I already said I think second hand smoke is a health hazard. I’ll say it again - second hand smoke is a health hazard. I don’t know if this has been proven in any scientific way, but it seems absolutely bloody obvious to me.
Happy?
I don’t think bar workers are different. What this comes down to, and what you steadfastly refuse to address, is what is defined as the job which must be made as safe as reasonably possible. You want to cast the net broad, and say all workers in the food and alcohol business, I assume. I am making it more narrow, and saying there could be a category of “smoking bar workers.” Within that category, there should be efforts made to make the job as safe as possible. Presumably those would include ventilation systems, etc. But different jobs have different accepted risk levels allowable under law, and the precautions that must be taken differ. I don’t see a problem with that if the choice is truly voluntary. You do. We will have to differ on that.
So, should my workplace be able to enter a category called “loud factories,” and then hire “loud factory workers” instead of providing hearing protection?
Villa, I don’t get what “truly voluntary” is supposed to mean. How is any employment “truly voluntary”? In the bad old days, when coal miners got black lung disease, was that voluntary? Well, they agreed to take the job, so I guess it was as voluntary as anything else. EVERY job is voluntary, the way you’re defining it. I just don’t understand the reasoning - you would seem to be saying that so long as someone agrees to take a job, that it’s not necessary to protect that worker’s health?
I doubt a court would find that a reasonable distinction to draw. While there are owners who no doubt would prefer to run “loud factories,” I highly doubt there are significant numbers of employees who would make a real choice to work in a “loud factory,” nor customers who would chose to purchase items from there for the reason that it was a “loud factory.”
But what the job description is makes a huge difference when we are determining what are ‘reasonable’ precautions that an employer should be mandated to take, wouldn’t you agree?
lowbrass
Truly voluntary - two bars on same street, one has smoking, other doesn’t, pay (including tips) the same. Bartender (who happens to be a smoker) chooses to work in Joe’s Cigar Bar rather than Tom’s Smoke Free Martini Lounge.
Is that a situation that will play out exactly - probably not. But in cities with large numbers of bars, of varying types, sizes, motifs, themes etc., and with a limited small number of them allowed to have smoking, I think you would be very close to it. If the situation developed where smoking bars were forced to pay higher wages to get the staff, I might look again at whether it was a truly voluntary decision. I don’t think that is likely to be the case.
Not truly voluntary - one coal mine outside a pit village, no other employment, unsafe working conditions, miner with children to support does not really have an option to refuse the job unless conditions improve.
Hope that explains it to you more. I have little hope it will, but there you go.
I don’t think you’re understanding how the job market works. There will always be workers who will choose a particular job, so long as there are more workers than there are jobs. Would you doubt that anyone would have chosen to work in a coal mine and get black lung disease? Well, people did.
There might be financial reasons to have a loud factory; they may want to save money on noise abatement measures.
That sounds like a pretty idealized situation. How would you ensure that there was exactly a one to one correspondence between employees who want to breathe smoke and available jobs?
Such a situation doesn’t exist. I happen to know that people have worked in smoking venues who would have preferred not to have the smoke. I have talked to many, and I happen to be one myself. In the past, I worked as a musician in many smoking venues. My choice was to work in a smoke-filled environment, or not work. I chose to work. This is not a complaint, mind you - I made that choice. I just don’t believe the term “totally voluntary” can ever be applied to a job. When you accept a job, you must accept the conditions of that job. But again, that’s not a complaint, just an observation of how the real world works (although I can hear Apos busily stuffing his strawman in preperation for his next assault.)
If you have 5 jobs at the beer-tasting factory, and 5 jobs at the toilet-cleaning shop, and 10 people looking for jobs, 5 of them are going to have to clean toilets. It’s kind of stretch to say they voluntarily took that job over the other one.
Exactly my point. It gets a little tricky when you start talking about jobs being “truly voluntary”. There is no such animal.
I doubt a court would find that a reasonable distinction to draw. While there are owners who no doubt would prefer to run “loud factories,” I highly doubt there are significant numbers of employees who would make a real choice to work in a “loud factory,” nor customers who would chose to purchase items from there for the reason that it was a “loud factory.”
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Well, the prices could be lower than at the other factory. And those who get so hysterical about property rights, maybe they would support a factory that chose to eschew safety guidelines.
How about if the bar wants to have cock fights and consumers are more likely to come to see the cock fights? Should bars be able to be “cock fight bars”? Is there something truly sacred about mixing an otherwise forbidden activity with alcohol that would turn it sacred?
Sure. Which is why if you were allergic to alcohol touching your skin, the employer shouldn’t have to stop serving alcohol in order to employ you.
But I disagree that smoking is a necessary component of a bar the way alcohol is (excluding “bars” that don’t sell alcohol). Bars, taverns, whathaveyou existed in the Western world long before smoking. And they have continued to exist where there isn’t smoking.
Which is why I tried to carefully phrase it as people who would chose to purchase it because it was made in a loud factory - like people who would chose to go to a bar because it was smoky, not, let’s say, because the drinks were cheaper. It’s also why I don’t think property rights provide an absolute defence, either here or generally.
No, because I don’t think the animal welfare grounds on which cock-fighting laws are based are in anyway affected by alcohol consumption. And no, there is nothing sacred about that - see below.
I think you are generally right here. Which is why I would limit public smoking to a limited number of areas, including some where I would allow the sale and consumption of alcohol. In a ‘smoking bar’ employers would not be required to prevent smoking. They would be required to have adequate ventilation, of course. It’s once again all about how broadly you draw the category. You maintain a bar is still a bar without smoking. That’s 100% correct. I say a cigar bar is not a cigar bar without both drinking and smoking.
But we could go narrower, for the fun of it - a person (myself) is made nauseous by the smell of Pernod, Sambuca, and other similarly flavored beverages. Now a bar is undoubtedly still a bar without selling these products, as I am sure you would agree. But I would also think it is an acceptable occupational hazard for me, the bartender, to be exposed to that odor, even if it did more than turn my stomach. Defining a job too narrowly is foolish; but then again, so is defining it too broadly. The ability to be blindsided by a 350 lb man is relevant to a professional football player, and the dangers involved are legitimate there. But define him as an entertainer, and I am sure we would not feel happy with stand up comedians (with certain exceptions - Carrot Top, I’m looking at you) being exposed to the same dangers.
There is certainly precedent for banning a particular kind of liquor if it is a health hazard:
However, I suspect that your complaint of being made nauseous by being in the vicinity of the beverages you named is an exaggeration. If those liquors truly made a significant portion of the population ill, they probably would be banned. I doubt that they do.
Shoddy, shoddy reasoning on my part. The animal welfare laws exists for reasons separate to where the cockfighting occurs. The laws defining a safe workplace and the steps that must be taken to ensure it are dependent on are, by their very nature, related to the workplace itself. Therefore I would not permit cockfighting in a bar, because I don’t think the locus of the fight is relevant to the reasons for the ban. I would, however, permit smoking in a ‘tobacco bar’ because the act of smoking is part of the rationale for the existance of such a premisis.
