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yes.. of course, next time i'll define my lame attempt at levity in plain english words.
I knew you were joking, but I wasn't sure if you were just having fun or if you were doing that "see it is fundamentally different because it has nicotine, so that makes the other chemicals in cigarette smoke 1000x more dangerous than when it comes from another source".
I'm a smoker (want to quit) and surprisingly I don't really have a problem with this.
However, while I'm a smoker I also take pretty good care of myself. My diet is good and I work out several times per week.
Why do I have to pay to take care of some obese person? Shouldn't they be forced to pay more than a thin person?
I'm a single man, why should I pay as much for health coverage as a woman? I work with an office full of women and they are constantly running to the doctor for various reasons (not saying it isn't necessary) while I haven't been in years.
After helping to care for a man who I considered a second dad, who was dying from lung cancer and emphysema it makes me wonder why anyone would want to smoke. He started at 16 but stopped too late. Not only the cost of buying cigarettes but health wise makes it not worth it.
People want to smoke fine but down the road why should I pay more in insurance when you are dying from cancer. You might think you are healthy and no damage is done but it is. Look at the lungs of a smoker and they are black.
I'm a single man, why should I pay as much for health coverage as a woman? I work with an office full of women and they are constantly running to the doctor for various reasons (not saying it isn't necessary) while I haven't been in years.
Um, and women shouldn't have to pay for your prostate exams or viagra? Bit of a sexist, or at least very ignorant statement.
This smoking issue gets tiresome. No, I don’t like smoking. It stinks and it’s annoying. Second hand smoke effects aside, one of the arguments I hear is that ‘smokers raise our insurance rates’ or ‘I’m paying for the smoker who contracts lung cancer and ends up in the hospital.’ In my estimation, that argument can be used for most any human pursuit. I can make a multitude of cases using the same logic:
My insurance is high because there are morons on the road who constantly disregard the rules and get in accidents… and then my insurance premium pays for the results of their negligence. Why should the general public have to pay for their risky behavior?
Health insurance premiums are so high because idiots go out and engage in high risk activities and sports, get busted up, and then rely on health insurance money to fix the results of their Darwin Award worthy behaviors. And the media glorifies these activities, calling them ‘extreme sports.’ Why should the general public have to pay for their risky behaviour? Ban risky sports.
People who build homes in high-risk areas (seaside, mountainside, high fire danger, earthquake, etc…) are raising the insurance rates for everyone when they lose their houses. Ban them.
People who consistently sleep less than 6.5 hours per night should be deemed outlaws because their mental faculties and alertness are compromised. Thus they get in more accidents and increase our insurance rates. Ban them. And put a bedside armed guard for anyone not honoring the ban, forcing them to conform.
How about this: get rid of your cell phone. You are exposing me to second hand radiation every time you ‘light it up.’
Even though I dislike smoking, I think smokers are just the scapegoats at this point in our history. Sooner or later, the public will find another sacrificial lamb, and it will probably be something else that will chip away at personal freedom. ‘Control’ is the operative word behind the mask here. I can certainly support no smoking in a public place and no blowing smoke in my face (verifiable, significant health risks--or so I’m lead to believe), but the latest measures are absolutely asinine and would be comical if they weren’t such a challenge to free agency.
As an aside, smoking is not a death sentence. It statistically increases your chance of certain conditions--it does not guarantee them. In my extended family, a large proportion of them smoked or smoke. In a group of perhaps twenty that I can think of, one (an aunt) died of lung cancer (in her late 50’s). The rest (most of which continued to smoke and never quit) lived into their late 60’s through 80’s--a couple of them into their 90’s. Right now, I have several uncles and aunts in their 70’s who smoke. I’m not condoning smoking, but most people act as if it’s guaranteed to kill you at a young age. Not the case. It increases the risk. There is a difference.
Your family is darn lucky. Still why do it if there is even a small risk. What is so enjoyable about sucking in smoke into your lungs. Lungs are for breathing fresh air not chemicals.
Watching someone die from lung cancer is enough for me. One person dying from lung cancer etc because of cigarettes is one too many.
Yes, I have to admit that on both sides of my family, people tend (and have tended to) live long lives (longer than average). So genetics is probably at play there too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by RiWrites
What is so enjoyable about sucking in smoke into your lungs.
That, I have no answer for. I have never understood it. I've never seen a point to it or purpose for it. On the other hand, my probably-fanatical support of 'personal liberty' tells me that self destructive behavior is allowed as long as it's not destructive to others. Which is probably a good thing in my case, because there are many things I'd be rallying to 'ban' if I didn't beleive so strongly in agency.
So who's going to pay for the bailouts if the smokers all stop smoking? What will happen to the tax on vice if people do exactly as their gubbermint demands, and live clean, decent, upstanding lives, never smoke, drink, or stuff themselves with red meat or pizza or burgers?
Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. All the sheep line up, with the gubbermint dogs barking at your heels, for the slaughter. It's for your own good. REally. I swear. If you do exactly as you are told, why, you'll never die. Nope, never.
Ummmm Can anyone say "Discrimination"? Next it will be if you are over weight, or drive an SUV, or what ever else the government decides is bad for someone. What happened to USA, land of the free? (meaning free choice)
Those are great ideas! Basically, smoking, being overweight and driving SUV's does affect the rest of us in a negative way. So why not discourage those behaviours? Obviously, people don't use their commonsense about these things, but hitting them in the wallet is the only way to make them change for the better.
Cigarette smokers cost everyone more money in terms of health care. Thanks to their emphysema and lung cancers (mouth cancer if they chew tobacco), their medical bills cause insurance premiums to go up for the rest of us. And as a lifelong non-smoker, I don't think that's very fair to the US population as a whole.
I'm all for having our freedoms, but only as long as it doesn't hurt anyone else. Cigarette smoking hurts ALL of us.
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