Smokers' Rights
After a long campaign that started with bans in California cities in the '90s, restaurants and cafes that allow smoking are becoming the minority. As smoking has become a universally decried and vilified personal vice, such bans have been generally applauded. However, smokers and libertarians who oppose smoking bans as government infringement on personal life have continually fought back, raising the question of how much the greater public good (if such a thing is indeed serviced by smoking bans) outweighs personal liberty. To what extent do smokers have rights, and do theirs necessarily pose a threat to the non-smoking public?
GRID SKIPPER - On January 2, Paris, one of the world's smoking capitals (besides Moscow and Havana of course), implemented a smoking ban that includes all cafes, restaurants, clubs, and bars. The ban caused quite an uproar with the skinny, tobacco-lovin' cafe set, but it looks like this whole nonsmoking movement has reached a tipping point as cities from Dublin to Berlin to Atlantic City to Flagstaff have forced their smokers to take it outside. Every city that passes a ban encounters the usual opposition from a) smokers who don't want to be forced into the cold for a cig, b) libertarians who are sick and... 
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SMOKING LOBBY BLOG - Smokers make up somewhere around 20% - 30% of the population, depending on who you listen to. Only 12% of America is African-American. Should we repeal the civil rights movements of the 60s since it only effects blacks? I don't know how many people are gay but I'm sure it's comparable, if not much less than, the amount of smokers in America. So why are these very small minority groups given rights, but smokers are denied them? It's because smokers are not a *vocal* minority, and because none in mainstream liberal America will take up our cause. If no whites helped the black movement in the 60s...
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INTELLECTUALIZE - I believe that government absolutely has a role in promoting public health, but there’s a point where too much of a good thing is exactly that. I’m not certain I have the answer to that question, but I’m ecstatic with each victorious skirmish in the war against smoking. I’ve said it before (and some of y’all have hammered me for it), and I’ll say it again- your right to smoke ends when it impacts my right to breathe clean, untobaccofied air. If you choose to slowly commit suicide, that’s one thing, but I refuse to be an unwilling participant and be adversely impacted by your...
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1.12.08
| 03:19 AM - |
It is our choice, just as it's your choice.
sultanofswing - If you don't want to go to a bar where people are enjoying alcoholic beverages, there are milk bars out there for you. More people want to go to bars with alcohol, so there are more alcoholic bars than milk bars. When more people want milk bars, we will have more milk bars. And so it goes with smoking venues. If people want smoke-free restaurants, which I happen to prefer, I will choose the smoke-free ones. But when I am in the mood to sit down and enjoy a cigar while watching a football game with friends at my local bar, I should have that right. If having that cigar is enough a part of my experience that I want it, I will find the place that lets me smoke it. If not having the smoke is enough a part of my experience that I don't want it, then I have the right to find a place where smoking is prohibited. But do not decide which one I want for me. Let me and the venues that I patronize decide what we want for ourselves.
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