. I have nothing against the idea of smokeless bars and would in fact strongly encourage them. Nevertheless, the idea that the lack of smokeless bars denies you choice and that therefore all bars should be smokeless reeks of hypocrisy; it advocates exactly the reverse of the status quo, and if the one is unacceptable on these grounds, so too is the other.

80

It doesn’t. But we’re not discussing the smoker’s right to smoke. We’re discussing their right to force their smoke on others. If smokers could smoke without obliging everyone else to share it there wouldn’t be a problem.

Because the moment the owner opens their property to the public they assume responsibilities for the health and safety of both their customers and their employees.

With this reasoning there would never be anything to legislate against racial-divided transport (“Don’t like it? Avoid it. Go run your own bus.”) or handicaped access (“Can’t park at new mall? Well avoid it, don’t shop there, go somewhere else.”)