News, If smoking is so bad for you, who still does it? (daily basis, hormones)

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by bluedevilz

More typical rationalizations from a smoker....

What, you think you won't deteriorate from old age as a smoker?

Are you just going to magically drop dead in your sleep at 75 because you smoke and miss out on the pleasures of infirmity?

Most smokers are going to "deteriorate" as well, just at a younger age.

Dying from COPD isn't a pleasant way to go, hooked up to oxygen for the last years of your life, struggling to breathe, unable to walk even a few steps without gasping for air...

Lung CA isn't a walk in the park either...one of the more horrible ways to go

Sure you could do everything "right" and get hit by a bus tomorrow or you could smoke 2 packs a day and live until 80 and die in your sleep (amazing how every smoker knows someone like that isn't it?)

But the "odds" are smoking will get you in the end.....and it isn't just the years it takes off your life, its the life it takes out of your years..

What? You think you won't deteriorate in old age as a non-smoker?

Come on! The inescapable fact is that we ALL will grow old and die from something (assuming we don't die earlier) and no manner of death is pleasant.

And, there's one more thing: IF you believe that life goes on after death, which I and most others do, what earthly purpose is achieved by staying here longer, in this vale of struggle and strife? IF life is eternal (and I believe it is) do you seriously think hanging around in this plane of existance an additional 10 or 15 or even 50 years will mean anything at all after 1 million years of eternity? Heck, I doubt we'll even remember it!

By the way, thanks for admitting all we're talking about here is statistical odds. That's really all it is, isn't? As I've said before, if I'm going to play the odds, I think I could do better on a Harrah's slot machine.

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by jeannie216

To each his own I believe. My only personal issue with it is that it has been said second hand smoke is more harmful than direct smoking because of the lack of a filter. I have a hard time when kids come in our office for asthma and respiratory problems and when you walk into the exam room, the room reeks of cigarette smoke and the parents cannot figure out why their kid is sick and/or having a difficult time with his breathing. If someone needs to smoke, then at least keep it in a well ventilated area, meaning outside, not around others who choose not to be exposed to it or children who cannot fend for themselves.

Ma'am, if second hand smoke were really that dangerous, I'd already be dead as my Dad smoked like an old timey steel mill all my life and Mom did too for years. So would my kids as both my wife and I do 2 packs a day.

Do some research on the science behind the "dangers" of second-hand smoke and you may find it's bogus. Are there chemicals in it which are dangerous? Sure there are, but you'll find more danger in automobile exhaust, yet no one is suggesting cars ought to be banned from the roadways, nobody is forcing drivers to turn off their engines when they pass walkers. Why not? Because driving is something we all like to do and because the public has not yet been whipped into a panic over it, the way they have over tobacco smoke.

At the end of the day, that's what this is all about: An unreasonable panic fueled by junk science for the purpose of....what? An excuse to raise taxes (Nobody really wants us to actually quit smoking. They want the increased revenue.) and a reason to create more government intrusion into our personal lives.

It's worked with smoking because too many people buy the lie, so now the next target is the obesity "crisis." A lot of people are falling for that too and what's been done to smokers will soon be done to a larger number of "victims," for the same reasons and the same purposes.

Ask yourself this: Where does it end? What's the limit of higher taxes for unpopular behaviors and intrusive government plans to save you from yourself? When is enough, enough for you?

[Aptor hours]

Originally Posted by stillkit

Live 15 years longer to do what? Slowly deteriorate from old age and end up staring at the ceiling in the rest home? Thanks, but no thanks.

And, by the way, if you do everything "right" and avoid all the "bad" stuff, how can you know you've succeeded in living "longer" if you don't know how long you were going to live in the first place?

You're only talking about odds as there is literally no way to prove anyone actually lived longer or shorter lives than they were supposed to. It's a con game we play on ourselves to support the foolish notion that we can control our own destiny, that our death, and the manner is which it happens, is controllable by us. It isn't.

Haha people that don't smoke can live long healthy lives while you on the other hand will die after a living in very poor poor health. Now if I sold the ciggys YOU are exactly the person I would want to get my cold talons into. You cannot or will not see the smoky truth. Good luck maybe you have bus waiting for you.

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by Aptor hours

Haha people that don't smoke can live long healthy lives while you on the other hand will die after a living in very poor poor health. Now if I sold the ciggys YOU are exactly the person I would want to get my cold talons into. You cannot or will not see the smoky truth. Good luck maybe you have bus waiting for you.

Your choice of words is interesting and significant.

"People who don't smoke CAN live long healthy lives." Can is a word which contains no certainties. It is akin to the word "possibly." In other words, there are no guarantees that not smoking will definitively and definitely lead to a longer and healthier life, but it might.

I think you're absolutely correct. There are no guarantees, are there? You could not smoke, yet still come down with lung cancer, right?

But, when you reversed that argument and said this, "you on the other hand WILL die AFTER a living in very poor health." See the difference? You're willing to admit that there are other possibilities associated with not smoking, but unwilling to accept the same possibilities for smoking! Not smoking MAY offer those benefits, but smoking certainly will NOT.

Why is that? Do you have any proof to support the notion that smoking WILL, without fail and without any other possibility, lead to dying AFTER having lived a life of very poor health? If not, how can you be so categorical in your comments?

Be careful, for we all know long time smokers whom the odds bypassed, don't we?

In truth, your use of the definite "will" is based upon nothing more than your perception and says much about how willing you are to consider the whole issue of smoking/not smoking with an open mind. Your mind is already made up and nothing will change it.

[Aptor hours]

Wow you sooooooooo don't get it It is your choice to smoke I grant you that. You probably will die gasping for your last breath for months and years but take heart you just never knowKeep on smoking baby

[SLCPUNK]

With proper diet and exercise ones older years (or any years) need not be as pitiful as those here portray it to be. We had a family friend who did triathlons well into his 80's before he died. He smoked as a younger man, and didn't quit until he was in his 40's, when he began exercising as well. Myself? I don't consider being addicted to smokes as "quality" life nor would I like to die of emphysema or lung cancer. Pick up a cocktail straw and breath through that all day if you want a sneak peak of what emphysema will be like. Thanks but no thanks.

[stillkit]

Originally Posted by SLCPUNK

With proper diet and exercise ones older years (or any years) need not be as pitiful as those here portray it to be. We had a family friend who did triathlons well into his 80's before he died. He smoked as a younger man, and didn't quit until he was in his 40's, when he began exercising as well. Myself? I don't consider being addicted to smokes as "quality" life nor would I like to die of emphysema or lung cancer. Pick up a cocktail straw and breath through that all day if you want a sneak peak of what emphysema will be like. Thanks but no thanks.

WITHOUT proper diet and exercise, ones older years (or any years) need not be as pitiful as those here portray it to be. Nor will they necessarily be years of wine and roses. The truth is that our "older years" are out of our control. We may THINK we can determine how we turn out, but can we really? Of course not, and we all know it.

And, just because you don't think of smoking as a "quality" of life, does that mean everyone else doesn't either? Or that only your feelings on the matter have any validity? Frankly, I don't consider an obsession with health and a compulsion to exercise as a "quality" life. You miss too many of the joys and simple pleasures by denying yourself what which you enjoy. That's my opinion and yours is different. Not right or wrong...just different.

Here's the thing, folks: What drives us to abstain from whatever we think is "unhealthy?" What's the motivation behind our self-denial in the name of good health and long life? What else can it be but fear of death, even a "slow" death by asphyxiation from COPD or emphysema or chronic heart disease or diabetes or whatever?

Why do you fear death? Have you ever asked yourself that question? What's so frightening about it that you would deny yourself whatever it is that brings you joy, pleasure and/or contentment to gain MAYBE a few more years? A few more years of what? Since you must die in the end, why is it worth the tradeoff? What do you gain?

I've already lived a pretty long life, and a good life. I'm now 60 years old and have seen, and done, things which most people only imagine. I've had enough adventures to fill 10 lives and have lived right out on the edge of the envelope for decades at a time, yet I'm still here, in spite of the dangers I've faced and in spite of the choices I made along the way. My life is full, complete and, at this stage, harmonious, yet I made just about every wrong decision I could have made by y'alls reckoning. I am, so far, living proof that worrying about health and denial in the name of longevity is a lie, a charade, a chimera, a falsehood.

During my time here, I've met the Grim Reaper several times, face to face. I've shook hands with him a dozen times, looked him right in the eye without blinking, and I've learned two very important facts about death which I don't think most people understand:

1. It is nothing to fear. In fact, it is God's gift to us! Sure, I don't WANT to die any more than the next guy and I wonder if my death will be filled with pain and horror, but death itself is not fearsome. It is actually a release, an easy and not unpleasant pathway out of this turmoil.

2. Death is capricious. You cannot figure it out, cannot rationalize it, cannot anticipate or determine beforehand where, when, or how, it will strike. Death maintains it's own schedule which we are not privy too, it follows its determined path, and we are but leaves in the gale before it.

I've seen people die in a hundred different situations and can assure those of you who have not, that there is nothing you can do, or not do, which will affect its mission one iota. The Bible says "it is appointed unto man once to die." That means you and death have an appointment, a given place and time where he will intercept you and you cannot change that appointment, no matter how concerned you are over your health, no matter what "unhealthy" activities you avoid or how many "healthy" activities you practice. There is a date and time already determined for you to die and if you think you can change that, I'd like to see the proof that you can. I'm not even convinced you can put a shotgun in your mouth and "speed up" that date because I know people who actually did that and lived.

The bottom line is that you folks are forcing yourselves to suffer and, as an adjunct to your foolishness, forcing me to suffer too because you think my cigarette smoke will kill you. And for what? Nothing, nothing at all. We all will die when it's our time to die, in spite of all that.

So, gimme a break, will ya? Let me proceed along the path to my own, personal death at my pace and doing what I like. In return, I'll let you do the same.

[myrc60]

Very well said stillkit; I'd give you rep but must have already and most likely for this thread. People as I said earlier unless I as a smoker is directly affecting you when you are out you don't have a right to berate me. Nonsmokers can't understand it...we know that so quit trying. Spare me the details as an active poster on this forum. I'm done in this thread.

[Charles22]

Originally Posted by stillkit

The bottom line is that you folks are forcing yourselves to suffer and, as an adjunct to your foolishness, forcing me to suffer too because you think my cigarette smoke will kill you. And for what? Nothing, nothing at all. We all will die when it's our time to die, in spite of all that.

So, gimme a break, will ya? Let me proceed along the path to my own, personal death at my pace and doing what I like. In return, I'll let you do the same.

Just don't do it anywhere I can smell it.

[SLCPUNK]

Originally Posted by stillkit

WITHOUT proper diet and exercise, ones older years (or any years) need not be as pitiful as those here portray it to be. Nor will they necessarily be years of wine and roses. The truth is that our "older years" are out of our control. We may THINK we can determine how we turn out, but can we really? Of course not, and we all know it.

The same can be said for our entire life: We live it on life's terms not our own. No telling what is going to be thrown in our lap. That being said, why in the world would I take part in something that would dramatically increase the chance of me kicking the bucket prematurely? Nobody said a good diet and exercise guarantees you anything. However there is enough evidence to suggest it will allow you to live a longer and healthier life.