Smokers "Rights"

at least your farts will be less dangerous than the danged overpowering perfume many wear!!!
the smoke from the smokers way down in that basement where no one has any reason to venture is harming no one except those who chose to be there with full knowledge of it being there! it's not harming any one!!!
I can't say the same about the girl I often work with who seems to drench herself in perfumes before coming to work....
allowing people to come to work with an overdose of perfume and expecting you to work along side them IS just about the same as letting me light up at my press, and expecting her to work along side me.....except of course, my production would be hindered since you can't print and hold a cigarette at the same time.
you have not produced any argument that is sufficient to justify singling out smokers in the workplace and having the gov't intervene contrary to the property rights of my boss and banning smoking from his building. I can point to many other things in that place that poses at least an equal hazard or greater to my health than 2 nd hand smoke, some of which my coworkers are free to expose me to whenever they like. any special breaks that are going on in the place are not related to weather or not a person smokes. everybody is generating so much pollution there's a plastic swamp in the pacific ocean twice the size of the US. and finally, I am pretty sure that all of those alchoholics in the place that go home every night and are drinking themselves into unconciousness are gonna cost the healthcare system far more than I will have in my lifetime!!
only thing that is accomplished by this anti-smoking craze is that when I do die, and if they do an autopsy, they will notice all the little fibers (flock) that is in my lungs, look at my chart and see that I am a smoker, and well, they won't be looking twice at the tiny little fibers, they will blame it on the smoking... and the public with remain oblivious to the dangers posed to the workers who are using the flock, and all the other dangerous stuff that is being poured into the air, into the water, into the food, into our homes, bedding, laundry, and the list goes on and on. the business world will continue to be allowed to dump their toxic chemicals onto the markets (it's alot cheaper ya know than them having to follow epa's guidelines for disposal!!!) for a profit!
by the way, a warmed up computer is probably just as dangerous to someone's health as shs is also.....can't wait for the day when they decide to protect the non computer users from that one.....each little computer in the office must be in a fully ventilated little office cubicle isolated from all the others workers...should be fun!!

[edit on 15-3-2008 by dawnstar]

reply to post by sparda4355

"The same people that complain about cigarette smoking go tanning, eat carcinogenic foods, consume large quantities of liquor, use skin products that are horrible for you, spend hours and hours a day with their cell phone pressed firmly against their ear only inches from their brains, eat frozen dinners, pop over the counter pain killers like candy every time they have the slightest headache or body ache, the list goes on and on..."

I waited to think about responding to this part of your pro- smoker rant.
I dont do any of the above, furthermore I avoid being in the presence of smokers when they smoke. The greatest step a person can take for the benefit of the general community is caring for themselves,, I prefer this paraphasing of the mote in other's eye's versus the log in your own. Might as well be the "cigarette in your mouth versus the cigar in your neighbor's mouth."

Originally posted by mattifikation
Yeah, because not being allowed to talk and not being allowed to poison other people are the same thing.

I did not say it was the same thing. I was drawing a comparison on the merits of courtesy being a two-way street. Reread (or perhaps read) paragraph three for ill effects a topic can have.

I'm done trying to argue against this mindless logic, because it really doesn't matter. People with common sense have spoken: If you want to do that crap, don't do it in enclosed places with people who don't want to be exposed to it.

No, people throw around results of flawed studies. Not a single passive (second-hand) smoke study has proven a harmful effect to anyone nor anything without using a razor-thin margin of error instead of standard statisical margins of error. When study results are done using the standard margin of error zero effects can be found that second-hand smoke causes any harm. And let me interject that in some Asthma suffers, some reactions are psychosomatic to smoke. Claiming the use of common sense in this argument is mute when your supporting information is from manipulated reports...see also Propaganda and Agenda.

That's the law you've got, that's the law you're stuck with, if you don't like smoking outside you can still go smoke in your car. :-)

Ammendment 18 (Prohibition) was repealed by the 21st. The 15th overturned the 3/5 clause. I could go on and on with examples of overturned laws here until we were both completely bored to tears, so to clarify the point go straight to the 10th. Rights not enumerated in the Constitution are held by the states or the people respectively. In otherwords the state can not make a laws that superceeds the rights held by the people given by the Constitution because they are unconstitutional. Life, liberty and property...can't have more than $20 taken away without due process, etc.

Property owners (bars, resturaunts, pool halls, bowling alleys) have lost far more than $20 after the liberty to run their businesses was removed. Let us also look at Article 4, Section 2. "The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states." So, if I can find a state or several states that still allow smoking in public places, guess what? The locally and/or state passed laws are unconstitutional and therefore illegal under federal law which superceeds all state and local laws in reguards to individuals.

For the record, next time I see a group of people smoking, I think I'm going to walk by them and let loose the most obnoxious fart I can muster. After all, I have the right to fart and if I don't fart, it'll make me uncomfortable. So by selfish smoker logic, nobody is right to make me not fart in their faces.

Since you are a champion of using common sense you might foresee that such a group might find it a form of assault rather than free speach (in America any butthole can have their say LOL) or an accidental coinsidence and beat you unmercifully. Yeah, they would be guilty of battery but common sense should dictate that the risk of injury might not be worth the sophmoric stunt. And the arresting officer might site you for causing a public disturbance in the first place and take you downtown for your protection as thugs typically do not like talking to police and give you a second beatdown for not cowboying up after the first one.

But as you condone unconstitutional laws and removal of privately held freedoms and consider yourself done with arguing with my mindless logic and the feel that the majority has no obligation to protect the minority I suppose that this is an empty post for extending awareness for you. I do however post it in the intrests of others that do not have a closeminded attitude as to what is just, fair and legal.

And let me state again the OP topic as I understand it to be: since the removal of indoor smoking should not shelter be provided to protect smokers from the elements? And allow me to add, since the law is unconstitutional in the first place?

[edit on 16-3-2008 by Ahabstar]

Originally posted by jbmitch
reply to post by sparda4355

 

"The same people that complain about cigarette smoking go tanning, eat carcinogenic foods, consume large quantities of liquor, use skin products that are horrible for you, spend hours and hours a day with their cell phone pressed firmly against their ear only inches from their brains, eat frozen dinners, pop over the counter pain killers like candy every time they have the slightest headache or body ache, the list goes on and on..."

I waited to think about responding to this part of your pro- smoker rant.
I dont do any of the above, furthermore I avoid being in the presence of smokers when they smoke. The greatest step a person can take for the benefit of the general community is caring for themselves,, I prefer this paraphasing of the mote in other's eye's versus the log in your own. Might as well be the "cigarette in your mouth versus the cigar in your neighbor's mouth."

You expect me to believe you don't stand under the sun, talk on a cell phone, walk near wet paint, take advil when you have a headache, or eat anything that isn't healthy for you...

okay...

wink wink... nudge nudge... Than tell you what... I don't smoke!

Originally posted by sparda4355


You expect me to believe you don't stand under the sun, talk on a cell phone, walk near wet paint, take advil when you have a headache, or eat anything that isn't healthy for you...

okay...

wink wink... nudge nudge... Than tell you what... I don't smoke!

Are you smoking something else besides tobacco......walking under the sun....what choice do we have......i use sunscreen, as i mostly work outside, to reduce my chances of skin cancer......like i try to avoid smokers......you choose to smoke. if i do eat something unhealthy i can as in moderation it matters little as any food in large quantities combined with little or no exersise is unhealthy.smoking is unhealthy always and if i do eat something unhealthy, i ain't asking for time away from work to do it, a room that i can do it in. Quit whinging....Quit smoking,......you smokers are giving me a headache with your stupid habit, your stupid logic......get me an advil....

reply to post by atlasastro


Green tea fills your body with anti-oxidents (good)

Smoking fills your body with free radicals (bad)

anti-oxidents kill free radicals (thinking...)

drink green tea while you smoke (perfect)

problem solved!

now, the whole reason it becomes adictive in the first place, is the fact that it replaces a certain endorphin that your name naturally produces. Now, after you start, your brain will not produce this endorphin. Thus making one very emotionally unstable. Smoking stops a natural function of our bodies.
Most people have no clue of this when they smoke.
I dotn think that sounds like choice to me. I'd liek to see someone try smoking for a year and quitting. Its not as easy as anyone thinks. There are maybe 1/100 people that can actually quit, and lord knows i am beng generous with those numbers

"i ain't asking for time away from work to do it, a room that i can do it in."

neither am I.....
my boss smokes, he's decided to be considerate to those in the company who don't smoke, and chose a place way outside everyone's way and designated it a smoking area....why are you trying to take his little place away?
as far as the "time away from work" bit....I'm sorry...but 10 personal phone calls in one day is a bit much don't ya think? and I swear, the guy that's always running to the bathroom or the drinking fountain was running to the phone at least ten times one day this week....at the end of the day, I had decided that if he got one more phone call, I would disappear for about 20 minutes for one of those unauthorized smoking breaks that smokers are constantly accusing me of!!! while I would have wasted about 20 minutes of my bosses time for that break, this guy probably wasted 2 hours....so tell me...or shut up about it!! Why is taking a smoking break any worse than wasting time with personal phone calls, or chatting with your friends at work, or wandering around aimlessly?

my boss smokes, he's decided to be considerate to those in the company who don't smoke, and chose a place way outside everyone's way and designated it a smoking area....why are you trying to take his little place away?

Your boss does this out of legal requirements as he has to provide a safe working enviroment for his employees.....and smoking is not safe. In no way is this out of benevolence so don't try and put it that way.

....as far as the "time away from work" bit....I'm sorry...but 10 personal phone calls in one day is a bit much don't ya think? and I swear, the guy that's always running to the bathroom or the drinking fountain was running to the phone at least ten times one day this week....at the end of the day, I had decided that if he got one more phone call, I would disappear for about 20 minutes for one of those unauthorized smoking breaks that smokers are constantly accusing me of!!! while I would have wasted about 20 minutes of my bosses time for that break, this guy probably wasted 2 hours....so tell me...or shut up about it!! Why is taking a smoking break any worse than wasting time with personal phone calls, or chatting with your friends at work, or wandering around aimlessly?

I'll repeat it again....stop whinging....stop crying.....stop smoking...... and you may even stop sounding like a fool.

p.s. seems like you spend alot of your day watching what your fellow employees do......inbetween wasteful smoking breaks, of course.....how productive.

well, gee, when they are partnered up with ya and susposedly working with ya to get a job done....it's kind of noticable!!!
as far the the phone call bit, sorry that's rather noticable also, since they announce it one the loudspeaker!

you didn't answer my question, I noticed...why is taking five minutes off to go have a smoke break any worse than taking five minutes off to waste time any other way?

[edit on 20-3-2008 by dawnstar]

Originally posted by sparda4355

If we can prove our chemical dependency than you can’t keep saying it is a choice… As long as we are “attempting” to quit we should get the following… Companies should be forced to allow us at least 4 unpaid smoking breaks per day, they should provide us with an outdoor weather protected area to smoke, and we should get to smoke inside if there is no suitable outdoor area provided! We should be in a protected class so that we no longer get treated like outcasts and tossed aside by society!

Here is my basic problem with smoking -- when you smoke near me -- I get to smoke as well whether I want to or not. Frankly, if you want to poison yourself that is your business, I think it isn't the brightest thing in the world but it is your choice. So, you may smoke where and when you please as long as I don't have to share in your smoke

Mayeb its tiem for people to stop hating those that smoke, and perhaps try helping. It makes things alot harder with people's attitudes like that. If you came up to me in the street with an attitude liek that sir, i would blow my smoek directly in your face, yes, just to start a fight. Becasue i need to vetn all the whining we smokers do. If anyone is whining, it is the non smokers.
You know i put pitstick on, and i still ahve to msell other people's BO at work. Or other people's bad breath. Or carbon monoxide from your car.
Do you hear me whining about it? Tehre are many things one can bitch about. I tend to notice smokers complain about everything much less than the average folk, unless of course they ahvent had thier smoke.