Quote from: Serious

Quote from: twist

The modern world is obsessed with risk-free culture.

Fork it.

I have at least five mates that thought the way you do, now all of them think they were dumb ****s who had no idea what they were talking about

Well, four now, one of them died of liver failure.

Thats really tragic and Im sorry to hear that.

Are you arguing using that example and the wisdom of hindsight that a few more laws, legislations, limits etc. would be a good thing as theyd help to stop things like this happening?

If so I can really relate to where your coming from - Really doesnt say much about your late friends ability to look after himself though.

He did it to himself, by drink, smokers are doing it to other people, that is the difference.

Quote from: Serious

Quote

For every liberty we gain - Two are being stripped from us.

When was one given back again? :shrug:

Youve got me there! Ill change it to this:

Were loosing our liberties - Its only a matter of time now until were living in cages being fed from a drip.

better

p.s. this seems a bit heated to be in general discussion :shock:   - Whats going on?! xD

Im thinking of moving it to SC ... ah go on, just for you.

I have no real problem with the ban tbh. Im a smoker and sure its an annoyance to have to go outside to have a smoke but Ill live with it. No point whinging about something that isnt going to change in the foreseeable future now is there?!

In fact for me its actually beneficial - being bone idle half the time when i would spark up at the pub i cant be bothered to make the effort to go outside for one so im smoking less

Only downside Ive seen is that pubs and in particular nightclubs are a lot less busy and theyre starting to reek of bleach, piss, body odour and vomit. Nice

Jaimz

Just visited the pub over the road, full of chavs and it doesnt smell of BO either :shock:

However I do still feel that its a right f*ck you to democracy. As discussed the democratic solution was a middle ground - where smokers could smoke in designated places that didnt affect non smokers and whilst expensive and a little impractical

I would agree with you, except there are things which are freely available which, perhaps with hindsight, should not be. Unfortunately a true middle ground would be too expensive for smaller pubs. The result is that a designated area is outside the building. This is a compromise of sorts, although a draconian one for the smokers. I used to have to leave pubs because of smokers output, now the situation is reversed. They choose to smoke, I dont want to be subject to it.

Paracetamol can kill some people if they take 16 500mg tablets in a 24 hour period, which makes it far more dangerous than heroin and quite a few other drugs. Only reason it isnt banned is its not addictive. There are other non-prescription only available drugs with similar problems out there but not as bad as this. Most heroin addicts can work effectively so why not make it legal as a non-prescription painkiller? They wont of course, the political implications are too big.

Then there is RoHS, ciggy smoke contradicts this in working environments, so far they have allowed it in pubs but this obviously goes against the idea of the law.

Really we need new alternative drugs to be available, preferably with minimal or no side effects and with low addictivity. Then to wean people off things like tobacco and, if possible, alcohol. We might manage tobacco, somehow I doubt if its possible to remove alcohol from peoples lives totally.

Ok my 2p.

Im a smoker who is loving the ban because its helping me quit. However I do still feel that its a right f*ck you to democracy. As discussed the democratic solution was a middle ground - where smokers could smoke in designated places that didnt affect non smokers and whilst expensive and a little impracticle I think the effort would have been worth it for a fair solution. I dont believe non smokers should have to breathe in smoke and would have been happy with a mid way solution but now I think that (like everything else in this country) its gone too far the other way.

Its also going to cost everyone yet more money when the government has to find new ways of recovering the money it will now lose on tobacco taxes as sales (eventually) will inevitably fall IMO. So the price of a pint will probably rise to compensate.

Id really like to see them ban drinking in public next (but I know it will never happen) to see how much that pisses people off. I bet then people would be crying out for democracy.... (and yes alcohol does kill many people, is a drug and causes disease like tobacco does. It also causes massive amounts of violence and anti social behaviour where often bad things happen to innocent people.)

There will be no need to recoup any tax losses - smoking related illnesses are a massive drain on the NHS that cost many times more than smokers revenue - if you smoked 60 a day for life (Say 50 years) you wouldnt even come CLOSE to the cost of the treatment for cancers/heart disease etc etc

I know - the gf designs clinical trials and has all the inside info on such things. You wouldnt even believe how much some of the new treatments cost. It is absolutely ludicrous.

Currently tax revenue in the UK from smoking is around 8 billion - that 50 billion figure is frankly ludicrous.

1 penny in every £5 of this revenue goes back to the NHS. So 16 million going in from cigarette revenue vs billions out in treatment (And those treatment figures are ONLY raw hospital costs - they do NOT take into consideration clinical research etc, which in itself is a ridiculous amount)

Things start to look a lot less rosy when you look at those figures.

Those figures are about 6 months old - my girlfriends clinical research company is currently doing (yet more) clinical research on smoking.

IMO, smokers should have to pay insurance for medical treatment.

However I do still feel that its a right f*ck you to democracy.

wouldnt go that far tbh...

fact is that it isnt something that is purely self inflicted - it is something that inflicts harm on others & it kills a shed load of people each year.

Just look at drink driving - doesnt kill nearly as many people each year as smoking yet tis fairly obvious why it needs to be banned - smoking just takes a bit longer to kill people and is less dramatic so people dont seem to be as aware of how serious it is.

so yeah smokers having to go outside are having some personal freedoms limited but only in so much as drunk people have the freedom to drive home limited. People can still drink - they just cant drive afterwards and people can still smoke - they just cant do it indoors - nothing is really getting banned as such there are just regulations introduced limiting certain activities that pose a serious health risk to others - which is fairly sensible IMO.