I have a very tough time tolerating smoking. My reasons are very personal. I lost both parents very young in their lives and two of my four grandparents from lung cancer as a direct result of smoking. I have never smoked nor will I ever do so, but I am old enough to have been exposed to years and years of second hand smoke, so my risk of developing lung cancer is still considerable.
Most of my friends are aware of my history and those who smoke don’t do so in my house. Some even take it outside when I visit them, which is incredibly appreciated. And thankfully I no longer have to deal with it in the workplace for which I am also very grateful.
I understand it isn’t easy to quit. I’ve seen people struggle with it and I sympathize. I’d never be mean about it to anyone, but I hate the nasty habit - deeply and irrevocably.
Maybe something like the bottle deposit law would help. Add a deposit of 10c per cigarette to the retail price, and then refund the dime for every butt that is brought back.
I don’t hate smokers, although now that my father, sister, and two aunts are dead there are no smokers I love, either. Part of me is sorry for them; a lot of me is sorry for their families.
I looked at one once and thought, “My kid never got to know her grandfather, so why should yours get to know you? Go ahead and smoke.” But I know there are people who smoke heavily and live a long time, and those who smoke little and die young, so smoking is no guarantee of an early death.
I do hate the smell, the butts, and the waste of money that comes with smoking, though.
I don’t smoke, but I love smokers. I like the smell of second-hand smoke, and I love the taste of kissing a woman who has just had a cigarette. It’s like the difference between a hamburger cooked on the stove or one cooked on a charcoal grille!
But I mostly love smokers because they are my last line of defense. When the do-gooders finally stamp out all smoking in the US (and trust me; it’s coming), they will turn their sights on me and my kind: the booze drinkers. Smoke up, my brethren! Keep me safe!
I personally don’t give a rat’s ass about the health of smokers - they can a thousand packs a day and if they get sick and/or die I don’t care - have fun and go to town!
If they do all this and are never ever near me, then great! But smokers are near me and I can’t stand the BS rationalizing and excusing they do.
For starters they stink, big time. I have a co-worker who is a smoker and he’s a great guy, really, but he and a group of us were on a two-week business trip and whenever we were in the rental car together it stank, because of his jacket. Again, he’s a great guy but…
Then there’s the “I only smoke in the garage or with the window open blah blah blah…” Sorry, it doesn’t work and your house/apartment/condo stinks. On a house-hunting trip there were actually houses that we wouldn’t walk past the door because of the stink.
Or, “I only smoke outside on the patios”. There’s nothing more outstanding than being “chased” from a terrace or patio inside on a gorgeous summer evening because of the smokers.
Then there’s the pseudo-political BS by bar and restaurant owners every time a municipality decides to ban smoking in bars and restaurants. I’ve been lucky enough to move from city to city every five to ten years and I’ve seen this stupid pattern every time throughout the late '90s and early 2000s. Yep, a few places go under, but that’s because of a crappy business model. In Ottawa, in 2000, about 75% of citizens polled were in favour of banning smoking in bars and restaurants. It was banned, despite the vigorous objection of an Ontario coalition of bar and restaurant owners in favour of smoking. Guess what - the world didn’t end.
A few years later in Montreal - same thing. Bars and restaurants are non-smoking (quel surprise) and we’re not experiencing the mass extinction of bars and restaurants.
Or how about smokers’ rights - WTF? Any smoker younger than 40 yrs old was not forced into it. You knew better at the time and you made a choice.
And the Big Mac or Bud Light comparison is BS. If I eat a Big Mac every couple of months it impacts nobody. If you smoke every couple of months and you’re standing beside me, it fucking stinks.
I’d say that as long as you don’t force everyone around you to have a taste of your booze whenever you drink, the “do-gooders” will probably not be going after your booze. Especially since it was tried once and failed.
More like a Lovecraftian nightmare. I remember going to a path lab in junior high to research a short story I was writing and seeing a post-mortem inspection of a life long smoker; excise of the lungs showed the alveoli to be disintegrating; the pathologist indicated that the patient was Stage II of development of emphysema, bordering on Stage III when he suffered a myocardial infarction (in plain language, a heart attack). I was frankly shocked that he could breathe at all. The worst part, though, was the stench of the lung tissue; it actually smelled like stale cigarette smoke combined with rotting cheese.
I don’t hate smokers for their habit, but I can’t help but pity them, especially after reading Robert Proctor’s Golden Holocaust: Origins of the Cigarette Catastrophe and the Case for Abolition and subsequently reading through UCSF’s Tobacco Industry Archives which details the degree to which he tobacco industry manipulated scientific research, legislatures, government agencies, and public opinion in order to cover up the harms being done by their product while simultaneously using research to make cigarettes more addictive and appealing to the least sophisticated consumers (children and the poor). I was once of the opinion that the tobacco industry had a right to pursue their business and consumers were responsible for the impact on their own hearth, but honestly, the general public never had a chance against the sophisticated and extremely well-funded tobacco companies and their research arm, the Tobacco Institute.
However, as I live over a bar where people stand outside to smoke on a regular basis, I also have to observe that in my experience, smokers (or at least a subset of them) tend to be the loudest patrons and the ones who are most aggressive, both verbally and physically, and the tend to litter with abandon, both their butts and packaging, and other items as well. Despite the not on that cigarette butts some how magically disappear after they throw them on the ground, they actually persist for years if not cleaned up, and the unburnt tobacco and residue is a harm for any bird, dog, or child who picks them up and consumes them. They also kill plants; the tree in front of my building where the smokers mingle has been replanted three times in the past five years because smokers throw their butts there and the nicotine soaks into the soil and kills the plant.
I’m sympathetic that many places have eliminated ashtrays with which to dispose of butts, but if you are a smoker, you need to dress your butts and throw them away, regardless of how much it makes you stink. You’re going to smell anyway, and the people who think they don’t because they stand outside when they smoke are just kidding themselves.
I have allergies, and where I go and how much time I spend there greatly depends on if I’m going to be exposed to smoke or not. Before all restaurants around here became non-smoking, I would almost never go out for a meal. It ruined the whole experience and made me ill.
When people smoke, even if they don’t smoke while they are around me, I can smell it on them and it also makes me sick. People very rudely block the entrance and exits to shopping malls and groceries stores with their smoking.
I feel sorry for those who smoke, because we know that the tobacco companies intentionally put substances to the products to make them even more addictive. I’ve known people over the years who have tried to stop smoking and still can’t do it. While others it has taken many times before they finally quit. It’s sad that for some demented reason, people have forgotten all about the health concerns and think cigars are now cool. I find it equally stupid there are now electronic cigarettes.
In my personal and professional life, I don’t associate with smokers, because there is no way for them to remove the residue from their clothing, homes and cars even if they aren’t smoking while I’m around. Most don’t realize the suffering they put those with allergies through or they simply don’t care because they must have their fix. When they have stopped smoking for a few months, and then open a coat closet in their house, then they get an idea of what smoking smells like to me. If I go into a store and talk with a salesman who smells like smoke, I leave without buying anything or find someone else to give them the order and commission.
I feel especially sorry for those working in low paying jobs, who take a break and smoke. They are poisoning themselves and everyone around, and spending a good chunk of their salary on it.
There was a carpenter’s assistant doing work at our home. They were smoking outside. One of them remarked that he smoked two packs a day and on break had to go out to get more cigarettes. Later in the day, he asked me, “You said you work in IT? I want to ask you, how much do you pay for internet access at your home? I’m thinking of getting it for my kid who is in middle school to help him with school work.” I told him how much I was paying, and he shook his head and said “I can’t afford that”.
Let’s look at the math. He smokes two packs a day, to make the math easy at $7.00 a pack. That’s $14.00 a day X 7 days a week which is $98.00 a week. Four weeks a month equals $392.00 a month. So he spends $392.00 a month for smoking, and claims he can’t afford internet access for his kid. That’s a small example of what an addiction like tobacco does to someone who would put the needs of their addiction above the needs of their child.
I’m a smoker, albeit a considerate one as in if I’m around nonsmokers, I won’t smoke. I confine smoking to one room in my house in cold weather. Otherwise I go outside. I’ve been told my vehicle doesn’t smell because I open all my windows and turn the fan on high when I have one.
I will say, though, that there’s nothing worse for a smoker than a reformed smoker. I’ve found they are more judgmental than nonsmokers and are more likely to say something. I’ve had the pleasure of nicely-but-firmly putting them in their place whenever they’ve tried lecturing me.
I’m not stupid. I know the dangers. Yes, it’s a habit and an addiction. I’ll try not to be around you right after having one. NOW BACK THE FUCK OFF.
It’s a long story but I know a major non-smoker who, after finding himself majorly attracted to his smoking next door neighbor (who had a hand in attracting him) ended up a smoker as a result of her manipulative conditioning. It’s amazing to me seeing him smoke with her now…all the time!
Mazel Tov to all the quitters. I just learned, from learning about weight loss surgery, that it is very difficult to get elective surgery if you are a smoker, because it turns out that smoking interferes with healing. I’m not sure of the mechanism, unless it has to do with oxygen transport-- less oxygen gets to the healing tissue, making it heal slower, and more likely to get infected. That’s just a guess though.
But everybody at the seminar for weight loss surgery I just attended had had to quit smoking (if they had smoked), or they couldn’t have the surgery.
Well, I can’t speak for all non-smokers, just myself.
It’s NOT a minor annoyance - I have asthma and your habit can cause me to be short of breath and experience physical pain and distress. That strikes me as a “major annoyance”. I don’t care about the stinky, that’s your problem, it’s the impairment of my breathing that pisses me off.
So… no smoking in my home or my vehicles. In my space it’s no smoking. And my smoking friends respect that. In return, I don’t tell them the rules in THEIR spaces. If I’m going to visit a smoker in their home I pre-medicate and probably won’t stay over long, and certainly not overnight. Ditto visiting bars or casinos where smoking is permitted - I enter at my own risk. I will object to someone deliberately blowing smoke in my face, but I won’t say a word about the ambiance.
Given ya’ll are addicted and I can’t force you to give it up I absolutely support reasonable designated smoking areas (meaning you can’t make the smoking area a half mile break from the work location, as an example, as that would be unreasonable).
At work I am called upon to sell cigarettes to smokers. I really, really hate doing that, but it’s legal. Ya’ll are adults and able to make your own decisions.
I’ll gladly cheerlead anyone trying to give up the habit, and I’ll put up with the crankiness and irritability of someone kicking the habit. But I know I can’t force, nag, or cajole someone into giving them up until they want to quit. But don’t ask me to approve of your habit or ask me my opinion unless you want to hear “I detest the habit and wish you’d quit.” On the other hand, unless you ask me directly I won’t say a word about it. Your body, your choice, it’s not like you don’t know better.
It’s not that I hate smokers… I feel sorry for them. I feel bad when my smoking friends who now have COPD are coughing horribly. I feel bad when they have other health problems. I feel bad when one or another of them has cancer that’s probably related to their addiction. I feel bad about the money they feel compelled to spend.
Nope, I don’t hate smokers. I just wish they could stop smoking.
My (limited) understanding is that it is two-fold:
Smoke contains chemicals like carbon monoxide which permanently latches to the hemoglobin in blood, rendering those blood cells permanently incapable of doing their job. So a smoke might not have anemia, but a certain percentage of their blood cells are useless, so the oxygen carrying ability of their blood is impaired.
Smoking causes blood vessels to constrict, which also reduces blood flow particularly to the smaller vessels and capillaries.
So… a smoker has surgery and the body tries to heal the wound, but not only does the body have a harder time getting sufficient blood to the wound (due to constricted blood vessels) but the blood that does get there isn’t as oxygenated as it should be (due to damaged red blood cells).
Use of “smokeless tobacco” - basically sucking on a wad of the stuff - will still cause blood vessel constriction but since it doesn’t generate toxic gasses the impairment of oxygen will be less than with smoking, but still not ideal.
I don’t know enough about vaping to know if there is CO involved, but it is my understanding it will still cause some blood vessel constriction.
Oh, and my dentist is really down on smoking especially in regards to tooth extractions not only because of all of the above, but also because the sucking in motion used in smoking can disrupt the scab over the resulting wound and raises the risk of dry socket.